Merry Christmas Y'all

Our first Christmas in Texas has been a huge success...and I can say that without taking ANY of the credit or bragging. Because I have been the epitome of the Scrooge, the Grinch and a bah-hum-bug combined! Seriously. Every time I saw the presents under the tree (half of which I purchased!) I would get stressed and crabby! The thought of fitting MORE STUFF in this house totally overwhelmed me. Speaking of the house I really did try to clean it for Christmas but my children tried just as hard to unclean it.  One child (who shall remain anonymous) smeared poop all over my freshly scrubbed bathroom while the baby squirted ketchup all over himself and my formerly clean kitchen floor. And I'm not even sure how he got his little hands on the ketchup packet in the first place. The tree did get set up and decorated. All thanks to my hardworking non-Scrooge husband. If there was one thing I could brag about it would be the three types of Christmas cookies I baked (on Joe's only day off while he watched the children and ran to the store for silly things for me like sugar and butter). Let's just ignore the fact that none of the sugar cookies got frosted. That's completely irrelevant;-)

The real reason Christmas was such a big hit was the fact that we somehow convinced my parents AND my sister, her husband and four children (ages 4 and under) to make the 1500 mile trip to visit us!!! They must really love us...either that or they were desperate for some sunshine and warmth in their lives. Regardless my kids have been loving spending so much time with their cousins. Everything is better with cousins and grandparents! 

It's even made having a zombie-like or sleeping or absent husband more tolerable for me! (Thanks night shifts)

Now if only we could convince them to come back for Easter too! That would be perfect. Not very likely but perfect.