Christmas 2011

I don't know if I have felt overwhelmed about all the things that I could write about from Christmas or if I have already shifted gears to January - birthdays, new baby, back to school, etc., either way, this post is way overdue and I am still not sure where to start. I haven't even gone through all the pictures and I know there are tons. We had at least 3 good cameras going the whole time which for the Falls family means hundreds of pictures. I am pretty sure I only ended up with mine on my computer so one day I will get to the rest.

No matter how you slice it, Christmas/New Years 2011 was amazing!!

I started saying in August that we would host the Falls family for Christmas. By the time the holidays rolled around, I would be well into this pregnancy (not fun to travel), we have a new house that we wanted to host everyone in and I wanted my kids to be home on Christmas day to play with their stuff. Plus, there are technically more Falls peeps in Ropesville/Meadow than there are in Sherman/Howe.

I never waivered on wanting everyone here and as it got closer, I got more and more excited. We finished projects, bought food, planned meals between Jeremy and Beth's and our house and even planned a day to spend with extended family that would also be in the area from Michigan.

After a record trip to the grocery store, Beth and I were ready to cook and host the whole crew!!

On the Thursday before Christmas, family started arriving and by Friday afternoon, everyone was here. PARTY!!! We cooked, played games, did crafts, played in the snow - pretty much whatever we wanted to do.

On Saturday, the Henson's and Noordyk's decended on our home. Here is the really fun part, Delinda and Mike (brother & sister), along with my mother-in-law, Carol, are grandkids of the original owners of the home Neno and I now live in... so fun to have them back in the house. I got to here more stories of time spent here and they helped us officially dedicate our home. Thank you for the blessings on our home and for your compliments on changes made. Pregnant or not, I am sure I would have cried either way from their words - and I did!! Oh, did I mention we all totalled 39. 39 people in my house is a lot!! But it was wonderful.

We ended the day by getting ready for Santa, sprinkling reindeer food and settling in with books read by Granna. It was a full day!

Sunday brought Santa and so many wonderful goodies. In Neno's family they love to stuff stockings (nothing actually fits in the stocking, but it is so fun!)! So we all spent a good hour going through our loot. Then it was on to a yummy breakfast, showers and getting ready for the day.

Here is where our day took an interesting and nasty turn... we have had some trouble in the last few months with plumbing on the living side of our house - 2 bathrooms. We had a plumber get his snake caught in our pipes trying to work out the issues, we had the waste pumped out and still on Christmas day, we have issues. Jeremy and Neno decided to tackle it so that we had use of toilets and showers. Really, on Christmas day???? They got the back-hoe, took the top off the tank (which was pretty much empty due to pumping the week before) and Neno climbed down in to see if he could see what the problem was. He found the end of the snake that the plumber had stuck 2 months before. He grabbed the end and started pulling. Once he got the snake out, here came the rest - YUCK!! Needless to say, drains started draining and we were back in business. Thanks babe for taking on that disgusting job, I am pretty sure I am burning those coveralls that are still in a heep on the garage floor.

After showers, we were back to celebrating Christmas!! As is tradition (and it should be), we read the Christmas story and were gladly reminded of what Christmas is about. We took time to go around the family and say one word that described our relationship with Jesus. Lots of amazing things were said and again, I cried. My word was "Plan", God has a plan for me, for my family and as long as I let him remain in control, it reveals itself in the most amazing ways. This year and this house have been proof positive of that!!

We continued with lots of great presents and a new trial of Chinese Christmas amongst the family. Neno and I got some great stuff and despite not being really sure how to run it with each of us bringing two presents, it worked out well.

It was another great day, full of fun, food and family. It doesn't get much better!!! I wasn't even worn out beyond belief. This baby cooperated and let me get some sleep and was rather kind to my feet and back since I did a lot of standing in the kitchen.

Sadly, it all came to an end on Monday when everyone headed back home, but I am already to host the next go around again in 2 years!!