Christmas #3, The End

Dad wearing his new "house divided" shirt.

Jacob and Morgan on Christmas Eve, watching The Grinch movie.

A few months ago, one of Michael's rich customers randomly gave Michael his old iPad (1st generation) because he wanted to update.  Yes, random and crazy.  But Michael eagerly took it.  Jacob and Morgan have been obsessed with it.  Michael decided to sell it and use the money to get Morgan an updated one for Christmas.  That was always the plan.  So imagine everyone's surprise when Jacob opened a gift Christmas Eve and yelled, "iPad!"  I was sitting so that I could not see it, and just assumed he was opening a gift that had been wrapped in an iPad box.  No.  It was so sweet of Michael.  Especially since the week before I had called him, asked him if he wanted me to pick up something for Jacob from him for Christmas, then spent $10 more than he originally told me to spend on him.  I asked him why he didn't just tell me about it, or at least that he had gotten something already.  He said, "You would have told me not to do it, and you would have asked too many questions if I just said I had already bought something."  Which is true I guess.

Mom got Jon a book called Garage Sale Millionaire. 

Morgan got a new American Girl doll from Grammy and Fafa.  Jacob apparently got a paddle ball...

Morgie in her blanket I made her :)

My dad gets me a nutcracker every year.  I have the characters from The Wizard of Oz, The Nutcracker Ballet, and other misc. ones.  This year he started me on the characters from A Christmas Carol. 

Lasagna server from my mom ;)

Jacob and I always pick out stuff to put in the dogs' stockings.  This year Jacob picked out "Flavor Balls/Goof Balls."  Very fitting and apparently very delicious.  Both dogs watch out for the other to leave their ball, then grab it, take it back to their own lair, and growl when the rightful owner comes looking for it.

I framed Jacob's jersey.  For the background I developed pics from their season in black and white.  We both really like it.

Playing Minecraft from Aunt Debbie and Uncle Vince.  This is a game that Michael calls, "Legos on steroids."  You build stuff with blocks & kill random weird characters.  There is a "creative" mode where you just build stuff, and a "survival mode" where you have to hunt and scavenge for food, tools, etc to survive. He has been begging for it for months.  I totally used this as a nod to "old school Christmas."  The game was only $20-not that much. And Jacob has had enough money to buy it for himself.  But remember when we were little and actually had to WAIT until Christmas to get that one special thing? How awesome it was when we finally got it? That is what I wanted Jacob to experience. 

New bike!

Giants magnetic dart board.

The new clothes from Uncle Mike..

His favorite gift you ask? The iPad? No...  The bike? No...  The UnderArmor shirts, the new XBox games? No.....  His fave would be the SNOWBALL MAKER that Santa found through Groupon for $4.95 shipped!  (Santa was actually thinking more of herself when she bought this because she is the one who ends up making all the snowballs each year).  Crazy child.

We went to Hallie & Josh's house on Christmas morning to open gifts.

This is Josh's dog.  He is such a doofus.

 "What bow?"

Josh's mom was in Steinmart one day and randomly saw this pillow. Hilarious how much it looks like him.

This year at Jon's family get together, we decided that each family would be responsible for dinner one night. I of course cooked lasagna on my night.  But on my brother-in-law's night, his son took over.  Conrad is in L'Ecole Culinaire school.  So we were treated to prime rib, flounder, scallops, salmon, and other fanciness.  It just happened to be the night of my birthday too.

 Finishing the creme brulees...

   Fancy fruit tray.

 The spread.

From left to right:  Jon's sister Donna, soon-to-be-married-to-nephew-Stephen Sue, Jon's sister Pam, Jon's brother's wife Judy, and me.

Jon's brother Brad and his wife Judy.

Brad's sons Conrad and Reed.

From the back to the front:  Random friend of Conrad's-Teresa, Sue & Stephen,  Jennifer, Abby, Josh, & Hallie

Jon's siser Donna, brother Brad, and sister Pam

Judy and Donna

Donna, Sue and Stephen

Jennifer and Abby

Joe and Jessie

Josh, Hallie, Jennifer and Abby

Judy and her son Elio

Judy and Pam

Jennifer, her mom Pam, and Judy

John and Pam

Pam, Judy, me

Rodney, Sue, Jessie, Joe, Hallie & Stephen

This is a cousin's boyfriend, Bradley.  He and the cousin (Bianca-who is Judy's daughter) have been going out, off and on for a few years.  We all love him.  We call him Wilbur.  I am not sure why.  One of the days this week he showed up an hour earlier than Bianca did, and it was totally normal.  Like he was the member of the family and she was the extra person.  For example, I don't think I even I have a pic of her in this post...

There she is, with her mom.  I just had to go and hunt one down from FB...

Reed and me (Jacob LOVES him).

 Jon's mom with her kids.

Hallie's cousin Stephen.  They have always been close, and next year they are both getting married, less than 2 weeks apart!  Here he is with fiance Sue.

Jessie and Sue

This is Donna, Jon's sister, Stephen's mom, and Sue's soon-to-be mother-in-law.

Donna with her two daughters-in-law.  

Brother-in-law Rodney.  He is married to Jon's sister, Donna.  We always do a pic like this. Don't know why.

Hallie's cousin Jennifer.  She is from California.  She majored in Spanish and spent a year in Madrid during college.  Where of course she met her husband. They have lived there for about 3 years, and are now in the middle of moving back here.  Insanity.  She is literally homeless right now (well of course she is staying with her mom).  But their stuff is in storage in Miami because that is where they are assuming her husband will most likely be able to find a job given the field he is in.  But he is still in Madrid, tying up loose ends, shipping big items that wouldn't fit on the plane with her.  I would have been going crazy.

My Jon carving the turkey with the John married to my Jon's sister Pam.  Does everyone remember from last year's post all the Johns and Pams?? There is my Jon who used to be married to a Pam, who is now remarried to a John.  My Jon has a sister named Pam, who is married to a John.  And let's not forget that Morgan's mom, Jessica, is dating a John.

Joe and Jessie.

Rodney and Joe.

Jacob passed out before we even made it off of Grandmother's street.

This was all Jacob's idea. He told Jon he wanted to write a poem for me and frame it.  We aren't sure what happened to the poem.  I can only guess that when he got down to it, he realized how difficult that was.  So I got a beautiful drawing instead :)