Merry Belated Christmas!

I hope that you all had a wonderful holiday and are continuing with the rest of the Christmas season being wonderful, too! We went to Dallas/Denton to see family on the 26th and got back just about an hour ago, very late on the 30th, which is why you haven't heard from me.

Our Christmas was mostly lovely. The mice arrived, the girls had a lovely time, and we got to spend some very nice time with our Corpus relatives. The Lone Star Baby is at the age where presents are very exciting to her and she built "the coolest, most beautiful-est thing ever" with her new play dough set :

I'm not really a fan of such present-focused phases (but I am a fan of cool play dough!) though I definitely fall under their sway and run around trying to make sure the girls have lots of stuff that will make them happy. We are silly humans.

The best thing about this Christmas to me, besides the kids getting to see their cousins, was that it was the first time in a few years that all six of the siblings of whom I am the eldest were in one place at one time.

As the years pass, I expect it will be even more hard to get all of us together for happy occasions. I hope not, though. I stood on a chair and Sarah on a stool if you are wondering. And I still had to stand on my tiptoes. We have a photo just like this in which I was 18 or so and Jazz just a toddler - we fit better then, but I still wasn't quite tall enough.

The road trips this time around were blessedly uneventful, always excepting that Manana Road exit, which was only a matter of being instantly lost and nothing serious. We are glad to be home! Good night!