Christmas #4 - the final chapter

Ok, so the final Christmas celebration was at my moms house today. We get together for a yummy lunch & then presents!

Poor Rhonda... She's doing the Ironman next year & she has been training. THIS is the piece of cake dad gave her. I told her to go throw up if she needed too... Carrot cake for everyone. Photo bomb courtesy of Jeremy!
Remember the Nativity from Thanksgiving? Mom saw these napkins between the Wise Men. She asked, " OK! Who's using my Wise Men for napkin holders?!" Uhm - it was my dad...
For some reason this year, Jer decided to hand out presents. This is usually MY job! Pssssh, doesn't he know I'M a control freak?!Lucky me-this was my view for the present giving outing.
He got dad a shooting towel. (Dad shoots sporting clays.) And Rhonda embroidered his name on it & also, "from the worlds greatest son". He's such a smart a**.
Rhonda brought a couple of her dogs over. Jack likes to help you open presents...
But ya can't let him help too much...or the box looks like this!

Mom couldn't believe all the presents she had!

Mom got something that she didn't know if she should give Jer or B-rad... Jer's such an attention whore....

See?!

Dad's not real 'socially' minded so he kinda interrupts the flow of things. Jer was opening his gift from us & dad just runs up to him to show & explain the knives he got him & B-rad. Of course, not wrapped...

Ok-here it is! I took a pic that I had taken of him during the Ironman & my friend, Shauna, made it into a poster & put the date & his times on it!

Woot woot! Aren't you proud of me, JLL? I was actually patient & asked for Eclipse for Christmas?!

Every family has traditions. You can't judge the traditions. They just are what they are. Got it?!

1st tradition - mom buys me a Holiday Barbie. 2nd tradition - mom fills our stockings. And inside the stockings are little knick knacks, ya know? Welllll, in MY stocking I expect Reese Christmas trees. Period. (I expect them in B-rad's too so I can eat them as well...) That's the tradition. After I ate dinner, mom said, "Is that all you're going to eat?!" I said, "Oh yes. I'm saving room for Reese trees." So mom starts crying & I'm like what the hell?! It seems THIS year she either a) lost the trees she bought or b) never bought trees at all? I'll pause for a moment of silence..............................

So of course I told her it's fine - which it is. Kinda. I mean-she DID get me other candy. But since we're all about the tough love - we had to give her a hard time. Jer said things like, "Next year I'm going to hide the trees so you think you forget them." I said, "Gosh mom, did you forget my Holiday Barbie too?!"

Nope, she got her. At least Christmas was not totally ruined this year...

Remember the knife Jer got? Well mom used it to open one of her boxes. Sheesh!

B-rad, myself & Jer all went in together & got mom a GPS. I think she liked it? (We got her other stuff too. This was just the funniest pic of her face I got!)

What you are about to witness is like a lunar ecplise. Or Galileo's comet. It only opens once every thousand years.... we.took.a.family.pic. Gasp...

I was trying to get the camera all lined up.

And attention whore decided to help...

HERE IT IS! Please, bask in the wonderment that is a Brown family pic.

Jer (which I'm really sure it was Rhonda) got mom a frame that said 'family'. So Rhonda took a pic of just us for moms frame. Wow. 2 family pics in the span of 10 minutes? Armaggedon is surely upon us...

Christmas #3 - Christmas#1, Part 2

B-rad's parents weren't able to be there when we did Christmas #1 when Erin & Eric were home, so we got together yesterday to visit with them.

We had a late lunch at O'Charley's in Corydon & exchanged gifts. We stuck the kiddos in a booth so they could argue, look at their phones, ipods & dvd players in peace... But since it's Christmas & all - the kids were in an especially loving mood!

They went around the room & took pics with everybody!
And they did it willingly.
No one paid them a cent!

Oh I do love these kiddos!

OK-so while I was passing out the gifts, I handed off picture duty to B-rad... He didn't get any of his dad. We got him a pillow that has a massager thingie in it.

We got his mom some kitchen stuff. (Sounds weird, I know...but hear me out. She loves to cook. I love to eat what she cooks. Voila!) They are going to put a kitchen on the top deck of their houseboat so I got her stuff to store things up there.

Her birthday is January 3rd, & we never know when they will be home, so I went ahead & gave her her birthday present too. A frame with pics of all of us.

So here I am passing out gifts.

And here I am showing Stanley how to work his massager pillow thingie.

And here I am doing God knows what.

Here I am showing you my fillings.

And here I am with crazy face!

Christmas #2- Chaos is the name of the game!

B-rad's extended family always tries to get together every year. And it's a b-i-g family. B-rad's dad has 3 brothers & 1 sister. Then they all had like 90 kids each. Now those 90 kids are having their OWN 90 kids... It's quite the scene!

Derik was there & he wore the shirt we got him for Christmas! He really likes it & that makes me happy! This is B-rad's cousins, Leslie's, little boy, Noah. (Say that 10 times fast!) He kept going, "woo, woo!"
B-rad, Cole & Sam! What a cute pic!

Hmmmmm....wonder why the kids love B-rad so much?!

This is little Friyana. She is the newest member of the McAfee clan (She's 8 weeks old, I think?!). She is B-rad's cousin Chad's little girl! She didn't hardly make a peep all night! But then again - it's hard to get a word in edgewise when all the McAfee's get together!

Friyana & her mommy, Fargol. They live in California so it's always a nice treat when we can visit with them. I'm sure you didn't notice that Fargol is freakin' gorgeous. Uh, yea - it's easy to miss. But she's SO incredibly sweet! That makes it harder to hate her for being so pretty! (of course, I'm kidding! Fargol is great!)

I helped Jake to an appetizer of chips & dip. Uhm Jake - next time wipe off the evidence so we don't get busted! Noah found the dog again!

Santa comes to visit the kids every year. The grandparents bring gifts for their grandkids for Santa to give them. Daniel was really excited about Jake's Elmo book.

Jake was very loving to his new cousin, Friyana. Next up is gift time for the 'big' kids! Each year we do a white elephant thingie...but with a twist. We bring a hillbilly gift which is basically some crap at your house you don't want. Then we draw numbers, pick our gift & then exchange with someone if we want.

Brady got to double dip this year because there were a couple of extra hillbilly gifts. He got this t-shirt! Love it! It says, "Tell your woman to stop texting me"

There are always some really creative, tacky gifts! Daniel got a Flamingo to put on the grill of your car like you hit it.

And then there are always gifts that seem to rear their ugly heads every year. This year Leslie got the honor of getting the tribal mask.

Sam said, "I'll take that!"

B-rad got a cutsie little Snowman that held a picture frame. Ahhhh, he could totally put that on his desk with a picture of meeee...

But nooooooo - he traded it for Brady's t-shirt!

The ones who are responsible for this mess! Front row: B-rad's uncle Greg, Grandpa Mac & Grandma Mac. Back row: B-rad's dad, Stanley. Uncle Bobby, Aunt Bev & Uncle Barry. During the hillbilly exchange B-rad lost that t-shirt to none other than his brother! Brian gave it back to Brady. Before we left, I saw B-rad wearing it. I said, "Did you steal that from Brady?!" He said, "No. He gave it to me. It was too big for him!"

That shirt will go great with one he already has. Picture it: A groom frowning & a bride smiling. Underneath it says, "GAME OVER" Oh yea - I picked that one out...