The Terrible Catsafterme

I didn’t sleep all that well on Christmas Eve night on Denise’s couch – hearing the periodic coughing from Grandpa Murphy upstairs and also a bit on the warm side on this blustery cold night. So I popped awake immediately at 7:00am when I heard the pitter patter of one set of little feet as Adam came to down to have a look around. Oddly, he gave only a cursory glance at the milk and cookies (which had naturally been consumed) and the gifts under the tree before disappearing back upstairs to his room.

It was a full hour before he surfaced again. Denise and Megan had already gotten up and we recruited Mom & Bob from the basement and Aaron from upstairs to begin the opening of the kids’ gifts from Santa Claus. Santa had left the kids a note as well, imploring them to be good for the rest of the year. I read it to Adam but it seemed to fall on deaf ears when there was such an array of gifts to open.

The photos below represent the best of the shredding of the packages:

Adam checks out his letter from Santa and the vacant cookies and milk platter

Megan shows how she can both operate a camera and pose for one

Aaron assists Adam as he opens up his Cars bedspread. Aaron is wearing his new Snuggie. He is not a Druid.

Megan gingerly opens a gift…hoping for something to put in her mouth

More gifts. And adorable striped pajamas I must say.

This one is extra chewy.

Assistance from Bob

Adam’s new easel, which was assembled, set up, and then forgotten for now

I don’t know about you, but I can’t get enough of this face

Denise and Little Denise

I love this kid

In fact, I love these kids

Grandpa Murphy hadn’t made it down for the gift opening, but he showed up once breakfast was served. Denise made a great french toast casserole, bacon, and eggs. After we ate, I gathered up the loot I had received the night before and headed for home around 10:30am. The drive was particularly long and sad. I got home, took a shower and a quick power nap, and then headed out for Christi’s Mom’s house in Liberty Township.

I got there around 2pm. Ashleigh, Briana, Christi, and Creed were already there as were Keith & Ashley and Joy’s boyfriend Kenny. They had already eaten but there were plenty of goodies to pick over including some great shrimp dip, a pot roast, eclairs, and plenty of other snacks. I had missed the gift opening so I didn’t get to see Creed open the remote control snake that I got for him, but he seemed to enjoy it once we found some batteries to put into it.

And then of course, we played Yahtzee. Actually I think it was the slowest game of Yahtzee ever played. Although I didn’t do too swell, I ended up coming in second place after Ashleigh. Christmas Day is also Christi’s brother Keith’s actual birthday, so he celebrated by blowing out a lone candle on a mini-eclair.

Ashleigh and Briana go head to head in Christmas Day Yahtzee

Keith is very patient as Joy sorts out the meaning of this roll

Keith determines that he has just enough wind left to handle this 40th birthday candle

Briana, Ashleigh, Christi, me, and Creed

Same as above, except minus me and plus Joy

Joy and Kenny

Everyone started clearing out around 4pm, so I took off and headed over to Mom’s house. They had been at Dave and Sherry’s house and arrived a bit after me. I was hoping to hang out with the kids for a bit, but they were visiting Aaron’s parents and weren’t going to get back until about 8:00. I had a heaping ham sandwich. I wasn’t even close to hungry at this point but felt that I just need to continue stuffing myself since it was the holiday.

Mom and Bob agreed to not get any gifts for one another, due to the home improvements that they were making on the house. However, they did get each other a few practical gifts. As you can see below, Bob’s were a bit more practical.

Mom’s collection of the worst Christmas gifts ever. Bob seems to enjoy them though.

I stayed there for a couple of hours, just sitting around in a daze, before heading on home around 7pm. Due to a preliminary falling out that day in the extraordinarily complicated friendship I have with Jamie, this was undoubtedly the saddest Christmas I’ve ever spent. We would finally reach some closure a few days later.

Fortunately, Christmas wouldn’t really end on this note, as we ended up having what was certainly the most enjoyable gathering of the season the next day.

Christmas will continue with the Murphy party the next day…

This entry was posted on Sunday, December 27th, 2009 at 6:32 am and is filed under 2000's - Late, Christmas, Family Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.