This year we left for our Christmas travels on Monday night, December 20th and arrived at Teresa and Roger's house to stay the night with them to break up our trip and get to share a little love with the Salinas family. Although the visit was brief, it is always good to see my cuz and her family!
Our first Christmas of 2008 began with another exciting round of Reindeer Rally. After last year's scavenger hunt through Katy Mills Mall, we knew we were going to have different teams, and we weren't sure what the format was going to be. It ended up being another scavenger hunt, this time through the main outdoor shopping section of Sugar Land. This time around, Brandi was with Diana and I [Daniel] was with my mom. I was looking forward to getting to be on a team with my mom because she had had a very stressful few days with school ending up, Christmas shopping and wrapping, and with ongoing new house issues. Also, her last place finish in 2007 meant that she was primed for a huge bounce back.
And what a bounce back it was. We were out of the gates quickly along with many other teams, and having fewer tasks to complete meant that speed in getting from place to place could mean the difference between first and second. My mom and I were consistently getting to the stores after Alicia and Cecilia, so for one of the final tasks, going to the cigar store and having your picture taken pretending to smoke a cigar, I decided to cut a little corner. With Alicia and Cecilia inside the store, I stopped outside the front door, stuck a pen in my mouth and took a picture, retaking a slim lead that we did not relinquish. Multiple teams complained that I had to leave my mom too far behind (the rules explicitly say that teams need to stay together) to accomplish this, and they may be right. I did tell my mom that we needed to stay together when she kept telling me to run ahead, but there were times when I did get a little bit past her. The judges awarded us first, but I guess history will be the ultimate judge. After Reindeer Rally, we went back to my grandmother's house to open presents to and from the Neelys.
This is Brandi and I won't go into all the things that Daniel did to "help" his mom win because it will make me sound like a sore loser. :-) Anyway, we had a lot of fun just like last time and it really is a great way to spend time with family members you may not always get enough one on one time with. Again we owe all of the creativity and planning to Diana--she did a great job!
Some of my favorite parts of Christmas Eve were our run in the rain that morning, the little child singing at Children's Mass who sang "Happy Bir-day Jesus, I'm so glad it's Cwris-mas" that was almost too cute to bear, visiting Daniel's Grandad and being hit on by Rachel, a woman in her late 70's that is also a patient at the Silverado Home, seeing the beautiful new house Linden and Lisa will living in soon and having dinner with the Lauves as a family.
You might be wondering about Rachel but most importantly she is harmless. I learned my lesson that I must wear pants to visit his grandad, unless I want my "smooth and silky" legs to be felt up again.
Christmas morning we got up and found our presents from Santa!! Daniel got a Wii, which I think he was pretty excited about (he's playing Wii golf as I write this) and I got a scrapbook supplies carousel organizer which I've been wanting for awhile plus lots of stuffers in our stocking. We had a great time visiting with and dressing like the girls in Christmas PJs Lisa bought us all, singing to Mariah Carey's "All I want for Christmas is You", playing Reindeer Rally, and talking about "White Christmas" the movie and the White Christmases the Lauves have had. We also were treated to Daniel doing his annual telling of Twas the Cheesy Animatronic Baby Elephant at Disney's Animal Kingdom.
We left the Lauves house mid morning and headed to my Memaw's for lunch. There were lots of people and it turned out to be a great time to visit with all my extended family. I usually see them all about 4 or 5 times a year. This year we made calendars on Shutterfly for our families as Christmas presents. I think Daniel's side of the family turned out the best--with over 70 important dates on my families it left a lot of room for error. Everyone liked it and I can't wait to do another one for my Memaw next year!
For the remainder of our Christmas we opened presents my parents and brother that night, Daniel got sick with a fever, Dad and I got some good runs in, we enjoyed Mom's good cooking, and we had fun playing games and watching movies. We got some great gifts too, like a Chi iron for me and laptop cooler for Daniel.
To round out our Christmas travels, we ended with a visit to the Comeaux's in Port Neches on Sunday night. We opened presents with Kaylin and Madison, and Amber and Jed cooked for us. Amber's parents, Rodney and Shirley, came over and visited with us too. Their family has always been a part of my Christmas season, and I appreciated Daniel putting up with my travel tour of southeast Texas.
After all of our Christmases, I have to say though one of my very favorite gifts I found in my stocking at Daniel's grandmother's house. You may read the sonnet he wrote me that describes each month in our first 12 months together as husband and wife:
From last September's joyful promise said
A fortnight's bookends: Islands, Broadway plays
The turkey's end to pigskin triumph led
A Reindeer Rally hunt through Katy's maze
A hoop, a cap, a Nunez yule five strong
We raced and raced to close the seventh book
The monuments and blossoms flew along
A guest foretold the hit our pantry took
A mic, guitar and drums kept us awake
The sweetest cake I've had, though peaches lacked
Great lake's and gulf's shores gave us family breaks
The hilly Human Race we both attacked
To ancient boot, the hub of Western life
I long to see more places with my wife.
We hope you had a wonderful holiday season in 2008 and are praying that all of you in internet land have a blessed year in 2009! We look forward to our paths crossing soon in the year to come.
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