Christmas Eve 2012

After hosting the oyster roast on Saturday, we cleaned up, packed up and headed 5 hours up to NC to have Christmas at Breezy and BestSonInLawEVER's house.

It was quite a trek, but we did it and we had a great time! Take a look---

Breezy had their house all decorated when we arrived---

Late Christmas Eve afternoon, BestSonInLawEVER's family came over for food and fun. That's Deanie with BestSonInLawEVER's two sisters. Let me just say that we couldn't have hand picked a better family to be in-laws with. That whole family is just wonderful!

Evwardo couldn't be with us because his family was flying to Indiana to spend Christmas with his extended family. So Birdie brought his look alike along (remember the life-sized cardboard cutout he sent her while she was in Texas?)---

The lovelies are a bit Harry Potter obsessed. And yes, they're all adults. But still kids at heart- which is one of the things I love most about them!

Every year, the lovelies draw names to see which sister they buy a gift for. A few years ago, we started the tradition of giving a handmade gift. This tradition stuck with Birdie, DoodleBug and myself. Birdie drew Breezy this year so she made Breezy a quilt---

Breezy was a little bit pleased with the gift---

The maker and the receiver of the quilt---

Yeah...I'm not going there---

See? Harry Potter crazy! Or should I say, "CRAY"?

Tucker may have appreciated the quilt too---

The lovelies---
 

They still love opening presents!

So, this year, Mimi (my mother) got in on the handmade gifts. When the lovelies were growing up, Mimi made their Christmas and Easter dresses every year. She also made them t-shirts or sweatshirts (depending on the season) for EVERY holiday- Valentine's Day, St. Patrick's Day, Easter, 4th of July, Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas.
  

This year, she made each of them a Christmas tree skirt. Each skirt had the designs on them that Mimi had put on the lovelies' Christmas shirts through the years---

The lovelies liked their tree skirts a little---That's Breezy showing hers off. The polar bears are the most recent design and were on one of the shirts Mimi made Breezy this year. That Santa was on one of the shirts Mimi made me.
 

See that Rudolph? That was on the first shirt when Breezy was in kindergarten. That snowman? That was on Deanie's first stocking that Mimi made. The Christmas tree? That was on the first shirt she made DoodleBug (that's DoodleBug in the picture). 

That's Mimi- rubbing Rico and Tucker---

That's my Aunt Betty- my mother's sister. She's the BEST even with her eyes closed---

 
Evwardo wanted an orange (because orange is his favorite color AND because he went to Clemson) hat with ear flaps for Christmas. I had no idea how to knit one, so I had to learn SPEEDY QUICK! He opened his before we left--- Birdie found a Clemson Tiger paw so I put that on the front---

The lovelies opened theirs on Christmas Eve--

I made one for BestSonInLawEVER and the husband too---They put the cardboard Evwardo in the picture but he had his hat in Indiana with him.

And the best Christmas present of all is one of mine---I saw a painting that I LOVED this summer and, because it costs $11,000, I took a picture of it and asked Breezy to paint one for me--in her own style, of course..She's not quite finished but here it is so far---

 It was a wonderful Christmas Eve!

Everyone wants us to make it a new tradition to travel up there for the holidays. I'm thinking that's just so they don't have to do any traveling and they get to have BestSonInLawEVER and Breezy up there and don't have to share them.

Even though it was a really good time, it was also a crap-ton of work to get everything up there and get the food ready, etc. And it was exhausting.

Of course, I told them that if there was a baby up there, we might consider being the ones to be put out every year and do all the work. ;)

All Things Oystery

Is oystery even a word?

We've had a marvelous holiday season and I hope that y'all have too!

Even though we still have the New Year to ring in, I'm going to go ahead and start sharing the Christmas photos- y'all know how I tend to over shoot pictures so it may take until the New Year to get these up. Haha.

A few weeks before the oyster roast on December 22, we started rolling the various balls because you can freeze them and take them out when you're ready to cook them (this is quite nice since we have to roll a gazillion of them every year.). Birdie and DoodleBug were more than happy to help---

The lovelies are so funny.

Anyway, Deanie and Breezy helped set up the goodie table the night of the roast---they requested bows for their headbands....just like when they were little. 

Viola! The table is ready!

And so are the oysters!

They went through 3 bushels of those nasty things. :)

That's Evwardo's niece with Birdie and Strider. Isn't she so cute?!

I love this picture! It's my BFF and her husband with Deanie-

That's Breezy (on the right) with her BFF from 6th grade---

The hit of the party finally arrived and we all nearly fought over holding him! Here is baby Jedidiah with DoodleBug---

Birdie and Evwardo---

This is Lambert Mr and Mrs--- they are the most fun and loving people I've ever met!

I caught a shot of Jedidiah smiling while Deanie was holding him---

AND I got him with his eyes open. WIDE open.

Evwardo donning my antlers I wore to school the last week before break---

Evwardo and Birdie with Jedidiah--- how stinking cute are they?!

That's the husband, Danielle (who made dozens of 12 different types of cookies from Pinterest and brought them to the oyster roast), BestSonInLawEVER and Deanie---I'm tellin' y'all, Jedidiah was the hit of the evening!

How could he not be? Look at that sweet little thing!

That's the husband with Tucker. They're conversing with Lambert Mrs.

 Those are two of my most favorite people from school laughing---we do a lot of that at school. You know, to keep from crying. LOL

 Of course, there's always guitar playin' and singin' going on. Sometimes the singin' is good...luckily the guitar playin' is ALWAYS good. :)

And those are the highlights from our 4th annual Christmas oyster roast. We ended up with about 37 people which is crazy in our little house. But we had a total BLAST!

I promise to catch up on all y'alls blogs soon! It's been crazy around here but things will settle down soon.

I'm looking forward to the day that we host an oyster roast for all my wonderful bloggy buds!

Love and hugs!

Hot Time on the 4th

Did anyone else spend all day yesterday thinking it was Saturday? I sure did. I was surprised this morning when the husband's alarm went off so I asked, "Why is your alarm going off on Sunday?" His reply- "Because it's Thursday."

Oh.

We had a cookout yesterday afternoon. In June, I was sent a BBQ kit from McCormick to use for a cookout. We had to postpone ours twice before we finally pulled it off yesterday! Y'all know how life gets in the way and all that.

It was HOT. I mean H.O.T. So all we did outside was the grilling. The eating, talking, games, etc. all took place inside. Sweltering + cooking out is NOT equal to a good time in my book.

Anyway, here's our afternoon in some pictures---as is often the case, I sat and talked and forgot to take a lot of pictures. Oops!

I started off marinading the chicken----

And the ribs---

Here are the other products McCormick sent me to use--- I did NOT look at the ingredients though I'm sure the products contained some ingredients that we just do not eat anymore. However, with the healthy level of the meats I chose and the other foods, it was (probably) acceptable. For this meal anyway.

 The grilling of the ribs---

The husband in deep thought as to the doneness of the ribs---

Consensus? Perfection!

Just to make sure, the husband samples a rib or two while grilling the chicken.

Actually, the conversation went something like this:
Me: You and Tucker and I should sample that little piece.
The Husband: Can we?
Me: Hey, I bought and prepped this stuff, you earned the money and grilled it- we can do whatever we want to do.
The Husband: Let's do it!

If he ever decides to leave his job at the port, he could get a job as the best burger flipper ever!

Ok, this next one is my family being mean funny (with their warped sense of humor). I'm always saying, don't pick at the food. Wait until people get here so the presentation will be nice. Aren't they just a riot?

Besides the meat dishes, we had: potato salad, baked beans, deviled eggs, watermelon and red velvet cupcakes. Everything was homemade and organic. The meats were organic free range/grass fed, etc.

Those are Evwardo's parents in the picture with Evwardo and Birdie- don't they look nice? Well, they're even nicer than they look!

Here's a group of feasters---

And here's my silly DoodleBug-- who is going to turn 21 in 19 days.

I put my guest book out and told everyone to write something about America or freedom or something related to the holiday and I would take a picture to share on the blog. Well, because my lovely family possesses a brand of hilarity that is cynical satirical different (I have no idea where they get it), I thought it best to leave that shot out. You're welcome.

Hope y'all had a fantastic 4th!