Merry Christmas-a Day Late!

It has been awhile since I posted a new blog entry and it is because we have been so busy, not because there has been nothing to write about. So here is a review of what we've been up to.

First of all, Merry Christmas. I hope it was a good day for you. We had a wonderful day with family and friends, but more on that later.

This past Monday we had a snow day from school because of blowing snow and arctic temperature. It was a great day at home, getting ready for the upcoming holiday. In the middle of the afternoon, we drove over to Syracuse, where they were in the midst of getting 8-12 inches of snow! We had tickets to an SU basktetball game against Coppin State. But first we ate dinner at the German restaurant I like so much~ I enjoyed it and the boys managed to find things they liked! Bob, Sally, and Liz joined us at the game and we had a good time watching Syracuse win the game.

Tuesday was my last day at school before our Winter Recess and Jim started his vacation time. Corey invited a couple of his high school friends over for dinner so he and Tucker made us all a wonderful dinner of BBQ ribs. 

On Christmas Eve Day we readied for a big dinner gathering at our house. Grandma did all the cooking and brought dinner to our house. Bob and Joanie arrived from Michigan so we were 10 around the dinner table. We ended our evening by attending the 11 PM service at church and it was a wonderful service with good music. 

Christmas morning did not start until after 9 AM, a real change from the days when the boys were little and would be up with the sun in anticipation of seeing if Santa came. Well, even with a later start, we did discover that Santa stopped at our house and left us some wonderful gifts.

Gram, GrandDad, Bob and Joanie came over to spend Christmas morning with us and have a traditional breakfast of egg strata, Bishops Bread, grapefruit and juice. Once again, we had another great meal. 

Jim gave me the Wii Sport and Wii Fit system for Christmas and we quickly got that set up and started to play with the many fun options that are available. In the photo below, I am trying to launch myself on the Ski Jump game.

Later in the day as the family and friends arrived we got them involved in Wii Sports. Here are some photos of the grandparents trying to figure out this crazy way to go bowling.

We had a lot of laughs and got some exercise before sitting down to Christmas dinner. This is a fuzzy photo, but it documents the 13 people who gathered at our house for this celebration.

Liz asked if we could do a sing-along after sitting between Tucker and Corey and in front of Bob at church the night before so after dinner Bob switched between playing Corey's new electric keyboard and our very out-of-tune piano and we sang a variety of holiday songs. It was  fun time. When we didn't know the lyrics or chords to a song Jim would do a quick internet search to get us through a song.
Our night ended with a duet with Corey and Bob K. singing a song that is normally done by a male and female singer with brother, Bob, accompanying them. 

This morning we four braved the crowds at the mall and went shopping for Rock Band to go with my Wii. We bought that and an extra guitar and an extra controller! We spent the next hour learning how to rock and roll!
We took a break around lunchtime to go to Schaller's for lunch with the family, one of the things that my brother Bob has to do when he is in town. 

When we returned the home, the four of us spent the next 2 hours playing Rock Band! It is addictive and great fun! I feel like we could do a commercial for Mastercard:

An extra guitar - $20

Rock Band - 100-plus dollars

Two hours of playing with your kids - Priceless!

Tonight Gram, GrandDad, Bob and Joanie came over for a night of Pontillo's pizza, beer and Three Stooges. We watched several episodes and then went back to some Rock Band performances!

Here are some final Rock Band photos with some jammin' band members.

Hope all is well.

Weekend Update

Sunday night-the snow is falling and the wind is blowing and I am hoping for  a Snow Day tomorrow! That probably won't happen as the forecast is only calling for 1-3 inches of the white stuff.

We do have a lot of white stuff on the ground~well over a foot. It sure looks pretty!

Saturday we did some errands and some decorating around the house. At night, Jim and I went to Sherri and Terry's house, along with Jean and Dave. Sherri cooked us a wonderful dinner and we all had a lot of laughs.
 

There is a new dog at Sherri and Terry's house, a black dachshound that belongs to Allison. The dog made the rounds at the dinner table, with Jim being a favorite!

We left there about 11 PM, after a couple hours of playing some fun games. When we got to our house, there was a car in front with Virginia license plates on it~Liz was here! She gave up trying to fly to Rochester from DC and just drove. We spent the next hour catching up with her and making some plans for the next week or so. 

Today was a full, rich day! An early morning trip to Wegmans to get some groceries for the next few days resulted in a bill of $175! I haven't spent that much at Wegmans since this time last year when the boys were home. We four all went to church and lots of folks were glad to see the boys. From church we made a quick stop at home to eat some sandwiches before heading downtown to the Geva Theater to see a comedy called Triple Espresso. It was very funny and we would recommend it to anyone looking for an entertaining show. It is appropriate for all ages. 

Right after the show we drove to Eastview Mall because our laptop computer died and we had an appointment with a "genius" at the Apple Store. Now we were a bit concerned about heading to a very popular mall on the Sunday before Christmas, especially after we read in the morning paper about people waiting for several hours on the roads leading into the mall yesterday!  Well, lots of people must have read that same article and stayed away because at 4 PM we drove right up and got a decent parking spot. Jim got to talk to a "genius" right away, and the guy took our laptop to replace some of its innards and it will be ready in a couple of days. I dragged all three boys into a couple of stores, before we went to an early dinner at Biaggi's restaurant. We like the food there and once again had a good meal.

I have school on Monday and Tuesday, but Jim will go in for half a day tomorrow and then be off the rest of the week. Tomorrow night we are going to Syracuse for a basketball game. So I will give a report on that in the next posting.

Hope all is well.