Last Sunday (12/21) was our church's Christmas Pageant. Natalie had three roles - Elizabeth (Mary's cousin. Next year N will be Mary!), the Innkeepers wife, and an angel. She did a great job! It was a little hectic - I was one of the "stage hands", and one of the other kids played multiple roles too, which made costume changes a little hairy, but we all made it through! All the kids were so cute! It really made the parishioners happy too - I think it has been several years since they've had a children's Christmas program.
Monday, Mitz came over and we made cookies. Only one kind turned out, which pissed me off so much, I made more that night, determined to get it right. Mitz did the same at her house - this apple didn't fall far from the tree. Just as I finished one batch of dough though, my Kitchen-Aid shit the bed. More on that later. Jon and Natalie made a gingerbread house while I made more cookies that night. It turned out really well this year! When we weren't looking, Natalie stuck Goldfish crackers to the house - it was a nice addition. :-P
Wednesday we didn't do a whole lot during the day. We went to Christmas Eve service at 4, then headed to Mitz and Pops' for dinner. Aunt Joan and Great-Grandpa Carl were there. We had ham, shrimp (to appease my finicky palate), potato salad, green salad (to appease my finicky palate) and something else. Cupcakes and brownies for dessert. Got the kids home in time to rush to bed to prepare for Santa's visit! We had the kids open our ornaments to them (I get them Lenox ones every year, which is turning into a problem - we never have enough strong branches to accommodate the heavy ornaments), and also ones that Great-Aunt Lois and Great-Uncle Don sent. Normally we have Natalie open her Christmas pjs, and their special ornaments are hung at the time we decorate the tree, but since the kids wore their Christmas jammies on the Polar Express, it seemed silly to wrap them up, so we held back the ornaments this year. Natalie hung our stockings, and the Santa key on the door. We got the kids to bed, then I realized we forgot to have N help with the cookies, carrot, and milk for Santa, so I took care of that, and Santa left Natalie a thank-you note. I made a few things ahead for Christmas dinner, and as I was mixing some Focking Good Cheese dip with my hand mixer, that shit the bed too. Then I noticed the outlet (on one side of our island) was smoking. More on that later. Jon and I got to bed way too late.
I woke up Christmas Day around 5:30, go figure, and tried to go back to sleep. Too excited, so I got up around 6:10. Oliver got up at 6:45, and we had to WAKE Natalie up at 7. Can you believe that? Opened our stockings, and then hit the tree. It was so wonderful - Natalie was so excited! Oliver was all wound up too - he had no clue what was going on, but was enjoying tackling paper and rolling in it, and eating bows. Santa hid Natalie's new bike behind the tree, so it took her awhile to spy it, but when she did, she had to have it immediately. We had to call her back to finish opening gifts - she was riding the bike around the house.
Jon made breakfast - bacon and french toast. He's the french toast master. Actually, he makes a wonderful breakfast, so if we're having a full breakfast, he's the one who makes it. Unless we're having pancakes - I found a product called Batter Blaster - organic pancake batter in a spray bottle like Reddi-Whip. The kids get fun shapes, and I make curse words for Jon - might as well have fun before the kids learn to read! Anyway....
Mom, Jim, Mike and Jamie were due over at noon, so around 11, we decided to get the prime rib in the oven. The recipe I use calls for browning the roast on the stove top. Works great, if you take into consideration the amount of fat on top of your roast - which I didn't, and also this roast had a thick layer of fat. Holy crap, we smoked the house out. It was awful! Natalie was convinced the fire department was going to come, Oliver thought it was funny for a bit - he was on his knees laughing and waving his arms, then the smoke got down to his level and he started coughing and gagging. You could barely see throughout the whole downstairs. I had Jon take the kids upstairs, threw the roast in the oven, then turned on the ceiling fans, and opened all the windows. Jon came back down after I went up and got a fan from the garage, and turned on the HVAC fan too. Luckily the smoke cleared by the time my family arrived. I was shocked that none of the smoke detectors went off - they should have - so Jon is replacing all the batteries tonight.
So we had presents round 2. It reminded me of when my brother and I were kids and we'd go to my grandparents for Christmas part 2. The kids got totally spoiled this year, and I loved every minute of it. I'm a Christmas junky. Mitz had stockings for all of us too - I pulled a mini Butter Shots out of mine, then Mitz exclaimed "Where's the other one? I put two in there - one for me". LOL. I lined up the shots when we started cooking. :-P Then we all hung out for the afternoon - Aunt Joan, and our friends Sylvia and Ed, and their sons Aaron and Adam came for dinner too! While I was getting dinner together, I mentioned to Pops that I didn't think my KA crapped out after all - that the outlet was smoking when in use. He jumped up, told us to grab some tools, and he pulled apart the outlet to investigate. Thank God for him.... He found that the connections were loose, and since he explains it better, I'll just leave it at we could have had a fire - he actually said he couldn't believe we didn't - the wires had fried so badly. He got it all fixed up for us, and my mixers work too! As we took the last pot off the stove, Jon and I noticed that the top half of the right front burner (glass cooktop. I WANT GAS) was glowing orange - huge orange circle, extending into the space between the front and back burners. More on that later too.
Then, that afternoon, I had one of the breakfast area windows open because the oven heated up the house and I was dying. Oliver crawled over to the window, pulled up and stood there, waving and tapping on the window. We thought he was just having fun at the window, then when I went to pull him away, I noticed that baby beaver (you should see his crib) decided to have a little snack. He chewed the windowsill (you'll see pics in the Christmas album) - down to the freaking metal - huge spot.
For dinner we had the prime rib, horseradish cream sauce, red wine au jus, Caesar salad, from-scratch green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, rolls. Sylvia brought a fabulous bundt cake from Nothing Bundt Cakes, which was SO good, and my mom made a delicious trifle.
After everyone left, and we got the kids to bed, Jon and I started clean up. He started to clean the cooktop, then called me over. The right front burner had an enormous crack in it - went all the way up into the back burner. Then I swear, as we were watching it more cracks appeared all over the surface. It was the strangest thing. Wasn't there when we were cooking, and nothing dropped on it. Kenmore can't get anyone out until Tuesday, and we're informed that they will determine what happened. Ok, whatever. It better be replaced - we bought it when we moved in, so it isn't that old. It has to be something with heat distress, as I mentioned, nothing dropped on it, and the left front burner was never used that day, yet it developed a big crack too. We had dinner at M&P's last night and tonight. Sucks to be without a cooktop. They say the oven is safe, but it makes me nervous - if it's a heat thing - I don't know that I want to be heating up the oven and using it.
It was nice to be with family and friends for Christmas! Usually it is just our immediate/nuclear family, so this was wonderful!
Last but not least, we remember and miss those who passed this year, Jon's father Grandpa Ron (March), Jon's maternal grandmother Grandma Helen (May) and Jim's maternal Aunt Ivy (December).
I'm working on pictures tonight. If they aren't up tonight, they will be tomorrow.
Merry Christmas!
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