Two days, three Christmases

Christmas Eve

We spent the evening with my grandpa, my parents, my brother and his wife, and my sister and her boyfriend. It was a much more relaxed Christmas Eve than we’re accustomed to, though we still didn’t get home until late.

Before heading over to my parents’ house, we attended the afternoon church service, where my sister sang during some parts of the service. It’s pretty normal for her to perform at pretty much every service on Christmas Eve, but this year she was all done by 6:45 or so. That meant that this year, every one of our family was together for the whole evening!

After church, we all went over to my parents’ house. They made Chicken Parmesan for dinner, but everyone brought a little something to nosh on as well. (We brought fixings for a relish tray: olives, pickles, mushrooms, and peppers.)

After dinner, we were faced with the ultimate question: have dessert, or open presents? Namine voted for opening presents, and we all agreed. (We were pretty full.) My sister distributed presents, and we all took turns opening them.

After we finished opening our presents, we headed over to my godparents’ house. Like the family gathering on Christmas Eve, this is another longstanding tradition in the Eiche household.

The evening really seemed to fly by. Before we knew it, we had to leave again because my godparents needed to get to Mass. We didn’t even get a family picture this year!

Upon leaving my godparents’ house, we headed back to my parents’ for dessert. Jessica and I had made a pumpkin roll (two, actually, the other being for her side of the family), my mom made what she called “deconstructed cannoli,” and my sister made sugar cookies in the shape of baby Yoda.

So, about those deconstructed cannoli. Instead of making all-out cannoli, my mom made the filling and provided little wafers. People could spread as little (or as much — why are you looking at me like that?) as they liked.

Christmas morning

On the morning of Christmas day, we had some time to ourselves. Namine brought in a pretty good haul of American Girl stuff, courtesy of a sale that Jessica had taken advantage of about six months ago.

Christmas day

That afternoon, we packed up the food we made and headed to Jessica’s sister’s house. This year, we opted not to make a big meal — instead, everyone brought something to snack on. (I wish, in writing this, that I’d gotten a picture of the spread. There was a lot.)

Namine always enjoys seeing her cousins again. She doesn’t see either of them as much as we’d like, so the holidays are a good chance for them to catch up and play.

The adults got some playtime, too! We all brought $5 gift cards and $5 gifts for the cling wrap game. When they had all been wrapped up, we ended up with a cling wrap ball roughly the size of a Thanksgiving turkey.