Post-Holiday Update

A little late, but here it is. After travelling back and forth from Baton Rouge to Slidell to Pineville for about two weeks, we finally settled back in at home on New Year's Day. Daniel was so excited to be back at his own house that he got in his suitcase and started unpacking it for us! We started out on Christmas Eve with my side of the family. We went to my mom's, then to my grandmother's, then back to my mom's.

One of the funniest moments was when my brother opened his Secret Santa gift from my sister and brother-in-law. It was a huge box of Stove Top Stuffing from Sam's!

He was speechless...later, when they brought out his real gift, he was really speechless!

That evening, we paced up the car and headed off to Pineville to do Christmas with Adam's family. I thought I would take some pictures of the food to show everyone what Christmas dinner for 48 people looks like...

That's a lot of rolls. And there is another pan in the oven.

Yes, that's 8 pies...and that isn't even all of them.

Two HUGE bowls of mashed potatoes. And what you don't see: two large pans of dressing, three turkeys, and two hams, plus other sides.

This is Christmas morning with some of the Huddleston crew. They do Christmas morning with the individual families, then Christmas dinner, then Grandpa reads the Christmas story from the Bible, and then Christmas gifts with the entire family that evening.

The younger kids watching THE PRINCESS BRIDE.

The majority of people in Pineville went home with more than they came with...and I'm not talking about presents. We had sicknesses ranging from respiratory infections to bronchitis to pneumonia to RSV. Luckily I avoided these bugs, but Adam and Daniel did not. Adam had a respiratory infection and Daniel had a lot of congestion and a bad cough. (We just found out today that Daniel has another ear infection in the same ear he had one in right before Christmas!) Anyway, aside from illness, we all had a great time. It was wonderful to see all of Adam's siblings and their families. We stayed up late just about every night either talking or playing games or both. One of my favorite moments as the girls' night to go see TWILIGHT. We all were wearing either TEAM EDWARD or TEAM JACOB t-shirts...I, of course, was wearing TEAM EDWARD. Pictures to come. While in Pineville, we accomplished an amazing feat. We corralled 48 adults and children (ranging from grandparents to a 6 month old) to take family pictures. The photographer, a self-proclaimed coon-ass, took charge and told everyone where to go. I think the pictures turned out pretty well considering... I mean, getting that many people to cooperate is pretty impressive. I will post some of them when we get them. After our long travels, we were happy to be home, sleeping in our own beds. Adam is busy working and preparing for the start of school on Monday. I am busy with Daniel, training for the race, and with my new calling...secretary in Relief Society. Needless to say, we are pretty busy over here! I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday!