Okay, everyone thought the idea of postponing our present opening until we were all here was a good idea.
Well, everyone but Jay who saw some flaws in the plan right from the beginning.
But we (I) reminded him that half the family wouldn’t even be here, so it’s not like he was going to get all his gifts on Christmas morning no matter what.
Turns out the idea of delayed gratification is much easier in the abstract than it is when there’s a giant pile of wrapped packages under the tree.
Santa comes on Christmas Eve. Everyone knows that. You can’t just ask Santa to fly back to your house from the North Pole two days later because you’re busy. Try a stunt like that and you’ll be lucky if he ever returns to your chimney again.
Katie met us at the 10:00 mass and then we came home and started brunch. Zack’s flight landed a bit early so he was home in time to eat with us! Adam joined us as we sat down to eat.
After brunch, we opened one gift each.
I’m so proud of us!
We could have turned into a pack of ravening hyenas and just ripped through the pile of Christmas loot, twinkling and sparkling under the tree but no, we stopped after one.
Then we got everything ready for our trip up to Bill and Jen’s.
We picked up Uncle Mickey and caravanned to Plymouth.
Bill and Jen live in a large, lovely home with the open concept everyone wants these days and so is perfect for entertaining large crowds of boisterous relatives. We all put the presents we’d brought each other under Jen’s tree and commenced to crowd around the kitchen Island to eat.
And eat and eat and eat.
And drink.
Jen makes coffee the old fashioned way; in a pot on the stove. It’s delicious.
Now, just like the Pivec side of the family, there are way too many Hubbells to exchange gifts with everyone. But most of us like to give stuff to Mom and Dad (they give us tons all year round. Today we’re going to see The Battle of the Five Armies on them) and some of us exchange gifts. MJ is my God daughter, so we’ve always exchanged gifts. There are a lot of God child/parent combos and they all do gifts. Nothing huge; Bananas and Punkin gave their God parents framed drawings. Those will be worth something, someday. Beyond the obvious worth inherent, I mean.
When Babydoll was here the other day, the girls came over and they were all coloring at my kitchen table. Punkin looked up at me and said “Nanas and I are great artists!” Then she thought a second and added “You and Katie are okay.”
She’s right. Katie and I are okay.
I gave MJ a doll and a Christmas ornament I made; she gave me a Star Wars book. We were both delighted.
My daughter Katie, who got married this summer, gave her grandparents mugs. On them were pictures from two of the wedding this summer; one of her as the bride and her cousin Katelyn as the bridesmaid and the other of Katelyn as the bride and Katie as the bridesmaid. In case you were wondering, one of them is blond and the other brunette, so we can tell which is which.
My brother JP and his wife, Royana, who couldn’t come home for Christmas, commissioned a family tree for Mom and Dad. It turned out really cool. They liked that as much as the mugs.
After dinner, we pulled out the board games.
I have no idea how many of us there were at the party but there were games being played in four different spots and folks were migrating between one game and another for the next several hours. I don’t even know the names of most of the games we played. One was Cards against Humanity, which is Apples to Apples but dirty. Part of the fun of that game was trying to play it without corrupting the innocence of the youngsters who ran by every few minutes. I don’t know the names of the other games but I killed at all of them. In fact, at one point, I heard my niece Hattie say “How ‘bout if each team gets one Mary Louise answer per round?”
I wasn’t even playing that game.
Much wine and candy was consumed. Cookies were inhaled.
I had no idea trouble was brewing until the ride home. The three kids in the car with me were quiet as I carefully wound my way through the dark of Plymouth, toward the interstate and civilization. It wasn’t until I was safely on 494, punching it up to 60mph that a voice from the darkness behind me said “We want to open the rest of our presents when we get home.”
I said nothing. I kept my mouth firmly shut because I knew there was at least a 50/50 chance if I opened it, I’d yell “Me too! Me too! PRESENTS!!”
My patience was rewarded as they talked themselves down from the brink. Turns out all they really wanted was to watch a movie. I finally piped up “I have the Neighbors from Netflix!”
So when we got home we watched Seth Rogan and Zac Efron duke it out.
I don’t know how I’m going to hold them back tomorrow.
Even without opening all our presents, it was a lovely Christmas.