adios, christmas! hola, 2011!

the first christmas in our new house is definitely going to be a memorable one. to kick off our celebration, we did an all day bake-a-thon with morgan's family. we made a variety of different desserts and even watched mark use a hand mixer for the first time. jerome won the reward for 'most creative dessert' for his recipe -- snowmen on a stick! he and morgan got a little too creative with the decorating and it was almost scary. (yarmulke-wearing snowmen aren't exactly traditional. but imaginitive nonetheless.)

after baking cookies and a eating nice midwestern dinner, we worked on a puzzle (didn't get very far) and then decided to open up presents. there was wrapping paper everywhere, except for in logan's corner. we made the poor kid wait and open his present last. in his giant box underneath a few blankets was an electric guitar. and after the guitar and amp were plugged in, we had a very confused puppy! we finished our night by watching a christmas story. (well, some of us...the mays' are infamous for their uncanny ability to fall asleep anytime, anywhere. mark, rita, morgan, and jerome were out like a light before randy could show them how the piggies eat.)

on christmas morning around 8:30, morgan and i decided to crawl out of bed. (probably our last christmas where we'll be able to wake up on our own terms!) we went downstairs and opened up all of our christmas presents, including a few gifts for our growing little baby. christmas as a married couple is much different, as well as christmas with two incomes! we may have gone a little overboard this year, but i think it was well-deserved. morgan says his favorite gift was apple tv. my favorite gift was a 12-pack of bumgenius cloth diapers. kash loves his new bed, and weasley goes crazy for his catnip ball. baby mays can't speak for itself, but i'm sure he or she will really love the pale yellow hawkeye onesie (s)he got to come home from the hospital in. :) 

later that day we drove into bettendorf to spend a little time with the maine side and to see my cousin jessica, who flew back from beirut for the holidays. we then made a quick stop at morgan's parent's house to play boggle and watch elf.

we ended our holiday festivities with our family christmas with our dad today. the overall result was mayhem, but that's what happens when you have 3 rowdy boys ages 5 and under in one house! we enjoyed having everyone over, and weren't quite sure what to do with the sound of silence after everyone left. 

so, to fill the void, my world-traveling cousin jessica came over and dropped off a furry little christmas gift named ramses. ramses is jessica's cat who was technically homeless until today. we offered to take ramses for her and give him a home. poor little guy hasn't come out from behind the toilet for the last 2 hours... probably has something to do with the warm welcoming that weasley had to give him. (it wasn't good... my cat is such a territorial jerk.) we hope that ramses will warm up to us soon... and that weasley will warm up to him!

we hope you all had a safe and merry christmas. now onto the new year... what are your resolutions? ours is to clean out our dirty mouths. i'm creating a high-tech swear jar that is going to end up being a savings account for baby mays. there will be a fee for each word.. the dirtier the word, the more costly. SO... watch your mouths while you're in our house or you'll have to pay up!! get it all out of your system before the first of january. :)

-the mays'