Delayed Christmas Writings

I feel kind of bad that I have been slacking so much on keeping you up to date on things. Chadd on the other hand has been doing an awesome job, so hopefully he doesn’t mind if I yoink chunks of his posts to quickly write mine.

I had four Christmases this year, first a week before the actuall Christmas with the Klaus family (My Dad’s side, obviously), one evening with my roomates and then I spent Christmas day with both my Mom’s side of the family, and Kerry’s family.

Klaus Family Christmas (12-16-06)

Christmas is just a week away, and every year the Klaus family (my Dad’s side) gets together to exchange gifts, stockings, eat and, any time you get a Klaus group together, play cards. This year it was at my cousin’s new house in Sacramento. Jason did most of the cooking, with some help from Angela doing the dessert (a very tasty dessert I might add).

While we waited for the stuffed meatballs to cook (also very good, and very filling), we handed out stockings. One thing that my Dad got in his stocking was a bag of army men, and let me tell you, give my Dad the right toys, and he’ll turn into a kid again.

From the stockings, we all went to the table when the food was ready. For dinner we had a plate of two Lingonberry Stuffed Meatballs on Terragon and Sweet Pea Puree layered over Truffled Garlic Mashed Potatoes. Most people couldn’t finish eating both meatballs, but every agreed that it was very good. For our dessert that evening we had Lemon Brown Sugar Bread Pudding. It was more bread than pudding; something that you could eat with a fork.

-Chadd

We did a fun gift exchange this year, basically a white elephant exchange but with a $40 budget per person, and thus, more interesting gifts. I opened a shop vac, which then got stolen, so I stole an ice cream maker. When Chadd’s gift got stolen, he in turn took my ice cream maker and I ended the night with a really nice crock pot.

In all it was a fun time, and it is always nice to see some of the family that I dont get a chance to see all of them all the time.

Roomate Christmas (12-22-06)

We had a nice little thing at our house for Christmas with the roomates, as well as Kerry and Candice. If I had realized that Cody and Becca were going to be gone, I would have done it at a diffrent time and had them over too, my bad.

Anyway, I decided I really wanted to make it something to remember, so I scoured the internet (not really, google is awesome) for the recipie to that dinner that Jason had made above. And wouldn’t you know, its really not all that hard to make. For those of you interested:

Lingonberry Stuffed Meatballs Recipe
Tarragon and Sweet Pea Puree Recipe
Truffled Mashed Potatoes Recipe

I got a chance to use my new crock pot as well, filled it with a gallon of Apple Cider which was almost gone by the time the night was over.

I’m really quite proud of how it all came out in the end, a really nice dinner with some good wine, good friends and lots of laughter.

Blanchard Christmas (12-25-06)

Every year the location that we will all go to for Christmas alternates between my Grandparents’ house and my Parents’ house. This year it happened to be at my Grandparents’. On Christmas Eve, we pack all the presents under our tree at home into as few cars as we can manage, and head up to my Grandparents’ house. Now, I’ve always thought it is cool that I can say honestly, “over a river and through the woods to Grandmother’s house I go.” Sure, it may only be a small creek, and trees are probably not packed close enough for some people to classify them as woods, but it’s close enough for me.

Once we arrive, we make several trips to and from the house with armfuls of gifts. We take these presents and pile them around the tree. The tree ends up with about a three foot radius of presents around it.

…

After some snacks were munched on, and a game of magic was played with my cousin, I ventured back into the main part of the house to find a (practically) family tradition being played on the table. Every time we get enough people together from my mom’s side of the family, we break out the Rummikube game. Vaguely similar to Rummy played with cards [that my Dad's side of the family seems to play religiously], only this game is played with tiles, and there are a few differences in how you are allowed to play tiles.

After Keith arrived carrying the rest of the Playstation 2 that I left at home, we plugged it all in and started up Guitar Hero. Unfortunately, we only had one guitar controller, so we had to take turns playing. I did manage to make Kyle look somewhat like a rock star in this photo.

Kerry had come up with me to visit with my family, but she wanted to be with her family, and particuarly in her bed (since she had been house sitting for a few days prior) for christmas, so I took her home around 10PM. Unfortunatly, I was tired too and laid down on the bed and ended up falling asleep for a few hours. I didn’t make it back up to my grandparents until just after midnight and had to move around by flashlight to get to bed.

People started moving stirring about at around 7 in the morning. When everyone was inside the house (some slept in the motor home outside) we started handing out stockings. After we all sifted through our stockings, we started to open up gifts (here are some of the pictures). Kyle left after opening presents to bring Kerry up so that she could open hers. Kyle almost missed his favorite meal. We had delicious biscuits and gravy (I had jam instead, not a big fan of the gravy) for breakfast.

After we all played around with our new toys and other gizmos and gadgets, we ate [an early] dinner. Turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy; can’t beat a great combination like that. Afterwards, we had to try to gather up everything and stuff it all back into the car. This time we had an extra person to ride in the car since Meghann had to leave to go spend time with her family, taking her car (and Keith’s ride there) with her.

All in all, it was a great Christmas, and it was nice to see some of my cousins again. Next year should be at my parents’ house, and if this moving out thing goes according to plan, it should be quite fun.

Bosch Christmas (12-25-06)

After leaving my grandparents house, Kerry and I headed back to her house to enjoy the rest of the evening with her family. Liz made a wonderfull dinner. I had Lamb for I think the first time. It had a very familiar taste, but I can’t think of any other time I would have had it. The best part though was Desert. Liz makes this thing called a Pepermint Crisp Tart. I dont really know what all is in it, but its delicious.

Kerry and I left her house not to long after dinner to go back down to my house where we tried to watch Batman Begins in High Definition (Both the movie and player were christmas gifts), however with my serious lack of sleep and a busy day, I couldn’t stay awake.