"It's the Most Crazy, Insane Time of Year"

Whew, I've finally got my decorations down, house cleaned, and pics uploaded. Now I can blog about our Christmas. It was GREAT! We had my parents, Chad's parents and his two brothers up for Christmas. I loved having my parents here. They work hard and don't have flexible lives, so it was such a treat!

They got here Wednesday evening. What an extra treat to have them all to ourselves for the day, before everyone else showed up. Muttah (short for the dutch "GrossMuttah") loves to read to her grandchildren. And of course they love it too. So she brought a couple of special books to read to them.
Two of Chad's family got here the next evening, while the other two got here Christmas Eve. We had our big dinner that night. It was just wonderful!
After dinner, we put out the reindeer food that Chloe made at school.

It must have worked. Because Santa's reindeer found our house. Muttah, Chloe, and I were always the first to wake. It was nice to have some quiet time together to chat each morning.

After everyone else woke, we pulled the tables out of the dining room and put chairs around. Chloe was "Santa" until she had too much to distract her. It was really cute. She loves presents; weather she's giving or getting them, it doesn't matter. So she started out passing out all of the presents she put together for everyone. I didn't help or encourage it at all. If she asked me to write someone's name, I did. But that was all. To me, she gave chap sticks and bracelets, etc. She made everyone some drawings and things like that. It was a bag, heavy with things like that. For Everett, she wrapped her purple elephant piggy bank, all by herself. It was a happy Mama moment, very sweet.
Right after the festivities, the boys snuck off to play the new arcade unit that Chad built. Speaking of which, I've got some catch up blogging to about some completed projects.
I wasn't going to at first, but the day after Christmas, we all headed down to GA. Chad stayed home to work, but I wanted to go see my sisters. And I wanted the kids to see their cousins. None of us live in GA, only my parents. But with the exception of one sister with her 5 kids, all 5 of us with our 20 grandkids get together at my parents' 2000 sq. ft. house each year. It's so crazy and crowded, but we always have fun.

This year, however, was the BEST EVER! I'm SO glad I decided to go down to GA after all! We did all of our traditional activities: we played lots of games. The older ones were old enough to join the party too, which was great.

And the little ones played games and video games together too, without really any fighting.

The boys wrestled. My brother wrestled in high school and now the older nephews wrestle too. I think part of why this year was so much fun is because all of the kids are much older now, and because my sister brings her Wii now. Everyone got along so well. The little boys got in on the wrestling too. But it ended when Reid gave his son a bloody lip.The little girls are thick as thieves! They were inseparable and loved letting me take their pictures.My brother's family wasn't going to be able to make it this year. We were all sad about that. One day we got a knock at the door, with this pretty girl in a car seat and a note that said, "WOOPS, Santa forgot something in his sleigh. Merry Christmas - Rudolph."
Not knowing what to think, we all filed out of the house to see what was going on. Before long, my brother, his wife and older boy came out from behind the cars. What a wonderful surprise!! They drove from Texas without us knowing!

The drawback to all of the grandkids being older now is that there was only one baby to go around. Before my sisters finished having kids, we added two family members a year. Now, we're lucky to get one. So little Charlie got passed around a lot. It just reminded me how much I want a baby of my own. I never was baby hungry until I started having my own.

Everett was so sweet to everyone. He doesn't remember most of them, but he warmed right up to them all. He even insisted on hugging everyone each night at bed time. As a kid, I hated being obligated to hug relatives I didn't know. So I thought it was really sweet.

My grandpa was able to come for a day as well. Again, Everett warmed right up to him and his wife. In fact, Grandpa almost got him to sleep!We got a picture of the 4 generations of Williams.
It's always been hard for my dad to quit working for any reason. So it's a fun treat when he does.
This is Charlie's big brother, William. He's such a mellow boy. He's quite happy to play with trains in a corner. Everett is more verbose, but he plays in similar ways. So they played really well together. It was fun to see, because William used to not really fit in anywhere among the cousins.
As per tradition, we also went to Jumping Jellybeans. Having so many kids in such a small space, you've gotta find ways to get that energy out constructively. So this is a must each year. Every time we go to this place, there's always that one kid that thinks he should be a part of our family. It's always wierd to me. But this year, they stopped letting parents on the play things. We were bummed about that. So we only slid a little bit ;) before chilling in the parents' room.

A couple of hours later, a mom came in to tell us that one of our children had fallen asleep at the bottom of the slide. Haha! Yeah, we play hard when we get together. We don't get much sleep in that tiny house either. It's a slumber party each night, where you keep each other up playing pranks and whatnot... OK, that's the adults, but you know, probably the kids too.

Tired as we all were, that night we did gingerbread houses. The little girls did one together...
... while the other kids each had a little one to do.
Chloe of course was terribly meticulous; it had to be perfect, and she kept getting distracted by the yummy candy. That girl is SO SLOW to do anything! But her house was perfect.
That was Thursday. Chad joined us that evening. I was so happy to see him! Friday, we went to Ikea.

We discovered a new game: Quelf. It is the craziest, most insane game you've ever seen. We think it was made by drunk people. It's random and makes you act like a fool. My Dad, who again never stops working, even got in on the action on New Year's Eve.

When we ran out of steam with that, we watched the ball drop. Then we lit some fireworks that Chad brought. I love this picture.

Saturday, Chad took our kids to his parents' because his mom wanted to take them to ride "The Pink Pig." I dunno, apparently it's an Atlanta tradition for those that grew up there. I was in GA to see my family though (it was nice not feeling obligated to split time for a change.) So I stayed behind and we just chilled.

We played a lot of pictionary. That evening, when Chad got home, he actually joined us for a round. But he was on my team, and we were tearing it up! Seriously, sometimes as little as two lines would be enough for us to guess the word. It was awesome! But my family couldn't hang with it, so they kicked him out of the game. Hehe.

In addition to the 15 kids and 9+ adults, there was also my sister's hot dog, Twiggy. Saturday, Chad came home with Curly, who was being babysat by his mom. Those two had a blast too! Curly finally got to play with a dog that could last as long as her (my MIL's dogs are lazy.) They wrestled for-ever! In fact, Curly, who's much younger, gave up sooner than Twiggy every time!

My sisters

Sunday we drove home. The kids got all of Monday to play with their new things. I think Everett likes Chloe's dollhouse even more than she does, but still not as much as he loves his dress up stuff.

Coming home was of course a let down. And of course we all got a little sick. The kids had a great time with their cousins. And I missed my siblings, sis-in-law and nephews. Even Curly missed Twiggy. She's probably never had that much exercise or fun. So our Christmas was crazy, insane, but wonderful!