Merry Christmas!

A day late. Bite me. ^.~

I spent yesterday at The House, with three hounds, two cats and my family - and damn it, it was fun. We opened presents and oohed and aww'd (and Mom 'bout dropped her teeth when she opened one of her boxes and saw "I, Claudius", which she's wanted for the longest time.) at the contents. I was quite pleased - the Man Who Is Impossible To Shop For has been decoded - give him socks and clamps and he's got it made - I threw in some clamp-pads and he was all sorts of pleased. *grin* Mission Accomplished! Heh.
He also got a set of security cameras from Mom (to keep an eye on the Hell-hounds in the yard. Really.) and some nifty rocks from Santa. I forget what Uncle Iain gave him, but I'm pretty sure it was something he wanted. ^^;
Andi got a box of sox. Thick, heavy sox. With hand-warmers and some other goodies cunningly concealed inside them. And from me, silk undies. Heh. I love Wintersilks....
I got a new backpack (thank the gods - the straps on mine are starting to part company with the rest) that will hold Circe and has more pockets than I know what to do with! Contained within said pockets was more handwarmers and, ohh! Gloves! Fleece gloves! Eeee! Warm hands.. *purrr*
We got a FoodSaver (yes! I can zip-pack leftovers! Eeee!) biiiig hints on my wishlist for one of these. ^^
And Andi gave me the Lord of the Rings: Return of the King Extended edition - with the little city-sculpture that is actually a little box - t'was the Gift Set. *thud* Ooh.. ^^ And a plastic dragon that flaps its wings. And looks quite fierce. I'm thinking to see if I still have any barbie-dolls lying around that I can dress up as Shadowhunters (or random adventurers) and stash on its back.... What?! ^.~

And then, there was Dinner. Oh, /man/ ... Mom had a fifteen pound standing rib in the oven (this is the woman who frets over a twelve-pound turkey), brussel-sprouts, carrots, and plans for yorkshire pudding, roasted potatoes (and I brought sausage rolls and dessert) and pickled beets (heh. I /knew/ there were some) and little pickled onions...
And crackers. Heh. This year, I have crackers I conspired with Joules to acquire (she gets hers a year early to take advantage of the sales and last year she mentioned this and I said something wistful and the next thing we know, we've conspired to get Real English Crackers on the table at The House this year, and I sent a packet of goodies over for her. There was much boinging on both sides this year. ^^) This time, Mom suggested we pull the crackers before serving the meal - so the meal would be eaten hot - rather than during. This suggestion was met with approval by all, so that's what we did. There was a resounding *crack* that startled the dogs and sent the cats racing for cover and toys and hats flew in all directions. For the first time in a long time, all the crackers cracked on the first pull. That's never happened to us before. ^^;
We found all the toys but one and all the hats - and the paper hats FIT! Well, everyone but Andi - and giggled at the jokes (so why /do/ bears wear fur coats?) and cleared up a little so there was room for The Feast.
And feast it was, with all the dishes. And it was /so/ good. I brought sparkling juice for Andi and I (I had a glass of wine, but I reverted to juice after that, although it was excellent wine, made by a friend of the family from his own grapes... ^^) as well. ^^
Gods, I was /stuffed/. Andi was the only one who had two helpings (The rest of us had MEABTMB* syndrom and could only manage one), but oh, /man/ it was good.
And the pie (had while discussing cameras and camera parts) was excellent. It has been unanimously agreed that I make good pastry. ^^

We got to discussing cameras after dinner and I came out of it with one of Mom's old camera bags, a flash, spare lens and filters for the Canon I'm borrowing. I wandered around with the Canon (after putting FILM in it... *sigh*) and took a bunch of pictures of this and that and the hounds. We'll see if anything comes of it...

*My Eyes Are Bigger Than My Belly - too much food on the plate.

All in all, it was an excellent holiday and we had a really good time. ^^
Yay for my family being completely and utterly nuts. Hee. ^^