Living in Munchkinland

We had a lovely Christmas. Michael worked. We saw Star Wars at the Alamo Drafthouse. We went to the Emily Ann Trail of Lights with my sister and nephew and had dinner after. We drove to San Antonio and had dinner with Martha and Clark and took a riverboat tour down the RiverWalk and saw the beautiful lights. We watched lots and lots of Christmas movies. Samuel got a Christmas puppy! Her name is Holly and she's yorkie and poodle and about two pounds and ten weeks and we are all head over heels in love with her despite the fact that she poops everywhere. We played outside in our 80 degree "Christmas weather". We baked and wrapped presents and prepared, but also lounged about on occasion and read. We enjoyed being at home. Davis and I participated in a Christmas carol and story evening at our beloved UU church and had dinner with Stacey and Chris and Alex and the kids after. I worked and then we had a fabulous Christmas Eve party with friends and musi...

We've been spending lots of time celebrating the season with the kids and with my parents. We are doing lots of baking and tree decorating and watching Christmas movies while sipping red wine by the fire. Mom and I had a date to Duchman winery to pick up our wine. We went to Davis's piano recital and out to lunch at Kobe for teppanyaki afterwards with my mama. We played boardgames at my parents' house and had lots of happy hours. Michael has been gone every week, but it makes the weekends even more special. The kids have been with me all week and we have enjoyed just being together. We enjoy getting to spend evenings on the weekends at Casa Pacifica. We are enjoying being together in the ways that we can. Bittersweet, yes, but sweet all the same. My family brings me so much joy.

We went to three parties this weekend. I only managed to take photos at two of them, but they were all fun. We started with at St. Lucia party hosted by our friends we made at the Tyler Place. I didn't know anything about the party so I googled and read the story to the kids and we were prepared. We drove up to Austin on a wet and muggy early afternoon. We stopped at our old house in Circle C as it was on the way and it brought back so many memories. It was such a beautiful house. The party was lovely with an amazing spread of food and good friends. The kids made friends easily and we had a nice time. That evening we dropped the kids off with the new sitter and drove over to Alex and Kyle's house for our book group Holiday party. My parents didn't host it this year and so it was a tradition that was changing. It was bittersweet like most things these days. Still, it was nice not being a co-host and just getting to be a guest and the party was so fun. Great foo...