Home again, home again.

Whew! We just finished 5 Christmas events in as many days. We are home and pretty dang tired.

After Christmas Eve at our apartment with my sister and dad and then Christmas Day at Paul's parents house, we still had 3 more Christmas events to go to.

Event 3:
On Friday we finished some last minute gift preparations and then spent the evening at the play Fat Man Crying, which was at the Minneapolis Theater Garage. I won tickets to this show when I attended Stitch, Bitch n Die at the Bryant Lake Bowl Theater in October. Both plays are by Joseph Scrimshaw and both shared a wry humor and an easy to digest storyline.

Event 4:
On Saturday morning we woke up bright and early, piled the presents, dogs and ourselves into the car to go to Wisconsin. It was there that we met up with my dad and then drove further into Wisconsin to get together with the extended family. I haven't seen some of my extended family members in so long that the younger cousins weren't recognizable to me anymore. It has also been so long since I have seen them that many of them had never met Paul. It was immediately obvious to Paul that I do not come from a vegetarian oriented family. He could tell by the "man room" in my aunt and uncles house that was full of taxidermy creatures including a bear, fox and other creatures I glimpsed when quickly scanning the room and promptly beating it out of there as fast as I could. He could also tell by the gift that said "man" of the "man room" gave to my dad: a back scratcher made from a dried turkey foot. Gross.

Event 5:
After spending the night at my dad's house where I got to sit and knit by the fire for a while, we got up early again in order to drive back to Minneapolis, drop the dogs off at the apartment, pick up a new batch of gifts and go to my mom's house.

It was totally worth it though because she made her famous chocolate mint bars. My sister and I look forward to those bars and have been known to get a little petty when it comes time to divide them up.

We enjoyed the afternoon together eating falafel, playing games, opening presents and teasing each other.

In addition to his real presents, Paul also got a few hand-me-down gifts including a tobacco pipe and a "meat pan." He is looking forward to totally grossing me out with his tobacco smoking, meat eating ways. And, to think, I married a non-smoking vegetarian. I think I was duped!

Although, I should mention that Paul was a really good sport and willingly filled his long Christmas weekend with tons of family bonding time.