Although I woke up once or twice during the middle of the night, it was almost 8am when the official wake-up came on Christmas morning with Adam and Megan together barreling down the stairs, checking under the tree, and shouting “He came! Santa came!” I of course had been sleeping on the couch where the Christmas tree was located and I notified Adam that I thought I had seen Santa leaving the kitchen area after depositing the goods. The kids had been concerned that Santa might not come since I was located there. A quick check of the cookies and chocolate milk indicated that he had not only left gifts but had fueled up on some high calorie food fare.
Mom & Bob came downstairs next, followed soon by Denise & Aaron. We tried to get the kids to sit still for just a few second while we all took pictures of them, but they were understandably restless. The ritual began on the fine Christmas Tuesday morning in 2012, of Adam and Megan alternating between themselves in opening gifts. They did this standing up, which was foreign to me as Denise and I were just lazy enough that we used to open out fits while seated on the floor. Naturally, at the end of the opening spree, Megan realized that Adam still had two more gifts to open after she had completed her cycle of toy unveiling. And naturally she fussed about this for a few seconds.
Smiling appropriately for the camera was the furthest thing from the minds of Megan and Adam
On any day other than Christmas, this would just seem weird
A cursory glance indicates that this one is for Adam
Megan and the Chipmunks
Adam awaits his turn. No pressure or anything.
Bob gets to work on assembling
Post-wreckage
In the end, two lucky kids had mounds and mounds of toys to play with. One of Adam’s gifts was the Wii game Wipeout, based on the TV series that we had watched the night before, and he roped Aaron and me into watching him play it downstairs in the kids’ room where the video game console was now located.
Kindly taking time to pose with their Uncle Brad…even after Megan’s declaration of “No more pictures!”
Denise applies the tattoos while Mom guards the monkey
Adam whips out the Wipeout
Denise and Mom made some breakfast of eggs, bacon, cheesy hashbrowns, toast, and orange juice, which I followed with a cookie. After eating and getting dressed, I took off at around 10:30am and headed for home. I didn’t have much of anything to do for the afternoon, so I just watched some Cheers, had a light lunch, took a five-minute power nap, showered, and by that time it was about 4pm and time to head out for the traditional Murphy family gathering.
After the clan had celebrated three Christmases in a row on days that came after the actual holiday, we he had returned last year to the traditional Christmas day celebration. I’m happy to report that we did that once again this year, bringing our Murphy Christmas Day party tally up to two in a row. Also like last year, the gathering was held at Debby & Mike’s spacious and lovely home in Bellbrook.
It was a pretty impressive gathering which saw very few family absences but among those missed were Ben, Brandon, Jacob & Lauren, Cathy (who was sick at home), and Bev (with a leg infection that had forced her into the hospital that morning). Lori and her family were in from Virginia, showing off photos of a new beach house that they just purchased in the North Carolina Outer Banks. Bryan & Erine were visiting from Germany, Brittney and Doug were there from Illinois, and Sarah was in from Colorado. Ashleigh surprised me by bringing along Christi and Creed, who had been with her at Joy’s house before coming to Debby’s.
Members of the Tangeclan – Ed, Allie, and Karen – lay siege to the food central zone
Making up for the melancholy mood of the prior evening, I get a photo with Silas and tree on Christmas Day
Ashleigh, Christi, and Briana
Man, the builder
Bob find the perfect combination of eating and lounging
Looking for lewd in all the wrong places
Jim, Jan, Eric, and Nikki re-claim their table from Christmas 2011
Charley inspects this gathering of ladies ’round the table
Megan takes a brief interlude from chewing to pose with Briana
Diana, Ed, and Tom enjoy their eats
Chris won’t take a brief interlude from chewing to pose with Sarah
In attendance at the Christmas day gathering were: Diana & Tom, Lori & Shane and Abbey and Elise, Debby & Mike and Bradley and Tyler, Dan & Natalie and Tori, Mom & Bob, me, Ashleigh, Silas, Briana, Christi, and Creed, Denise & Aaron and Adam and Megan, Bryan & Erine, Ed, Susan & Charles and Charley and Sam, Chris & Sarah and Livi, Karen & Joe and Andrew, Abby, and Allie, Jim & Jan and Nikki and Eric, Darlene & Bob, Brittney & Doug, and Zac.
The food was plentiful and similar to the previous evening’s food: turkey, ham, shrimp, cheeses and crackers, cookies, and all those other things that make you want to keep gnawing after your stomach has begun picketing for shorter hours.
Ashleigh’s gang didn’t stay long at all, so I gave Silas his final gift from me: a throw rug for his bedroom that featured a United States map on it. After they took off, the rest of the kids went about the business of opening their gifts – which were provided by the grandparents.
Debby and Ashleigh are considerably jubilated to see their sons Tyler and Silas give each other a high five
Chris and the Colorado-style Christmas lap dance
Erine, Mom, and Bob perusing Diana’s Germany scrapbook
Once word gets out that it’s time for the grandkids to open gifts, they congregate like piranha at feeding time
Bryan and Erine get ready to head out. It was nice of them to stop by from Germany.
Then we did our fun family tradition of the White Elephant gift, which saw the usual laughs and backstabbing practices of obtaining the best gift possible. I didn’t participate in it this time around. One of the gifts was a game called Bean Boozled, where contestants dared to spin and eat the jelly bean that comes up on the color wheel. The risk is that each color of jelly bean has two flavors, one standard (ie. caramel corn), one disgusting (ie. moldy cheese). Bob Robinson took great delight in making the rounds and getting the young and young-at-heart to participate.
White Elephant hunting season begins
Certain people were fascinating by the repulsive jelly bean game
Abby and an unrelated toothless moment
Composure and big blue eyes follows a momentary Megan meltdown, with the recurring phrase “Ma-mee, Ma-mee”
Elise and Abbie approach the jelly beans with understandable reserve
In the midst of the fun family chaos, I was able to get family photos of those present of the various clans:
Club Claude, no Cathy
My Gang
The Tange-clan sans Bev
The Murph turf
Re-meet the Robinsons
I stuck around until 9pm chatting with those were still remaining, all the while enjoying some irish cream and cheese and crackers. The snow storm that was expected that night didn’t come until the next morning, causing us to miss out on any sort of white Christmas. Nevertheless, it was another great one to chronicle in these here Christmas annals.
Late evening family summit stretegically held around the feeding trough
The Terrible Catsafterme wishes everyone within the sound of my voice best wishes for a Happy New Year. We will see you in 2013…
Thanks for the pictures! I wish I could have been there. I tried to tell the doctor I’d come back to the hospital after the party, but he said no.
Bev
January 12th, 2013
What is it that Bob Ch*ndler is assembling?!
And his perfect combo of eating and lounging is of course fantastic.
Peter
May 24th, 2013