An Unconventional Christmas Eve

Lisa had everyone over two nights in a row. She did this because Amy couldn't be there except for an hour or so Sunday night and Chris couldn't be there at all Monday night.

The kitchen was loaded with good food and while they were finalizing the dinner the movie "Griswold's Christmas" was on the TV. The one where the cat gets fried. We laughed and hoped the kids were missing the few inappropriate moments of the movie. They were so involved with other things that none seemed to pay any attention.

After dinner we began the important moment of the evening, opening gifts. The gifts were mostly for the eight grandchildren who were present, and they enjoyed themselves immensely.

After that Mike read the Christmas Story from Luke in the bible. Our Christmas story is a little different since we have so many little girls and they all want to be Mary. Last year there were even more little girls and so to make everyone happy there were four Mary's! When the reader, Jake got to the part of Joseph and Mary, he said, "And Joseph, and Mary, and Mary, and Mary, and Mary - - - and then continued on with the story. This went on every time Jake got to the part of Joseph and Mary.

This year we only had two Mary's, but we had three angels of the Lord. So the story went like this, "and Joseph and Mary and Mary, and the angel, and the angel, and the angel, and so it went. We didn't want the program to be irreverent, but it was funny.

What may have been a little irreverent was that we had two baby Jesus'. One was a bald doll dressed in pink pajama's. Hey, you never know! And the other one was a stuffed animal, which was a monkey that Mike and I gave Ashley as one of her presents. She wouldn't put it down, and insisted that her baby was baby Jesus too.

There were a few snickers when Lisa and Sherri noticed one of the angels picking her nose. And the snickers got louder when the angel made it clear she hadn't had enough to eat at dinner time. Or maybe it was an additional dessert. Mike was oblivious to the reason for the snickers and seemed a little put out that people were laughing during his story.

Earlier in the evening, Amy had given her mom (I'm Amy's step-mom) a four-roll pack of toilet paper as one of her Christmas presents. She told her there was one roll for each cheek.

During the story we needed a manger for the baby Jesus and someone threw one of the Mary's the toilet paper. It made a very nice comfy manger. The other Mary and the monkey didn't seem to mine that there weren't two mangers. Maybe it's because Ashley is only three.

It wasn't long before one of the Mary's started picking her nose too. She was the sister of the Angel. Must run in the family. Actually, Sherri was getting a little embarrassed, even though she was laughing.

Well, that about ended our Christmas Eve. It snowed earlier that day and added to that amount that evening. Mike and I drove home in the new fallen snow to the song, "I'm Dreaming Of A White Christmas", and fell into bed exhausted again.