Christmas Miracle

This year we hosted Christmas for the very first time at our new house.  Abe's entire family came over from all over the east coast for the holiday - 15 people total... meaning 17 (7 of which were kids) of us plus 1 dog.  This was no easy task but overall it went over much more smoothly than imagined.  6 people stayed at the house, 5 people in a hotel nearby, and 4 live close enough that they could commute over a few days.

The hardest part about hosting this many people is meal planning: breakfast x 3, lunch x 3, and dinner x 2.  Breakfast was simple enough, just scrambled eggs with bagels and coffee.  Lunch was Papa Ginos on day 1, a mess of Raman style noodles with kim chi and rice on day 2, and pasta with sweet Italian sausages and salad on day 3.  Dinner on Christmas Eve was Chinese delivery and beers with mac and cheese for the kids, and on Christmas day it was a gigantic prime rib with mashed potatoes, salad, steamed green beans and rice and kim chi of course with wine.  Each meal was followed by a large array of desserts that seemed to never end.  I didn't plan ahead as much as I probably could have - we went back to the grocery store once, but we also only have 1 fridge and I know many people with houses tend to have 2 just for this purpose.

The kids were kept happy with the Wii and all the new toys that Santa delivered (oh my God, So Many Toys!) so it was a lot less loud and chaotic than it normally is on these kinds of holidays.  We are lucky enough to have a fully finished and warm basement for them to play in, and that made a huge difference.  This was also the first time that I could speak up and "yell" at them when they were out of line with each other, and unexpectedly they totally listened to me.

Abe did most of the cooking and I did most of the cleaning, which we're both happy to do because we really go crazy when there are too many people in the kitchen.  That sort of madness is not welcome here, and usually that's exactly what it's like coupled with people yelling at each other and bumping into one another while a kid is pulling on a shirt and asking for more juice.  My mother and father in law barely lifted a finger when it's usually them who do the bulk of the work and I think this was very welcome to them and also surprising.

Mia fared well with everyone in the house.  She barked at the kids as expected, but she did get used to them after some time.  We tried a vibrating bark collar on her for Day 2 and it worked, but it also made her really weary of everything.  Once we took it off after a couple hours, she acted as though she still had it on and behaved herself for the rest of the day.  Mia even jumped into the annual family photo - unexpected and hilarious.  She's very happy that everyone is gone now - and is also really confused as to where everyone went but is really enjoying her new toys that Santa brought.  She had a bit of an embarrassing stomach ache but seems to be feeling better and is liking the quiet that our house normally holds - we are all enjoying the smaller volume of noise!  Hopefully it lasts for a couple days...