Les fêtes

I hope everyone had a great Christmas.  Mine was great.  On Christmas Eve we had a big dinner with my parents and my brother and then we spent some quality time together opening presents and playing games.

Then on Christmas Day, as is tradition, we drove up to my aunt and uncle's house and had a big Christmas meal with my extended family.  It was so nice to see everyone, especially because it has been so long since I've seen a lot of my family.  Lionel and I even got really motivated this year and made a traditional bûche de noel, which actually turned out to be much more complicated than expected, but it sure was good in the end!

Then on Christmas night we were invited to my friends house for her 2nd annual Naughty Santa Christmas party.  "Naughty Santa" because the whole premise is that everyone brings a bottle of alcohol for a gift exchange, and then afterwards everyone ends up drinking it all, along with the beer and wine everyone brought.!  It was a lot of fun and I ended up seeing a lot of people I knew in high school and haven't seen since high school or early college and it was really great to see them again and to catch up.

Unfortunately, because we were so busy with our arrival in the US and all that goes with that, we didn't really have the time to do any of the other holiday activities I usually enjoy so much in the US.  But I'm still very glad I was able to be in the US this year for the holidays, even if it made the move even more exhausting and stressful with all the Christmas shopping to do!

And I know someone else who really enjoyed Christmas, or at least the Christmas tree: