Day Eighty-five: A family event...
Dec. 24th, 2004 09:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nagi_schwarzSo I managed to find my parents. My mother and father have been redecorating my sister's room to become some guest room, so today they made the final trip to who knows where to get the last of the accessories, and when they came home I helped them put stuff together and now we have a bona-fide guest room (i.e. not Nagi's room full of Gundam models that scare guests). The jokes about mom turning this place into a B&B have increased somewhat, but mom's basic story is that when she leaves in January to go trippin around the world with dad I have extra room for friends should we decide to come down on the weekend and have a large, say, RP marathon or something.
Once the new room was set up - and it does look pretty cool - I set about helping mom get ready for the big eve dinner. The meal of the night was lasagne (for which I had to pop a pill) and salad and dessert was cheesecake. I made the Christmas jello for tomorrow night, a recipe I grew up with that mom says comes from Grandma Bobby. That was slightly disastrous. I'm still a dangerous cook. The cheesecake went much better (apart from the butter making a suspicious explode-y noise in the microwave) and we had that tonight. I did some other random chores for mom, too. Such as folding the serviettes pretty in the formal dining room for the big Christmas dinner. And making place name tag things for the formal dinner. I often end up doing such odd chores. I wrapped some last-minute gifts. I'm supposed to be crocheting some doilies for the new guest room - yes, the rosy doilies of eye-strain doom. Delacoeur still doesn't entirely believe the 'of doom' concept. You hang around us enough and you'll start doing it too, girl, trust me.
We went to see a movie, too. Usually we have a gift exchange on Christmas eve. Everyone buys a gift that costs up toe five bucks, a gift that anyone can use, and we tell a little story that ends up in us exchanging the gifts. But the newlyweds were sorta broke this year, so we just went to see a movie. Ran into Trevor, the old debate partner. He's still working up at the cinemas. Saw 'A Series of Unfortunate Events'. Hm. It was good. I probably will not watch it again. Jim Carrey was scary. And whichever kid was keeping an eye on the projector must have fallen asleep, because the film kept going out of focus. Halfway through mom and dad threw in the towel and left, so I finished it out with the neesan and her hubby. We picked up Audi the chihuahua and headed home for the big dinner.
The big dinner was great, and we had a lot of fun, just talking and stuff. After dinner we got out Soujiro's Christmas present and played a long, arduous game of Chinese checkers. It was loads of fun. Sid might have won had he decided not to foil mom to let his wife win. Shaz has brilliant spatial skills and did really well, but mom would have won if Sid hadn't been messing with her. I'm awful. I have no sense of visual strategy. But Shaz kept skipping over mom's turn, and there was lots of laughter and fun. It's been a while since I've hung out with the family like this, but it was fun. Since Dad had declined the Chinese checkers (and I managed to derail Sid's attempt at a game of tiddly-winks) we played some Taboo and Scattergories. Since Sid, mom and I were on a team of three we won because we had more minds, but Shaz and dad put up a good fight. Shaz actually won the game of Scattergories. Gah. My mind has been blank all evening. I must be more excited for Christmas than I originally thought. But it was fun hanging out with the family - just talking and laughing and joking with each other.
I promised mom and dad that I wouldn't wake them up at some (childishly) ungodly early hour of the morning so I'm gearing up for a long night awake - I have writing to do and whatnot. So anyway, have a merry Christmas, all, and to all a good night!
Once the new room was set up - and it does look pretty cool - I set about helping mom get ready for the big eve dinner. The meal of the night was lasagne (for which I had to pop a pill) and salad and dessert was cheesecake. I made the Christmas jello for tomorrow night, a recipe I grew up with that mom says comes from Grandma Bobby. That was slightly disastrous. I'm still a dangerous cook. The cheesecake went much better (apart from the butter making a suspicious explode-y noise in the microwave) and we had that tonight. I did some other random chores for mom, too. Such as folding the serviettes pretty in the formal dining room for the big Christmas dinner. And making place name tag things for the formal dinner. I often end up doing such odd chores. I wrapped some last-minute gifts. I'm supposed to be crocheting some doilies for the new guest room - yes, the rosy doilies of eye-strain doom. Delacoeur still doesn't entirely believe the 'of doom' concept. You hang around us enough and you'll start doing it too, girl, trust me.
We went to see a movie, too. Usually we have a gift exchange on Christmas eve. Everyone buys a gift that costs up toe five bucks, a gift that anyone can use, and we tell a little story that ends up in us exchanging the gifts. But the newlyweds were sorta broke this year, so we just went to see a movie. Ran into Trevor, the old debate partner. He's still working up at the cinemas. Saw 'A Series of Unfortunate Events'. Hm. It was good. I probably will not watch it again. Jim Carrey was scary. And whichever kid was keeping an eye on the projector must have fallen asleep, because the film kept going out of focus. Halfway through mom and dad threw in the towel and left, so I finished it out with the neesan and her hubby. We picked up Audi the chihuahua and headed home for the big dinner.
The big dinner was great, and we had a lot of fun, just talking and stuff. After dinner we got out Soujiro's Christmas present and played a long, arduous game of Chinese checkers. It was loads of fun. Sid might have won had he decided not to foil mom to let his wife win. Shaz has brilliant spatial skills and did really well, but mom would have won if Sid hadn't been messing with her. I'm awful. I have no sense of visual strategy. But Shaz kept skipping over mom's turn, and there was lots of laughter and fun. It's been a while since I've hung out with the family like this, but it was fun. Since Dad had declined the Chinese checkers (and I managed to derail Sid's attempt at a game of tiddly-winks) we played some Taboo and Scattergories. Since Sid, mom and I were on a team of three we won because we had more minds, but Shaz and dad put up a good fight. Shaz actually won the game of Scattergories. Gah. My mind has been blank all evening. I must be more excited for Christmas than I originally thought. But it was fun hanging out with the family - just talking and laughing and joking with each other.
I promised mom and dad that I wouldn't wake them up at some (childishly) ungodly early hour of the morning so I'm gearing up for a long night awake - I have writing to do and whatnot. So anyway, have a merry Christmas, all, and to all a good night!
