Am I the only one? Im so glad they are over.
I cooked..I visited..Im done til next year. There is a reason the holidays only come a few times a year lol.

I talked with my FIL and he is gonna let the other son have Thanksgiving at their place and then Christmas at his house. They normally do it that way but the other son has a new premature baby so my FIL did both holidays. After turkey on Thanksgiving FIL decided to do a crazy pasta, burger, hotdog hodge podge Christmas dinner. I cannot say I cared for it. I prefer a more traditional Christmas dinner. The pasta is great to do with a regular hoiliday dinner but not in place of. Next year a traditional holiday dinner with some Italian elements like baked pastas and a antipasto platter sounds ideal. Maybe the old mans stove will finally kick off by then and he will have to replace the antique. :rolleyes:

We will do another dinner for Easter and then nothing else til Nov.

I too am ALWAYS glad when the holiday season is over- BUT, I don't really like this too-quiet January time of year, either. It's a wee-bit too uneventful and hum-drum now, for my taste.

I love Christmas but by New Year's I'm always through w/ the fussin' and wantin' all to be back to normal.

This year was a bit more my ideal as far as the gift-giving, 'cause everybody was feeling the pain financially due to the economy, so we all scaled-back the buying a lot. I much prefer giving small token gifts- or simple omemade gifts, myself.

My sister has kids, and she and her hubby are both lucky enuf to have decent jobs, and like most families today with any amount of means, their kids are over-indulged and have everything. (Mind you- I don't blame them, necessarily- as EXCESS seems to be the common thing these days...)

I don't myself like to see a Christmas Tree that's half-buried in excess presents- I'd much prefer a lovely tree, beautifully but simply decorated, with a small, tastefully-modest scattering of parcels beneath it.

But, I'm the non-parent in our group, and whenever I voice this view of preference for scaled-back giving, I'm always shoved off to the side and told that since I'm not a parent, I cannot really and truly "understand". (Hmmm... Okay!)

My all-time favorite Christmas Party was an annual event my friends Julie & Scott in Fairbanks always have- sadly I obviously did not attend this year- I sure missed it!

They invite about 20-30 folks to their home and they cook a theme dinner. One year it was moose chili- another year it was Mexican, another year it was lasagne...

The party is a "white elephant" (or "Chinese Auction") tree-ornament-exchange. Everyone brings a wrapped Christmas Tree Ornament. We draw numbers and person #1 selects a wrapped box- unwraps it. Person #2 has the choice of selecting either that ornament previously selected by person #1 (in this case, then person #1 then selects a new wrapped box to unwrap) OR selecting a new box to unwrap. And so on...

Soon, person #23 has the option of selecting a new box to un-wrap, OR he may select any of the previously unwrapped ornaments that the prior 22 people have chosen.

These are always fun because inevitibly there are always some lavishly beautiful ornaments that everyone covets- always a few goofy gag-ornaments, and always a few new trendy ornaments that are that year's "rage"- that everybody wants! There's also at least one "bum" ornament that is the lousiest of them ALL- that NO ONE wants! So the competitive "war" and "rascalling" that occurs is always really a hoot!

Plus the fellowship and food are always perfectly fantastic, too!

(I sure missed Julie & Scott and their wonderful annual party this year...)

Kevin I bet your friends missed you at the party to.
Cathy if I didnt have to cook for 13-14 and then pack it all up and haul it to another location I would want more holidays lol. Shlepping all that up and down the stairs here to my car in winter takes alot of the fun out of it for me. I have to reheat it when I get it there and no one in Jons family has the ability to get there on time.

I am very glad the holidays are over and I can get back into my normal routine. There is always so much to do at the holidays and I don't get much help. I try to limit what I do but you should have seen the fuss that was raised by people at work when I refused to participate in the 3rd December holiday potluck. By the time it's over I'm exhausted.