Merry Christmas, Bialosky!

One of my family traditions has been the reading of Bialosky's Christmas to my grandchildren when they were little. When I talked with Terri earlier today, Kelley and Molly sang out the climactic line of the book, "Merry Christmas, Bialosky!" and brought back some wonderful memories. Ed and Julie called on their way home from visiting friends and reported that they had a white Christmas in Flower Mound when they woke up this morning. Julie admitted that in the crush of Christmas preparations, the wrapped gifts from Santa under the tree had no name tags, so Cate and Sam had fun opening each others' gifts this morning.

We went out to dinner this afternoon at the Echo Hotel and Conference Center in Edinburg with our friends Hardy and Judy and Bob and Pat. The place was packed when we arrived--it's evidently a favorite spot for the Christmas buffet, and we saw some fellow square dancers leaving as we arrived. We were seated quickly and had a lovely meal, and no one had to cook or clean up. On the way home we stopped at the Cinemark Tinseltown in Mission to buy tickets to see Avatar in 3D tomorrow afternoon with Hardy and Judy.

Ken talked with Gordon and Romaine, who have plenty of ice on the roads in Michigan, but no snow. Rebecca and Cathy called to wish him a Merry Christmas. They celebrated by going to several movies, including the new Sherlock Holmes movie and Avatar, and plan to return to the theater tomorrow. Cathy is working on her third degree black belt now.

Aunt Iris called and reported that her family is doing well. She had a group for Christmas dinner, and in preparation, she got up at 3 a.m. since she couldn't sleep and scrubbed the kitchen floor--just like Iris, who also sang in the choir at the Christmas Eve mass.

We opened our presents wrapped under our little tree. It's been a delightful Christmas.

Ken with his warm wool socks from Terri and can of colossal cashews from Romaine--
he's happy and has warm toes.

The "buy-ology" bag from Terri folds down to a compact, easy to carry size,
but expands to fit whatever you buy.

We watched the first episode of Ken's gift to me tonight--the complete Series I of All Creatures Great and Small.