364 days out of the year I pride myself on stretching our grocery budget as far as possible and even challenge myself to reduce waste (food waste and $ waste) by using creative meal plans to recycle leftovers. But, on Christmas Eve, we live it up! In fact, we set aside money from each paycheck all year long to afford the luxury of throwing anything and everything into the shopping cart for our Christmas Eve feast. After gorging ourselves on meats and cheeses, fruits and veggies, seafood, dips and spreads, we didn't even make a dent! Next year we're either going to have to a) scale back (unlikely); or b) invite 500 of our closest friends to share our feast.
I had the laughable notion that, as the kids were hours away from being spoiled rotten by gifts galore, maybe, just maybe, they might think to be on their best behavior. Wrong! The boys quickly disabused me of this silly idea. It was beyond them to contain all of their excitement and anticipation--and that energy manifested in loud, chaotic, and basically downright obnoxious behavior. Keeping it real. I had envisioned an evening program with singing, game playing, scripture reading, and nativity re-enacting, but it was not meant to be. We abbreviated the program (boo) and tucked the crazies in bed with visions of sugar plums (or presents) in their heads.
