Christmas Eve 2009

Christmas Eve is the one time every year that the whole extended family is invited to my house. Last year we were snowed out but this year we had a lot of family.

There were 7 Sirrines, 4 Walshes, 11 VanderHoevens, 6 Lutzes, 3 Livelys, 4 Keenans, 2 Dukas and 1 Ojeda, so 37 people, not to mention 2 dogs.


No VanderHoeven family party is complete unless there is a ton of food this was no exception.













My family was especially blessed because we had all 5 of our kids and our 3 grandsons over. We even had Olga, Jared and Emily's exchange student who has become part of the family (dang it, is that lamp crooked?).













Emily played the piano and this year we sang Silent Night in English, Spanish, German and Dutch (my favorite part of the night)





Then there was the white elephant gift exchange with some very clever gifts. The rule was that whatever you ended up with, you had to take home. That rule was obeyed with a few exceptions. Let's just say violators will be prosecuted.





Patricia was pretty happy with her "Hander-pants" and she couldn't be convinced to trade.





I got an assortment of products from a Japanese store including a package of freeze-dried fish. They turned out to be a highlight of our Christmas the next day but I'll let someone else tell that story.