Christmas 2012

Like last year, we opted to stay home in Davis for the holiday.  Our Christmas was small, with just a couple of gifts for each of us (well, Eddie also got one from Santa plus a hand-me-down I nabbed from my parents' house and we haven't done our gift exchange with my family yet).

We let Eddie put out cookies, a glass of milk, and a carrot for Santa and his helpers. And he was happy to see just crumbs and a carrot nub left when he got up at about 9 am on the big day. I made him pose for a few pictures before we opened up our gifts.  For record's sake, here's what we received:

Eddie's fourth Christmas, he's 3 years and 4 months old.

Eddie got a pair of ear muffs from his Grammy and Papa (for wearing on the heavy equipment), a dinosaur LEGO/K'NEX kit from us, a set of dinosaur figurines from Santa...and my old kid-sized sleeping bag that I nabbed from my parents' house.

Checking out his new toy.

He was insistent that we go to Gualala immediately so he could drive the "sheens" with his muffs on.

Dave got a coffee cup from Eddie and a set of Coffee Joulies from me (check them out--made by two Dave's and they're called Joulies ("Julies")--isn't that awesome?), and a bottle of Bogle port.  We both like Bogle wines a lot and he especially loves port (generally too sweet for me).  I took Eddie to the homewares store here in town and we found alllllllllll the cups with red on them, lined them up on a shelf, and then he picked one for his Daddy.  He almost settled on the roses and hearts one, but then chose one with two dogs chasing a cat on it. How appropriate.

I was spoiled and got a wireless mouse, a sleeve for my new laptop, a pair of crystal earrings to match last year's bracelet, and (the best part!) a no-touch infrared digital thermometer.  This type of thermometer has been on my wish list for eons and I'm so glad I got one!  Dave and I have both been using it--me for cooking and him for cooking, analyzing the new vs. old windows, and determining if the doors hanging in the garage were warm enough to paint.

You can see Eddie's cup of chocolate milk next to Dave's coffee cup during presents.  Giving Eddie a special treat like that allowed us to delay breakfast until nearly 10:30 am!

My parents arrived late that morning and my dad and I got right to work preparing our Christmas feast.  We were joined by my post doc (Rongzhong), his wife (Jane), and their toddler (Liyang...I was pronouncing it phonetically and then realized that they say it like Leon...oops).  We made: ham, greens, sweet potatoes, salad, olive bread, Red Hots apples, and two Swedish recipes since Edward and Jennifer were there on the holiday.  The Swedish things included glogg (basically sweetened, mulled red wine) and a  pepparkakor spice cake.  Jane brought some Chinese sesame balls filled with red bean paste and they were amazing.  I think we all had a great time.  Eddie and Leon had a fun time playing and my dad and Rongzhong chatted at the table for a long time.

Eddie helped me make the spice cake.

Christmas dinner.  We used my Grandma's silver and our wedding china (Ballet Ribbon by Waterford).

My mom always does such a nice job decorating/setting the table.

Normally I make the desserts, but this time I let my mom buy a "French Silk" and a berry pie from Shari's in Livermore.  They claim to make the same pies as Baker's Square, but their chocolate silk pie is definitely not the same.  I keep meaning to try making my own because all the imitations I've had just aren't even close.

The next morning my dad and I made crepes using a Nordic Ware crepe pan we'd found at the SPCA thrift store a few weeks before.  It was only like $4 and it sells on Amazon for over $50.  I don't have the dipping dish for the batter, but a soup plate worked well enough.  Not well enough for my dad, however, so he made a template for one with a piece of cardboard.  His plan is to make one of the appropriate curve on his lathe.  It was definitely worth the $4 but not at full cost--I like my normal crepe pan better, which I adopted from a cookware orphanage (i.e., my parents' pantry).

Me and my fancy new kitchen toy!

My dad loves Swedish crepes and he recalls having them with cardamom powdered sugar dusted on top--so he used the mortar and pestle to make some.  I didn't have any lignon berry jam so we used plum jam and lemon curd.  Sadly, my folks had to return to Livermore early that afternoon but we wish they could have stayed longer.

Crepe breakfast!

Grandma and Eddie spent a lot of time reading together.

In the days following Christmas, we hung around the house mostly.  My Picasa auto-upload phone pictures remind me that we went to Joe's Crab Shack to use up some BOGO coupons we'd gotten when we "donated" money to a charity back in September when the Whitneys were visiting.  At the time of purchase the waitress had said we could use both coupons at the same time if we needed to--but of course it wasn't quite that simple.  We were able to get our waitress to split our table into two tickets without much trouble.  So from two coupons, we ended up with three adult entrees an an order of crab nachos.  One of the entrees was a small steak and sides, which we just took home.  The steak turned into two batches of cook su, the broccoli turned into left-over-Christmas-ham quiche, and the chickens enjoyed the rice.

The waitress wrote silly things on our bibs.  Eddie, being a "bigger boy" as he calls himself, refused to wear a baby bib.  Haha, I love what she wrote on his!

Dave made me take this picture and send it to our college friend with a quote from Super Troopers. Prav was a good sport and texted me back with the next line from the movie. 

I hope everyone had a great holiday, too!