So Many Parties, so Little Time!

I love this time of year!

Have you all been as busy as we have?

We have had 4 Christmas parties in the last 3 days.

I love visiting with my family and friends, and boy do we have a lot of family and friends!

It all started on Friday. It was the first anniversary of Mr Bird's mom's death.

We wanted to all be together and remember mom and have fun at the same time. She was quite the party animal, you know. We decided to meet at her grave and then head over to our house and decorate gingerbread houses in her honor.

Lisa, my crazy sister in law made her the perfect snow angel for our angel mother! Did I mention she had just come from the temple and was in her nice dress!

She's crazy!

She looks so prim and proper, don't you think? Don't let the outer exterior fool you, she is up there with the craziest of crazies. Just ask her sisters, they'll tell you.

Mom loved getting together with all the grand kids at Christmas time. We decided to have the festivities in the barn since it can get quite messy.

Thank heavens for our wood burning stove out there. It was about 20 degrees that evening and we would have froze without it. We cleared out the ground level of the barn and set up tables and had hot chocolate and soup with yummy home made rolls. Not to mention candy galore! I think my kids ate more candy than ended up on their ginger bread houses.

Good times were had by all. I would post pictures of that too, but our battery died in the camera (the one that is on loan to us thanks to Josh and Tiff since we are too poor to buy a new one right now, Thanks Guys!). Sadly we did not get any pictures at any of the other parties this week end.

Saturday was party marathon. We woke up and started getting ready for my family party. Now all 4 of my sisters live within 60 miles of each other. When we get all of us and our spouses and all the kids together it is quite the group. Some of my oldest nieces and nephews are getting married and having babies so we really are a huge group.

We played our traditional White elephant game and ate and talked and ate some more.

When that was over we took one of my nieces home with us and dropped her and the kids off and Mr Bird and I were off to his company party. After a quick wardrobe change, that is.

This party was held in the Imperial Ball Room at the Grand America Hotel in down town Salt Lake City.

Sound fancy?

It was.

We put on our fanciest clothes and I wore my highest heals and we were ready to party.

They had a live band, juicy prime rib and a dessert buffet. You know what that means, don't you?

All the chocolate dessert I could hold, without looking like a pig of course!

After they did the company awards they opened up the dance floor for those who wanted to dance. I finally talked Mr Bird into dancing with me. You'll never guess what song we danced to.

The hokey Poky

I kid you not. There I was in my fanciest clothes and my highest heals and my nicely curled hair in a gorgeous ball room with lots of chocolate in my tummy, playing the hokey poky. But hey, for a guy that has not danced with his wife since his wedding, it was improvement.

The next song was Wonderful Tonight and I made him dance with me. Then they played another slow one and we danced again. I thought I'd died and gone to heaven, I had such a good time. After 3 songs in a row I counted myself lucky and we headed for home. It was a nice long drive, with lots of nice long conversations. Have I mentioned that I love my man?

*sigh*

Our 4th and final party was Mr Bird's family party hosted by that crazy lady, Lisa.

His family is just as big, if not bigger than my family. His parents have 6 kids, plus spouses and grand kids (around 30) and now even a great grandchild. We played the traditional sock game and sang carols and ate and acted out the nativity. My kids were in the middle of melt downs during the nativity so it was a little interesting. We came home around bed time with visions of sugar plums dancing in our heads.

Today has been catch up day around here. It's amazing how messy our house gets, even when we are not here for 3 days straight.

I am officially partied out! I am ready for Christmas and I can't wait.

I feel just like a kid again.