Christmas

I had a fever of 102 Christmas eve, so I didn't attend Christmas mass this year. I spent Christmas eve in bed, and my mother-in-law, Louise, came up to visit for Christmas and part of the weekend.

I cooked part of a Christmas meal - I made green bean casserole, balsamic vinegar marinated vegetables, garlic rosemary mashed potatoes - all made with ingredients I had purchased a few days before - before I had gotten sick. My plan was to buy the ham or bird the day before so it would be fresh, and also because I hadn't decided what to serve yet, but when I discovered that I had a fever on Christmas eve, I just got a pre-cooked rotisserie chicken instead. Actually, I asked Oliver to pick up "the ham" at the store, and he went to the store and brought home ham, in lunch meat form (he doesn't usually do any of the cooking or shopping you see) - so, sick as I was, I ventured out to the store again and bought the pre-cooked rotisserie chicken - thinking, at least we could eat that if I was too sick to manage anything else - luckily Nyquil is a wonder drug, and I was feeling much better the next day.

I hadn't eaten anything but toast for two days before, but I sure made up for it in the next 24 hours! Lots of food and cider, and chocolate, and cookies... lots of food.

The obligatory photo op by the river shot:

Toby, making himself at home on the bed linens Louise brought with her.

We ate, walked along the bike path by our house, went to the park, opened presents, ate some more, drove around and looked at the Christmas lights, played Scrabble and watched a Saturday Night Live Christmas special on TV. Oliver's mom watched Toby for an hour the day after Christmas and Oliver and went out for a "date night" breakfast. We had eggs benedict at this funky little Asian cafe across the street from us - decorated with Asian art and Chicago Cubs fan memorabilia - an odd little breakfast spot, but nice to get out of the house as a couple nonetheless. After breakfast we all headed out to the Sacramento Train Museum in Old Town Sacramento.

The park

Christmas lights (not ours)

The Train Museum

We topped off the weekend by visiting with Oliver's Dad, his sister Amanda, brother Nikolas and his girlfriend Veronica, on the computer via Skype. It was fun watching them all play "peek-a-boo" with Toby via web cam.

When we turned it off Toby said, "That was a good show!" It was pretty cool.

Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas!

Lots of love from the Greene family.