Christmas Outtakes

Thought this would be fun... I realized I had some pretty funny photos from Christmas!

My dad, for some unknown reason, decided to give us all "gag gifts" this year. My mom's wasn't actually a gag, although she thought it was at first and nearly tossed aside the box of Airbourne that she unwrapped from my dad. At his urging, she opened the box to find a pair of earrings she'd been wanting.

Here's my gag gift - the past six weeks of the Sunday comics from the AJC. Look at the foresight he had to have in order to pull this off - either than, or they forgot to take out the recycling for six weeks... This is actually also useful, as I will read these (Chris and I have gotten through about three weeks' worth). I guess it's become a joke because my dad knows that if a visit from me includes a Sunday, my firts question to him that morning will be, "Have you seen the comics?" Too bad they aren't really funny... I guess it's just a habit for me!

Okay, I know this is really lazy of me, but I forgot to rotate this photo and uploading is painfully slow, so I am going to leave this picture sideways. This is Tim with his gag gift - his was the most useless of all. Since he is in the seminary studying for the priesthood, my dad's gift was this very old puzzle of Pope JPII - it has been in their basement for at least 20 years. I don't know where it came from, but how random is that? A 500 piece puzzle of the Pope? We did this puzzle once in my childhood - that white background is a killer!! I wonder if Tim plans to take this back to school to do with his fellow seminarians in their free time?

My dad gave my other brothers rolls of deoderant - ha ha.

"What happened??? My cake doesn't look like the one in the picture!" Tim convinced my mom to make this fancy cake with Lindt chocolate and chocolate ganache and whipped cream and peppermint marshmallow topping... it had several "issues," including overflowing, sticking to the cake pans, missing some layers of whipped cream, and the marshmallow topping didn't quite turn out (this picture was taken before the topping ran down all over the cake plate and stovetop). As my mom said, "I like to COOK, not bake!" We affectionately dubbed it "toothpaste cake," and I very much enjoyed indulging in 3 or 4 pieces during our stay, plus bowls of crumbs from the failed cake topped with extra peppermint whipped cream - mmmmmmm.

A baby, a cat, and some dog food. Although Cecilia thought the cat was "Utch" too.

And "Utch" thinks this is a cat.

Can you spot the baby?

"Bungee cords - just what I wanted!!!"

How pitiful, opening Christmas gifts in a 13 year old t-shirt with a barf bucket at her side...

Clearly, we all need a little of this!!!
(It's a strawberry daquiri mix if you can't tell)