I've met my match. Damn you, Hot Wheels.

Christmas is a time for traditions. Sparkling trees, nostalgic ornaments, hot cider, lovely gifts, and playing the same songs over and over until all retail workers everywhere begin to bleed from their ears. Also cookies. Spritz, date cookies, rum balls, monster cookies, double chocolate cookies, Belgian waffle cookies, thumbprints, haystacks, Hershey Kiss peanut butter cookies... So. Many. Cookies.


Of course the best part is that my nephews and niece get so excited. I learned how to type in like the fifth grade, but Laura is in first grade and already at about that level. She could operate the DVD player when she was two. And now she has a little gaming system on which she logged about four hours directly after opening it.


Finn is too little for electronics. He almost ate the Christmas tree. You can imagine what his drool would do to something with batteries. And Max is so little that he needed to sleep all through gift opening, which is just as well because the constantly flashing camera would've probably been real annoying.


Sammy received a few sets of Hot Wheels track kits, all of which he insisted that I set up for him. What with missing parts and track that has to be held down in just the right way to keep the cars on course, I was not pleased. I stuck it out for a half hour, and then all the adults were begging the children to just sit and watch a movie. We're horrible people.


Penny was ever so pleased to be reunited with my grandma.

Now it is 2011 and I'm going to say this: I'm filing 2010 away in the "to shred" folder and moving forward in the hope that 2011 will be grand. Now I'm going to knit so I actually have something of substance to share!