California Christmas - Just Like Old Times

We spent Christmas 2012 in California at Grandma Wee's.  Thankfully, we encountered no travel delays and Keegan did great on the flight out and back. We got him his very own carry-on bag just for the trip (trying to teach him my travel motto - if you want to bring it, you carry it!) and he loved being able to roll his bag through the aiport, just like Papa!

He had just one little moment on our flight out where it seemed like his ears were bothering him during the descent to Chicago. He spent the first part of our layover at O'Hare in a funk, but the 2 1/2 hours we had to wait for our next flight to SFO gave us the chance to eat, walk around, find the airport clinic to get some pain reliever for the ears, and bump into Santa!

Put all those things together and he was feeling much better!

We had a nice quiet Christmas morning where he and cousin Renne got to open their gifts.

 

 

  

And then at lunch time, family - including aunts, uncles, many of my cousins, and their kids - began to arrive. I think my mom hosted 50+ family members on Christmas Day and I am always amazed at how effortless she makes it all seem.

Loved that we were able to snap this family photo of almost everyone in attendance, thanks to my brother who climbed a ladder to place the camera tripod on the roof! Just bummed that Matt and Keegan were napping at photo time.

Grandma Wee and her sisters

Cousin Lucas & Dylan teaching Keegan how to play Mario Bros.
 

  

There was lots of catching up, seeing how much some of my cousins' older kids have grown, meeting new babies in the family who were born after our last visit 2 years ago, laughing, noise, and in general what might be best described as large family celebration chaos! It was Christmas like old times, as I remembered it growing up. And of course, with enough food to provide everyone with take home leftovers to last a few weeks!