December 26

The week spanning from Christmas until New Year's is quite possibly, the most awesome week of the entire year. I truly look forward to this week with such anticipation as a time of relaxing - and savoring my friends and family unlike any other time.

The day after Christmas, we woke up to snow in northern Virginia. The landscape was white and beautiful flakes were still softly falling.  I couldn't have dreamed up a more wonderful day if I'd tried. We had no plans to go anywhere, so we all stayed inside, with two refrigerators stocked full of goodies ... and we cooked. And cooked. And cooked. 

We played with all of our new Christmas toys - and we donned our new Christmas clothes including flannel pajamas, cozy slippers and my new Snuggie (courtesy of Charlie who rightly thought this might help keep me warmer than my oversized underwear). We played an abundance of board games and we sat in front of roaring fires and we curled up together watching movies. 

All of us put in an an abundance of soul-food rich deposits in our memory banks. 

And it was good. Perfect even.