On top of spaghetti, all covered in cheese...

'Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house.
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse;
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there;

When out, in the bathroom, there arose such a splatter,
I sprang out the bed to see what was the matter.
Twas poor Kevin, puking his dinner.
The meatballs, we discovered, should have been made thinner!

It sounds so much better when I follow the style of a traditional Christmas poem, right? Despite 3 hours of simmering, the meatballs for our Christmas Eve dinner were still raw! At the time we were eating, we thought it was just pink from the sauce, but thanks to Kevin's digestive acrobatics, we discovered that was not the case. Luckily, Kevin got it out of his system in one swoop and spent Christmas day feeling tentatively OK. My mom made a (thoroughly cooked) turkey with all the fixin's for Christmas day and we are still enjoying the leftovers of both meals, nearly a full week later! Christmas day was sunny and had a high temperature of 66. Though not reminiscent of past Christmases, we all agreed the change was welcome and enjoyed several walks around the neighborhood.

The rest of our Christmas celebration went off without a hitch, and consisted mostly of lounging around, reading, watching movies, and a little bit of shopping. Oh yes, and eating cookies (that were also fully cooked..fancy!). Squirt had a blast chewing all the wrapping paper on Christmas morning, was very sad to see my family go...just the two of us seem to bore her a bit! Kevin & I were so happy my family could make the trip, it felt like a real treat to celebrate the holiday in our own home. We definitely missed his family in New York, though they weren't far from our thoughts as we followed their typical holiday traditions of meatballs for dinner, someone being sick, and a toilet overflowing. We look forward to seeing many of them in a few weeks when we travel home to MD for Christmas #2.