Sunday, January 11, 2009

New Year's Eve


We had a really fun New Year's Eve at home this year. Holli, Johnny, and Rhys were in town visiting from Georgia and they also brought John's mom Christy. Our friends Jay and Shauntel also came over with their two kids.

We decided at the very last minute to have a murder mystery party. Fortunately, we had a bunch of Chinese decorations on hand and we made it to Panda Express just before they closed for some takeout. Some even managed to throw together some decent costumes.

It really was a blast. I think my favorite part was either Jay's raspy drawl, (he was getting over a cold, but it really added to his character) or Johnny's awesome Chinese accent.


Unfortunately, the kids had a little too much fun as well.

We had a bit of a breakdown with the toyroom closet locking system. This picture was taken after a bit of cleanup had already occured, including putting the cushion back on the futon.

While I thought we all looked pretty cute with our costumes and props, leave it to a few cute kids to steal the show!
I gave Isaac first pick on the props, and I was surprised when he picked the fan. I was also surprised that no fights broke out over who got which prop. (I'm kind of missing his curly locks!)
What cuties!

The girls.

By this point in the evening, (maybe 10:00ish) poor Isaac was so tired he just wanted to go to bed and went there happily while the other kids continued to play. The rest of us were just getting started. We ended up talking, snacking, and playing games until about 1:30 am. We had fun taking turns asking questions from the game "Would You Rather," which prompted some interesting discussion.
And lastly, just before bed, the kids left their shoes under the tree. At our house, Mrs. Santa Claus comes on New Year's eve and fills our shoes with nuts and candy. Each person also gets a book and a small toy or something. Anyways, I always loved this tradition growing up--it gave you something to look forward to after Christmas was all over. And that is how we celebrated the new year over here!

5 comments:

Sam said...

Cool, yet another fun tradtion! First you wack the santa pinata and now you extend the holidays by having shoes filled with treats! Very cool!!

cassidy said...

That's a fun idea for New Year's Eve. I always get so antsy waiting until midnight. Looks like you had lots of fun.

Sarah & Eddie said...

What a fun and creative New Years eve you guys had. I love it. We are so very boring over here, but I think we tend to enjoy the laziness that seems so accompany the boringness. LOL, I hope what I said just made even slight sense.

Lexi said...

did you really have all those decoration on hand. glad you had a fun new years party

Jolynn said...

Well it looks like you had tons of fun. But my word, that play room! What happened to the lock? Cute pics of everyone, especially the kids.