Christmas Party with the O'Connor's

This Christmas was the year that all the marrieds in our family went to their in-laws' for Christmas, but we still wanted to party! We had a family party on December 19th at my parents' house and it was a blast as always.

As you can see, we had plenty of delicious food!

Including fried shrimp. Yum!

Brycen wore his Santa outfit. He always has a great time playing with his grandparents, aunts, and uncles!

Mom made a delicious pomegranate drink for all of us to toast with before the party started.

Dad said a few things that were really nice and uplifting.

Time to dig in!

After we ate we went into the living room to open presents. We drew names this year (except for Brycen). My family goes from the youngest person to the oldest person when opening gifts, so Brycen went first. This was from my parents and they got him a whole bunch of clothes, size 12 months. Just what he needed!

Then Adam went. He got a t-shirt from Aaron.

l got Amy a couple of shirts and some earrings.

Amber got Britney a scarf and a necklace. So cute!

Mom got a snuggie from Britney. (I had a picture of that but forgot to add it! It would be a huge pain to add it now, but it was really cute!)

Adam got Amber a necklace.

Aaron got a gift card from Amy. Mom got Che' some tools.

Che' got Tyson a shirt for work and a Wendy's gift card.

I didn't get a picture of myself opening presents, but I got a baking pan from my mom as well as a little grater and some pajama pants.

Tyson got Dad a Utes t-shirt and blanket.

Brycen had been working on a secret gift for my parents since last Christmas. He gave them a Shutterfly book that included all the different happenings with the O'Connor family in 2010.

They really liked it!

I put our whole family photo on the front, but Brycen wasn't originally in it. So I just photoshopped him in. I made Tyson holding him in the picture. It turned out pretty cute!

Brycen taking a break on his grandpa

Mom enjoying her snuggie

After presents we played Bingo like we did last year.

Brycen was so tired by this time! Can you tell?

Adam reading the book we made

"Chandler, I Think I'm Sick."

It's 3:30 in the morning. This is how Tyson feels:

And this is how I feel:

Pink bathrobe and all. (Thanks clipartguide.com for letting me borrow the entirely too perfect image that fits me exactly right now.)

...

A term that would describe how I'm feeling right now would be completely miserable. Tyson has gotten up a couple of times because of a toothache, and I've got a head cold from you know where. I don't think I've ever had one this bad. I haven't slept since December 23rd because of the excitement of Christmas. But on Christmas night I couldn't sleep because of a sore throat and stuffy nose. It has since then turned into the worst head cold in history.

...

When I'm in bed the pressure in my head is horrible. And to add onto that, my nose just runs and runs. You know that feeling where you have sinus pressure so bad your teeth hurt? That's how my teeth are feeling right now. Scratch that. That's how my entire head is feeling. There's also that pain where you feel like your head is going to explode if you bend down to pick something up. Not to mention an awesome cough. My pillow is about as crappy as a pillow gets so I can't exactly prop it up and try to sleep. And it doesn't help that I'm having the most detailed dreams of my life the last few days. Last night I was a new server at Roadhouse and couldn't find the kitchen to drop off dirty dishes and find a to-go lid for someone's baked beans. Didn't get a tip from that table. And tonight I'm at yet another Christmas party, but this time I'm taking a lot of pictures of cupcakes. Mostly green ones, a couple red. Most of these super detailed dreams have been about Christmas parties.

...

So here I am at 3:42. I have a roll of toilet paper sitting next to me (ran out of tissues yesterday) as well as a bottle of hand sanitizer. If I'm going to be sitting here sneezing and blowing my nose like crazy I might as well keep my hands relatively sanitized, right? On the bright side my favorite little man has been able to sleep tonight. He woke up at about 12:30 crying, but as soon as he was picked up he went right back to sleep. Hopefully he'll be able to sleep well into the morning and get the rest he needs.

...
I have a lot to do tomorrow and I'm not sure if I'll be able to get to it if I'm feeling this crappy.

...

Frustrating. I need some soup.

Happy Birthday, Che' & Mom!

Che's 27th birthday was December 13th and Mom's 51st was the 17th. They decided to have a combined birthday party on Mom's birthday and it was really fun. And yes, we had suki yaki. It was delicious as always!

Brycen getting ice cream from Aunt Amy

Our happy little family


I changed Brycen into his jammies part way through the night and my mom was pinching his cute back fat.

It was making him laugh.

Dad makes the best gyoza ever!

Amy's table scape

Aaron, Tyson and Britney dishing up while Mom gets another phone call for her birthday

Two thumbs up from Amy and Adam!

Amber reaching for some food

Brycen sat in his bumbo chair and watched all the action.

Che' & Amber

Mom & Brycen
He loves his grandmas!

Opening presents

We got Che' a workout shirt and a Buckle gift card for his birthday.

He got a really big summer sausage from Mom and Dad.

Tyson, Amy and Dad watching Mom and Che' open presents

Amber and Che' gave Mom a really cute snowman holding a candy dish.

We got her "The LDS Christmas Hymnbook".

These books are so cool. This one has all the Christmas songs from the hymn book and primary song book, plus other classic Christmas songs arranged in hymn format. It is really neat. We have "The LDS Hymn Book" and Tyson's mom has "The Primary Children Song Book" and they are all awesome!

Amy got Mom some really cute black boots.

Aaron, Britney & Adam

Brycen was really enjoying playing with some plastic wrapping.

And with a bow on his wittle head.

Che' went and got his own cake again this year.

Mom likes chocolate and he likes vanilla, so he chose a chocolate cake with vanilla frosting.

Singing "Happy Birthday"

Blowing out the candles

Brycen & Aunt Britney

Cutting the cake