Belated Christmas wishes

Hope you had a lovely Christmas! Ours was quiet and good. This year, like last, we joined Nathan's parents at their place in Montana rather than gathering at our house. This time, we made the trip before Christmas instead of on/after Christmas. So...after getting (almost) all of our fudge delivered and having all our presents wrapped and ready, we flew to Bozeman on Saturday the 21st. 

It was a long day that started with Asher waking up sick. He was having symptoms near enough to appendicitis that we figured we'd rather be safe than sorry so took him to Urgent Care to have that ruled out before getting on a plane and then being in the middle of nowhere in Montana. Fortunately (?), the doctor was pretty confident that it was a stomach bug instead of appendicitis so we hurriedly finished up our packing and got to the airport. (We made it fine but it was definitely a more chaotic morning than we're used to, lol.) There was a slight scuttle with an unruly passenger during boarding that delayed our flight but we managed to take off. John & Nancy picked us up once we landed, we had dinner nearby and then drove the couple hours to their place. Just before bed, though, Asher vomited all over, so that was fun to clean up before finally getting some sleep. 

On the pro side: it was nice to have our holiday stuff pretty much done early...and John & Nancy's floors aren't carpeted so clean up was a bit easier (would have been easier if he'd managed to use the trash can we'd preemptively set beside him, though, lol).

On the con side: it made visit number five to Urgent Care for us for 2024 (Asher's third visit)...and the vomit sprayed on coats and the quilt and the walls. 

Fun times. 

We spent Sunday and Monday just chilling together, exchanging gifts and playing games. By Sunday evening (having mostly kept to himself until then), thankfully, Asher was mostly recovered. Whew.

Tuesday, we made the trip back to Bozeman, enjoyed lunch near the airport together and then got dropped off for our flight. I remembered to take a photo...

We had an uneventful flight and got home in time to heat up the frozen Waltzing Kangaroo meat pies we'd purchased for that purpose (since most places were closed for Christmas eve). 

Oh! One of the highlights of our trip this time was tiny bunnies. Remember the little ducks we hid last Easter for boys to hunt? Well, we got tiny bunnies (Nancy used to collect bunnies and still has quite a few despite downsizing) and hid them all over the house. (The bunnies are actually a little bigger than the ducks, fyi.) The intention was for them to find them throughout the year and think of us. :) 

Nathan entertained himself lining the bunnies up before we split them up between the five of us and set about hiding them while John & Nancy were out of the house. It was fun! Plus, it was awesome watching John & Nancy find them during the rest of our stay. By the time we left, they'd only found about a third of them but seemed to enjoy the hunt. Some had been intentionally hunted and some had been happened upon randomly. We're easily entertained, lol. 

Christmas morning, then, we woke people up to exchange our own presents a bit after 10. (I don't think we've ever opened gifts earlier than 9, btw, lol.) It was quiet and thoughtful and lovely. We played some new games and enjoyed a Christmas lasagna and just appreciated the time together. 

And now we're slowly getting back in the swing of things. Micah headed back to Boulder yesterday (he had work today) and Noah's been back at work yesterday and today. I'll be back later with more of a wrap up of the year as we get closer to 2025. :)