How We Spent Our Christmas Vacation

Many dinners out:
The kids were treated to Uno's by their aunt and uncle, and afterwards they went to see the lights at Wickham Park. Now everytime we pass Uno's, Anna tells me that is where Uncle Cory took her.
We celebrated my Dad's 65th at Red Lobster, where I actually had a really good meal (the Maple Chicken was good!) and I had a personal victory of only eating ONE of those devilish biscuits they serve. Never.happened. before. Then we went back to the house and enjoyed a good cake that Dave made but I decorated. I say the making is far more important than the decorating, because I could make a tunafish/dogfood cake with tarragon frosting look really good, but it would make everyone want to vomit.
Our fearless and trustworthy leader, Dave/Daddy, led us through the darkened streets of Orlando on an hour long quest to find a Fazoli's. The kids (well, us too!) haven't been the same since Fazoli's shut down in our county, and we were in all you can eat breadstick heaven when we found one after a looooong day at Sea World.
We went out with my Mom to a fun late night dinner at Steak n Shake (the kids' current favorite place to eat) and we were delighted to learn that kids eat free there on the weekends.
We used a giftcard and took the kids out to eat at Chili's on a Saturday night. They were fascinated with the whole thing. Something funny happened there but I have been sworn to absolute secrecy by Jonathan. One thing that was cute, is that Jon read the kid's menu, circled his choice with a crayon, and wrote YES next to it and showed the waitress.
I am sure I am forgetting something...
We also celebrated two birthdays (and two more in spirit, Meredith's and Grandma Jane's) Anna's first, and then Dad's over Christmas break. Anna loved her party and was thrilled with her decorations, cake and presents, and gratefully, thankfully so, was oblivious to the family tensions.
We bought tickets/planned a trip to Kentucky for spring break, which I am VERY excited about. The kids have great memories of Grandma Jane's house, and we will get to spend time with her and Aunt MerMer and also, Dave will be going with us this time, which is VERY exciting! And I think we are finally going to go to the caves. I love visting caves. I always have. Like on tours, I'm not a spelunker or whatever you call it. (As if. Seriously. Can you imagine the play-dough fat factory that would occur right now if I were strapped into one of those harnessed outfits? Shivers, Chills, and shudders on my part. Sorry, y'all, to inflict that painful mental image. David, stop enjoying it.)
We actually got some noteworthy cold weather here, and it is ALL ANYONE CAN TALK ABOUT. Meanwhile, most of our relatives/loved ones are dealing with actual cold weather. But we have spent a lot of time exclaiming over it, dressing inappropriately for it, and posting Facebook statuses over how cold it is. And by we, I mean everyone I know in this town.
We had a scrapbooking frenzy here, and it wasn't even me! Justine made a beautiful album as a gift for her Mom, and the kids caught the bug, and made albums of their own. It was very sweet and fun. Good memories, of the memory-recording, I guess.
I learned how amazingly self-sufficient my children can be when they want to. They got into various kinds of mischief, and, lacking other social contact, found each other to be sufficiently fun playmates (they had some wild music parties with Anna's new Hello Kitty CD player). Also, Anna developed the capability to get herself her own breakfast. She actually got blueberries out and washed them well and put them into a bowl, and poured herself some cereal. And Jonathan, well, Jonathan is probably going to be more of a grown up than me pretty soon. :)
What else, what else? Trip to Sea World, Bethlehem Walk, OH! We made it to the gym exactly 0 times. We had good plans, but it simply never happened. We did watch a ton of movies. Dave bought a blu-ray player for himself for Christmas, and we hooked up to Netflix (it is all magical to me and the kids) and we have tons of movies and shows available to just watch whenever we want. Also, we went to lots of movies, the kids saw Alvin and the Chipmunks with Dave, Dave took Anna on a daddy/daughter date to see The Princess and the Frog, and Dave went to see Avatar by himself because I fell asleep at 9 PM when we were supposed to go to the 10 PM showing. He said it was REALLY good. I went to see It's Complicated with my Mom, and was humored by her falling asleep and snoring. The couple in front of us clearly had some infidelity issues, because they fought almost the entire movie. When the two main characters asked each other why their sex was so much sexier than when they were married, the girl in front of me said loudly, because IT'S WRONG and then she gave her husband a scathing look. They carried on like this during most of the movie. I did not find the movie as funny as some others. My Mom apparently did not find it entertaining (I think she was just really tired).
Oh, yes, we put the tree up, and we took the tree down. By we, I mean Dave and the kids. I did not help.
I cleaned the house very well, once, although you can't tell... My Mom came over and cleared out and organized the kids' rooms, and that made a difference. I think next year instead of buying them any gifts we should just clear their rooms out so they can rediscover all their toys they already own.
We went to a fun gettogether at some church friends house for New Year's Eve. We played the best game ever, Apples to Apples, and left around 9 PM. The kids were tired. I went to brush my teeth around midnight and had to spit in the sink and hurry back because the ball was dropping and I almost missed it.
I renewed my teaching elgibility, and am going at the first available opportunity to go get my fingerprints done (for the THIRD time since August, don't get me started on that scam) so I can actually be a certified teacher in the state of Florida for English grades 6-12. I have been in a weird state of flux since I graduated college in 2003, having met all the requirements, but sort of in a certification purgatory. Now I am ready to get out.
What else, what else? I cried a lot. It was a rough holiday...but we made it through.