2nd Annual Neighborhood Progressive Christmas Party

Once again, our neighborhood put on quite a party! Last year we started an annual Christmas Party, where we travel from house to house eating and playing gmaes. The problem was we ate way too much and there were too many houses. The poor people (I was one of them) that were at the end had tons of leftover food and most of their food was overdone. So, this year we changed things up. We chose three houses:

appetizer house

main course house

dessert house

and it worked out wonderfully! The night started at our house where I served appetizers. I made Rumaki, stuffed jalepeno peppers, and my favorite spinach artichoke dip. Here is Raquel digging in:

Then to help us work off some of our calories, we played a few games. One of the best ones was Christmas Carol Charades. I added a twist to the game and split the party into two groups. Each group wrote five lyrics from Christmas Carols for the other team to act out. The team had to guess the lyric and the carol it came from. Among some of the harder ones were:

And our dear Savoir's birth from O Holy Night

Kevin got this one and actually got down on his back, grabbed his knees and pushed out a baby.....the party erupted with laughter

And if you ever saw it from Rudolph, the Red Nosed Reindeer

this one was really hard

Here is a glimpse of some of our Charade fun:

And it wouldn't be a neighborhood party if Kiera didn't get some love from Chris:

Some of the men talking:

After a few games and some good treats, we moved on to the main course at Joanne's. Roast beef and Pork Roast were served with scalloped potatoes, sweet potatoes, broccoli and salad. It was prepared by several people and simply delicious! We had some table topics to keep us busy.

After dinner, as the time approached 9 pm, Kiera became a little whiny. She wanted me to carry her. I was preparing the next game, so I could not. Warren came over and asked her if he could carry her. She said no! So he started crying and saying, "Please Kiera, let me carry you..waaaaa" She stood there for a minute and just looked at him. He was pretend crying so loud, I thought she was going to start. She didn't know him and she was overtired.

Then she did the sweetest thing:

She reached forward and hugged him. She rubbed his shoulder and kissed him on his cheek. That is my Kiera, so sweet and sensitive to others!

After dinner, we really had to work off our food in order to be ready for the dessert house, so we had a digital scavenger hunt. Again, the party was divided into two teams. Each team was given a list of things having to do with Christmas such as a lump of coal, a gold star, Christmas boxers, etc. They were things that were a little harder to find. The object of the game was to find as many of the things as you could in fifteen minutes. Instead of actually bringing the things to show the other team, we took pictures of the items. One of the items to find was a broken ornament, so Joanne (who apparently is quite competitive) decided to take one of her glass ornaments and smash it into the floor so Kevin could photograph it:

So, we synched our watches and said you have to be back at 9:40 in front of Chris and Jerry's door or you are disqualified. My team was there at 9:38. Kevin's team was running (fast!) down the block and arrived at 9:41. We let them submit their pictures even though they were late and they still lost!

It was tons of fun.

The last stop was the dessert house and white elephant gift exchange. Apparently, my photograher got tired, so there are not many pictures. We did enjoy some delicious desserts that included Tiramisu, Black Russian Cake, and homemade Christmas cookies.

We did the tradional White Elephant game and there was lots and lots of present stealing going on. I ended up with what I brought....10 lottery tickets and Kevin got a ball cap.

It was a fun, fun night! I live in the best neighborhood. The parties just keep getting better!

Merry Christmas!