Heading North for Christmas Vacation

We love spending time with family, and the holidays are a great time to get together. It would be easier to stay in sunny south Texas, enjoying the 80-degree weather at the pool. But instead, we made the 13-hour drive in the car to see our families during the holiday. A beautiful Oklahoma sunset greeted us back to Oklahoma at the end of our long journey. The picture isn't great, as it was taken from the passenger seat through the driver's side window. Maybe it was glorious to us at the time because we had been in the car so long. It was dark when we left at 5:30 a.m. from South Texas, and dark again when we arrived in Oklahoma at 6:30 p.m.

We spent three days in the Oklahoma City area, getting to visit family that lives in that part of the state. One stop was at Denisa's sister's house to see Connie and Joe's family. We spent some time in the kitchen cooking up delicious family favorites. We made a meal of German veranika that would have made our Grandmother proud. We introduced the youngest generation into the technique of rolling out the dough to make these dry-curd-cheese-filled pockets.

Denisa's sister also whipped up a batch of sugar cookies. We had their five grandchildren at the house, enjoying the family tradition of cutting the cookies into shapes and then decorating them with frosting.

We were blessed to be hosted for Christmas day at our daughter-in-law's parents' house. We enjoyed spending the entire day with them, as our son and daughter-in-law didn't have to make the hard decision of which set of parents to spend Christmas Day with. We forced them to choose all four of us! We realized that we forgot to take a family picture when our other son finally arrived that evening. But we took this afternoon picture showing the beautiful Christmas weather that central Oklahoma was blessed with. Denisa was too busy playing with their dog to smile for the camera.

Even though we had driven 13 hours north, we still had unusually warm weather for the Christmas holiday. In fact, Oklahoma City broke the record for the warmest Christmas Day in history with a high temperature of 75. That allowed us to spend some fun time outdoors.

We spent another day with Denisa's other sister and her family. That would include a trip to Debra's son's house to see their family of four young children. We also got a tour of their chicken coop. They got these hens as baby chicks, so they have been held and loved on all their lives. Even two-year-old Olive knows how to hold these tame chickens.

But the real chicken farmer of the family seems to be Hazel, who enjoyed showing us how to fill the feeders and gather the eggs. She is holding one of the young hens, as well as the two eggs she had just gathered from the nests.

We took home a dozen of the freshest eggs we have ever eaten!

Some of the fun of visiting these nieces and nephews is getting to play with their new Christmas toys. Denisa had a great time helping Hazel make the first batch of cookies in her new Easy Bake Oven.

Contrary to its name, it wasn't the easiest baking experience ever. She also found that it wasn't the most efficient cooking experience, as it took us over an hour to bake up those twelve nickel-sized cookies.

Denisa also enjoyed holding the newest addition to the family. At two and half months old, we got a toothless grin from Harvey before we left.

We were blessed with some great Christmas memories, but we still have more family gatherings during the New Year's week end. So we're driving on to the Oklahoma Panhandle for more family fun.