12.24.2011: Cooking Lessons & Jammy Pics

Christmas Eve morning was full of cooking!!  Mom went over to Gramma & Papa's for a little bit really early while the rest of us ate breakfast & relaxed before the day got busy.  Dad, Brent and Andrew all went over to Gramma & Papa's in the morning too so that Brent could install the new TV that we bought for Papa to put in his room.  His old one was REALLY old and the stand was pretty rickety.  So we all chipped in and bought a new big 42" tv for their room.  Papa was speechless, and LOVED it.  Since he spends more time in his room these days, and since basketball season was starting again, we thought he would get great use out of it. 

While they were over there installing, we stayed home and cooked for the Christmas Eve party over there later.  This year, Brianna helped us out a LOT.  She learned how to make Mom's world famous tyropitas, hot crab dip, hot spinach dip, and Mom's pasta salad.  All things that need to be passed down to the next generation!  We had a little assembly line going with bowls lined up and ingredients being added down the line.  Brianna did a great job of adding stuff and mixing it up.  Mom did a great job of trying to add new ingredients to the different bowls.  I eventually had to take away the knife & cutting board since she was just chopping stuff up and trying to add it to the bowls!  And we joked with her about it the rest of the week too!  Nana had a great time being a cook, and especially loved the tyropitas, because it consisted of painting them with butter. 

 Mom telling the girls what to do....

After all the cooking was done, and Avery woke up from her morning nap, and the boys were back from the TV installation, we took a few hours to relax before heading over for the party.  The kiddos were feeling photogenic, so we propped them up in front of the tree.  Andrew didn't last long, but the girls liked posing.

 And she is off....