The Rogers Come to Town

Unfortunately I don't have a photo of the whole gang together, but this was the thank-you photo the Rogers sent  in appreciation for my parents lending their RV for the visit.

We typically go to the Pacific Northwest when it's time to celebrate the holidays with Tori's family since the majority of her siblings now live there. There's a certain charm to spending the holidays in colder weather, but I wouldn't say that's the case when you have small children. Being cooped up in the house because of bad weather gets a bit overwhelming when you have little kids that need to get their wiggles out, but then trying to properly dress them for freezing weather is a drag (especially when it takes you 20 minutes to get the three kids dressed and they end up coming back in the house after 5 minutes!).

So this year we were pretty happy about the fact that Tori's family was going to be coming to L.A. for Christmas! If given the choice between a white Christmas and a sunny Christmas, I'll definitely take the sunny Christmas.

Tori is one of five siblings and, combined with their kids, that's a whole slew of folks. I admit I made lots of jokes to my co-workers about having a huge group of in-laws come visit for 16 days. People were quite impressed with that number! But it was a bit of an exaggeration because the 16 days ended up being spent all over Southern California and I think there were only three nights at our house (not that I mind having family!). And I opted out for the last leg of the trip (to their dad's house in the Central Valley) because I wanted to go see my parents and sister. The Central Valley portion of the trip featured 14 children five and under, though I admit that the Central Valley contingent of kids are perfectly behaved (unlike my own kids!).

All in all, it was a great visit. I love to see our kids enjoying their time with their cousins, especially when the older cousins are good about entertaining the young ones. And of course I enjoy spending time with the adults, especially my mother-in-law, who I wish we could spend more time with. The only challenge is when all the kids and the adults are heaped together into one big mass of humanity for long periods of time. That's when it's a good time for me to volunteer to go to the grocery store and have some quiet time!