Christmas Eve

This year I cooked my first holiday meal ever. It was a success! We had the Beyer family over for Christmas Eve afternoon and evening. In all the years' passed, we have traveled to both New Jersey and to Maryland to see each of our families. Because traveling is much more of an undertaking now that there is more than just the two of us to take along, we have decided that we are only going to travel to one state each holiday season. It was wonderful to have everyone over to our house even though the Jets lost their game.

At the dinner table

I made a roast in my rotisserie oven for the first time and it turned out really good. I have only ever used it for whole chickens before. Al carved it for us.


Trafton was, unfortunately, not feeling well on this day and spent more time sleeping than actually being awake. He had a 24 hour stomach flu that Daniel had two days earlier.

Jonathan and Melissa - their first married Christmas!

Courtney and Michael - their last single Christmas!

Time for dessert

Al and Melissa

Sanchez fans - Trafton is wearing his new Christmas slippers from Melissa and Jonathan. He didn't like them at first, but now he can't be without them!

Trafton rallied a bit to open some presents.

It was exciting to watch him open presents and get excited about what was inside even though he wasn't feeling well.

Trafton just couldn't stay awake - very unlike him.

Now falling asleep on Pappy

This is how he spent most of his day.