Christmas 2007

Well, the holidays are over. You look forward to them for so long and spend so much time preparing and then suddenly they are over. It seems we are taking kids back to the airport the day after we pick them up. Anyway, Ill try to recap the Dickerson Christmas.

The weekend after we got back from being in Utah for Thanksgiving, (the first weekend in December) we went to Stockbridge. MA to see their annual re-creation of Norman Rockwell's Christmas in Stockbridge painting. Here is Dad standing in front of the Red Lion Inn with the old car as seen in the painting.


They close off Main Street to traffic and bring in the old cars and it is very festive with carolers and horse-drawn wagon rides, street performers and Santa. It started to snow while we were there which put us in a very Christmas frame of mind.





We got a couple of good snowstorms at home in mid-December which set the stage for a white Christmas. The second one left about 3/8 "of ice over the snow which kept the snow from totally melting when the weather turned warmer. Without that we would have had a brown Christmas, but see how wintry things looked when we got home from the airport with Megan and Evan. (Evan flew in from Denver around 9:00 on the 15th but Megan didn't get in til midnight so we drove around northern CT to kill time and especially enjoyed the decorations on the old New England houses in Sufiield.)


This is our front yard and the front of the house which didn't show up well in the dark













I put up lots of decorations this year to make the house seem like a Holiday Inn when the kids came home. I even put a wreath on each bedroom door to bring the festive feeling upstairs.






















Mollie and Kyle both flew in on the 19th and Michael flew to New York and took the train to New Haven on the 20th. The family was home! (Erin and Bryce stayed in Utah this year and enjoyed Christmas with Bryce's family. We definitely missed Will's enthusiasm.)

Christmas Eve we had our usual program after traveling to the Clements in Berlin to have our band play a couple of carols for them. Megan even got Evan to play a guitar duet of "O Holy Night" with her. We served the usual snacks and opened the gifts from the kids which these days are getting to be better than the Santa gifts.




























Then it was Christmas morning. Megan had to beat Michael and Evan with an empty tube from wrapping paper to get them up but eventually everyone assembled at the bottom of the stairs for the obligatory picture. Then on to emptying the stockings.

Evan displays his usual excitement. We all enjoyed Michael's purple and yellow "Sugar Daddy " pants.





































































Megan finds that people from Idaho get potatoes in the toes of their stockings instead on an orange.























On to the family room!

















Mollie unwraps a chest full of Harry Potter books.














Michael received numerous books from his Amazon wishlist.











Evan got a motorcycle jack. Probably not the right one but Santa needed something for him to unwrap and Evan wouldn't provide any suggestions.



Wii at Last! Wii at last! Thank God Almighty Wii at last!

Kyle wanted this last Christmas but there were none to be had. This year I just happened to be in Wal-Mart right after they got a delivery so Kyle lucked out.








Dad tries to figure out his new SLR digital camera.




















Michael got a light meter for his fancy photographic work.





















Megan opens a new laptop.













Thanks to Guitar Hero III there was a little game playing before everyone returned to bed to nap away most of the day.

Well I'm going to post this now and finish later because I don't know what I'm doing and it gets more complicated to add pictures as I go. I will have to finish later.

Merry Christmas

An arrest has been made!

You all remember last fall when I met with the detective in the unsolved murder case of my former roommate? Well, I just heard they made an arrest. Here are pictures of my roommate who was murdered along with her former boyfriend who was arrested. Oddly, he looks less creepy now than he did 33 years ago. Perhaps if it goes to trial I will get to be a witness. For more information google Gerald Hicker.

Very funny Erin. Even old girls just wanna have fun! Now our husbands probably won't let us go away again.

The crime scene photos were taken at the Lizzie Borden house in Fall River, MA. We were the only people on the first tour of the day, (It pays to get up and get moving. The next tour was packed in case your were thinking we were probably the only people ever) so we got to do more things like recreate the crime scenes as found by investigators. Andrew Borden (Dad) was found downstairs in the sitting room reclining on the settee as shown. Abby Borden, the stepmother, as played by me was found upstairs on the guest room floor. Dad wasn't too into playing these parts but since no one else was on the tour I got him to cooperate. Actually I thought it was very interesting. Maybe I should have been a CSI.


Perhaps I need to change my password if you're going to hijack my blog.

New tricks

**** Update: maybe I should mention that no real beer or cigarettes were harmed in the making of these photos...that is root beer and candy cigarettes folks!"****

Ha Ha. Mom may have thought her password strength was "strong" but it is only strong if other people don't know what you are likely to use as a password. Thus, here I (Erin) am publishing Mom's first blog entry. Victory.

Yup folks Mom has started her own blog. I guess so she can blog about all of her wild goings on since officially being an empty nester for the first time. Watch out Mom - if people see these pictures your custodian job may be in jeopardy!

As for these crime scene photos . . . well, Mom will have to explain that one.