The Tsaos invited all of us over for a holiday get-together tonight.  We arrived at their house at 4 something, and our boys were drawn into the movie showing, Pocahontas, immediately.  Later, the Changs and the Kaos arrived, and some kids migrated up to Peyton’s room to play.  Brandon and Peyton shared their toys nicely with everyone.  Logan loved playing with one of Brandon’s airplanes and he had us watch Teddy for him while he played with it.  Connor was more interested in eating snacks initially; he practically filled himself up with crackers and salami.  We then had a nice sit down dinner prepared by Dave along with some side dishes from Ted and Julie too.  All the kids ate their dinner relatively quickly, including the slower eaters too (Logan, Mckayla and Peyton), as they all wanted to return to playing. 

     After dinner, I was watching Connor, Mckayla, Brandon, Marcus and Peyton playing in Peyton’s room.  The kids were serving me a big meal with the toy food from the play kitchen.  They all played well together with just a couple of instances where I had to intervene as Connor was fighting for a toy with Marcus and then later with Peyton.  We then took a break for another highlight of the evening, ie. decorating the gingerbread man.  Robyn had made the cookies ahead of time, and prepared icing and toppings for the kids to use.  All the kids jumped right in to decorate with some help from the parents.  I was impressed that Logan did a great job remembering the designs from yesterday, and neatly drew the eyes, mouth, sleeves and pants with icing.  As soon as Connor was done decorating, he eyed me for permission to start eating the cookie.  Both Logan and Connor enjoyed eating the cookies (Logan even licked the icing) while some kids saved their cookies for later.

    While the kids returned to play upstairs or watched Polar Express, the adults had a chance to have our dessert, the chocolate mousse cake that I prepared.  Connor was the last one still engaged in the movie, and at some point, he looked over to us and asked for ice cream.  When I denied his request, he suddenly started crying sadly that I had to go over to give him a big hug.  We did a quick gift exchanges for the kids, then it was time to go home to end the night.  Thanks to the Tsaos for a wonderful evening and Stuart enjoyed his special beer.