Friday, December 25, 2009

Christmas

Yay!! Christmas morning!! Uncle Mark brought everyone fresh pineapples! And also these awesome tools that core the pineapple and cut it into slices in one move!

Ben got to join us for stocking this year before heading out to spend the day with his family!

Baby Kate sure loves snowmen. She got this little stuffed one in her stocking!

Oooh, a big huge present for Baby Kate!

Time to open it!

What is it!?!

It's a little baby guitar!! Grandpa made Kate an exact replica of one of his own favorite guitars!!

Grandpa showing Kate how to play her new guitar.

Her first strums!

Breakfast break!!

YUM.

Back to the presents! Dad is an incredible wrapper and tag-maker.

Matching guitars!

At some point, we took a break so that Kate could go home and take a nap. When they came back to Grandma and Grandpa's, they quickly realized that they had left her new snowman sucker behind. She had just gotten it in her stocking that morning and was in love with it. Baby Kate wanted it so much that she said she'd rather just go home than stay at Grandma and Grandpa's for more Christmas fun!! So, Pete ran home to pick up the sucker. Here she is watching for him to return.

She sees him coming!! There's Daddy!

The hero!!

Returning the sucker. She doesn't have candy very often so that sucker was a pretty Big Deal.

Best wrapping paper in the whole world.

Content with her snowman sucker. That thing lasted for HOURS.

Christmas carols!

Kate got a pinwheel!

Mmm, Christmas dinner.

Thursday, December 24, 2009

Christmas Eve

This afternoon, we met at Danny and Amy's house for the 2nd Annual Erlewine Family Christmas Eve party! Here, Dan and Tom explain the differences between the two punches.

Kids' punch and adults' punch!

Mer, Pete and Kate arrived. Baby Kate is wearing a little wool cape that Mer wore when SHE was a baby, that had been a hand-me-down from her cousin.

AND IT IS THE CUTEST THING I HAVE EVER SEEN.

UM.

Pete and Kate!

Party!

Ben and Danny were twins!

Baby Kate helped open the presents.

Dad, Mom and Pete!

After the party, we stopped by a house with christmas decorations that Kate loves.

The display has music playing, and moving things and lights that change colors!

Mesmerizing.

It's Santa on a see-saw!

Thinking it's about time to start dancing to the music.

Christmas dance party!

Sunday, December 20, 2009

Third Annual Beery Christmas

When Tom moved away to England, we were afraid of what that would mean for the future of Beery Christmas! But of course we figured out a way to carry on the tradition. Summer and Suzanne came over to my house...

... and Ben set up a web cam for us in the living room! We video chatted Tom and Sara in. Beery Christmas has gone international!! We drank different beers on our different continents, but we drank them together.

Our first beer was a Trader Joe's Vintage Ale.

Summer showing our first beer to Tom and Sara.

Cheers!

An international toast!

Suz and Sum.

Hat switchery!

Next up, we had the 2009 edition of the Anchor Brewing Company Christmas Ale.

At one point we noticed that the way Tom was sitting made his beer look totally like a weiner.

Hahahaha!

So then Suzanne and Summer discussed how they could sit to make SUMMER'S beer look like a weiner.

There it is!!

Here's Tom showing us his next Beery Christmas selection, while Summer sits there with a beer weiner.

Tom notices Summer's beer weiner.

Next up in America, we have Southern Tier Cherry Saison.

Group photo!

Here I am showing Tom my new boots!

He rewarded us with a shot of his own leg. Hubba hubba!

Tom took his laptop around his house, so we could get a little tour of his new place, and it was neat when there was a reflection of us on his big window.

Our last beer was Southern Tier Creme Brulee Stout.

BEERY CHRISTMAS!!

The official 2009 lineup. They were all pretty delicious this year! The cherry was a little disappointing.

THIS JUST IN!

Rose, who is living in Korea this year, could not attend our live webcam Beery Christmas event because she was on a holiday vacation. But she certainly did participate in this year's holiday beer tasting! She tasted many beers while traveling, and submitted her report to be included in this year's Beery Christmas event! From Rose:

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Beery Christmas and a Beery new year! While I missed the webcam beery christmas fun, I want you to know that I was drinking new beers nevertheless. While on vacation, I made a point of trying national/regional brews - nothing special, just the everyman beers, advertised on the canopies of market stalls and the backs of buses. Anghor is, of course, the Cambodian lager, cold and refreshing.

I also tried Anghor Stout, which had good, creamy stout flavor, and gave me a bit of a mustache, which we tried to capture in the picture.

Saigon is Vietnamese; I drank it after riding to the top of a mountain on the back of a motorcycle to watch the sun set over the rice fields of the Mekong. Again, the main selling point is, I was hot and dusty; the beer was cold and wet and oh-so-refreshing, especially when coupled with a spectacular view.

Singha is a beer I had in Thailand but I think it's just one of those generic Asian beers, not Thai. Honestly I don't remember how it was, but I'm sure I drank it down!

I drank the Tiger in Vietnam, but it's from Singapore. It was my favorite of the lot, has more of a bubbly, fermented taste, almost fruity but I wouldn't say that because I generally dislike fruity beers.

Of course none of this was as good as it would have been had you been there to enjoy it with me. I miss and love you betches, and wish you a happy 2010!!

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UPDATE: February 13, 2020

Yumi had to miss out on Beery Christmas this year, because she had her wisdom teeth extracted and was in pain and on antibiotics that prevented her from drinking alcohol. Really unfortunate timing! She had already purchased a special beer in St. Louis for the occasion, so she saved it to bust out at a later date.

That later date was tonight. Meet O'Fallon Brewery Cherry Chocolate Beer:

This beer was DELICIOUS!! It ended up being perfect for Valentine's Day weekend! It tasted like chocolate covered cherries. ACTUALLY, it tasted almost exactly like a cherry TOOTSIE POP! Bottom line is, it was DELICIOUS. I think it's pretty safe to declare this beer the Most Delicious of Beery Christmas 2009. Thanks, Yumi!