Testing...1...2...3...I'm back...

Apparently I do have a few readers of this humble blog. Thank you to everyone who asked where I went during all of December. I'm going to try and wrap up the last month and give this whole blogging thing a try again. Thanks for reading and sticking with me through the crazy times of life.

I'm sure our little life will only continue to get crazier, so it's good for me to start realizing now that it is not worth getting worked up about traveling with Liam. Honestly, he does so well when we travel and believe me, I am thankful for that. We have our moments -- this trip it was two fevers and a car throw up -- but overall, we are a portable little family.

Since we spent Thanksgiving with the Bedinghaus family, we spent the larger part of our travels in Pennsylvania with my family. We left in the middle of the afternoon on Tuesday with the goal of driving mostly through the night so Liam would sleep. After a quick stop at Rob's parent's house to drop off their gifts and eat supper, we hit the road again for the rest of the drive to PA. Liam did eventually fall asleep and slept for most of the way with a few brief wake-ups. Rob and I enjoyed using the headphone splitter and listening to podcasts on our iPod (NPR's Wait, Wait Don't Tell Me, This American Life and Pirate Christian Radio's Fighting for the Faith if you're interested in knowing) which surprisingly kept us awake until we got to my parent's house around 1:30 am.

"Hi Grammy! I'm glad to be at your house!"

Wednesday and Thursday we rested and ventured out to join my mom's classroom for their "holiday" party. That was chaos, but Liam enjoyed the kids.

Hanging out in Grammy's classroom

On Friday we spent the day getting ready to host the Beiler Christmas at my parent's house. My mom's extended family is up to 51 people now and lucky for us (that's not sarcastic!), almost all of them wanted to come to Christmas. Mom cooked up a storm on Friday and we ended up with more than enough food for the 43 people who did come. We are so thankful to have such a warm, close-knit family who truly loves each other and enjoys spending time with each other. The evening passed too quickly, but it was sweet to be together for a short time.

My mom and her oldest sister whipping up the mashed potatoes.

Every year my aunt Millie takes a photo with her nieces, nephews, great-nieces and great-nephews. Somehow the great-nephews photo is the only one that ended up on my camera. Probably because Liam is in it! It's fun to look back over the years and see how the family has changed and grown.

Christmas Eve day my dad hosted an open house at his studio so we were in and out of that visiting with people. We also had a great visit with our Bloomington friends Phil and Amy and their boys who are originally from Souderton. We've been close friends with them for over two years, but our paths have never crossed while we're home visiting our families. It was fun to finally make that connection with them.

Liam opening his first present from Grammy -- a John Deere tractor -- on Christmas Eve.

Both my brothers and their wives drove in late Saturday night after having Christmas with their in-laws. This was the first time we've all been together since the boys got married and it was great. Rob and I kept remarking how relaxed and fun they were. No wedding stress, no long distance relationships, etc., really made for a great few days together. We had a slow and relaxed Christmas morning, especially enjoying all the handmade gifts we made for each other (come back for my next post about all the handmade gifts). We played games, Ben and Heidi's Wii, ate tons of food and just enjoyed being together.

Liam opening his gift from Aunt Logan and Uncle Luke -- his first baseball mitt and ball.

And opening his gift from Uncle Ben and Aunt Heidi -- a handmade tool box made by Ben. It came complete with Black and Decker toy tools.

A close-up of the tool box. The other side says "Tools".

It's an original folks.

Liam and Uncle Ben read the personalized board book my mom got for Liam. (www.pintsizeproductions.com) So cute and smart!

My dad, the license plate collector, happily opens one of the only states he still needed to complete his collection.

All the kids, wives and one baby. Love you guys!

We all parted ways again on Tuesday -- Ben and Heidi back to Ohio and work, we went to Cincinnati to Rob's family, and mom and dad and Luke and Logan up to my aunt and uncle's cabin in northern PA. As always, it was hard to say goodbye, but we're already looking forward to our ski weekend in February together.

We journeyed westward and on to a few days with Rob's family. It was a great and relaxing way to round out our trip and spend some time with their family. We had "Christmas morning" with them on Wednesday and enjoyed opening and giving more presents.

Aunt Lauren and "pseudo Uncle Ryan" (he will be a real uncle someday :) starting the Christmas present opening.

Liam got a great dump truck with blocks

Reading a new book with Mimi

After some good family time together, we enjoyed visiting with Rob's cousin Jeff and his family who came from Long Island for a week. Since his wife and daughter had never been to Cincinnati, we gave them the star treatment with trips to Montgomery Inn, Graeter's ice cream and Skyline Chili. Apparently I forgot to take my camera on all these visits which is a bummer because I would have liked to get some pictures with them.

But when Friday came around we were ready to come back home and settle in again. I about had a nervous breakdown when it came time to pack our car and the realization that everything we were bringing home had to go somewhere in our house. It was nuts how much stuff we had!

Poor Liam was all scrunched in the car. Seriously. The stuff. It was crazy. (Oh and notice his favorite Christmas gift - an old remote)

In our parent's defense though, we did have a custom countertop Ben made us in the car (hence the reason the two back seats are down next to Liam) and we made a trip to IKEA in Cincinnati and spent some Christmas money to buy a toy storage shelf and four baskets. So it wasn't all toys and gifts!

We came home and spent most of Saturday and today purging our house of excess. It's amazing to me how such a tiny person (ahem, Liam) can have so much stuff. Thankfully he doesn't really understand what is going on and putting some toys away in his closet for later doesn't bother him.

We still have about a week of break until Rob goes back to school. I'm so spoiled when he is home; grocery shopping by myself? Yes please and thank you. I still have a list of projects to get done, but we're trying to balance having some family downtime and doing stuff too.

Hopefully that doing stuff will include blogging again soon because I'm excited to share with you more handmade Christmas stuff.

So. It's a new year and I hope yours is off to a great start!