Goodbye 2014

The sad thing seems to be that just when I finally got to the point where I think spending New Year's Eve with just my family is actually not lame -- they are fun people now and can play games that are interesting and have conversations that make me laugh -- our oldest child has now decided that spending time with just his family is too lame.  Did we miss the "sweet spot" as a family?

Anyway, most of us had a good night.  We had a wonderful dinner, cooked again by Pete, and had discussions about things like purchasing "part" of a donkey for some poor people through the World Vision catalog.  The boys started talking about which part they wanted to buy -- the legs? the head? Eventually they came to the conclusion that they actually needed all of the parts of the donkey wouldn't really function well -- except maybe the tail.

Afterwards we played a rousing game of "American Trivia" -- and Miles won.  Which is good because he is the one who would have been devastated if he lost.

But before all that, we had a nice brunch with this gang:

It was a fun reunion with 2 families we have walked with for many years now.

We also had a good time playing some Pickleball on the driveway.

So, 2014 went out in the midst of loud celebrating, a full house, and some interpersonal (parent-child) conflict...  which is a good representation of the whole year.  Thankful for a wonderful 2014!

p.s. While we may have missed the Family New Year's Eve Sweet Spot, I take comfort that we have at least found a small sweet spot for board-game-playing.  I enjoyed walking in to this scene a couple days ago -- all 4 of them involved and loving it.