Happy New Year!! Most of us were in bed by 10pm last night, but Ron did stay up until 1am. Things here have been crazy -- Christmas and then our party and Kate arriving for the week -- a lot of stuff going on!

Christmas went very well and the guys were thrilled to get a Wii from Santa. They were also given fantastic things from their Aunts all over the US. They are wearing their book owls (a light that they put on their head for reading) every single night and the basketball is showing up in places that I really don't want it, like the kitchen. The only thing that wasn't so great on Christmas day was the fact that I had planned to roast the beef I had bought for the party that was planned for 27 December. We had invited about 50 people, so I bought several sirloin roasts (at $4.99 per pound) from the butcher. I planned to cook them on Christmas day so that I could slice them very thin and then they would be all ready for the party. That is not how it worked out though. Five out of seven of the roasts turned out terrible -- overcooked, stringy, tough, just bad. The other two were at least pink, but also stringy and tough. We had terrible beef for dinner and then I planned to visit the butcher the next day to ask what happened since I had bought the same piece of meat the week before to test drive it and it was fantastic.

I went to the butcher the next morning and brought some of the sliced meat with me so that they could see what I was talking about. The butcher agreed that something was wrong and he said that he thought it was because I had gotten roasts that were on the smaller side and if I had gotten a larger roast, it would have been much better. So I left the butcher with one roast that I paid for and one roast that he gave me. They turned out way better than the others, and I could serve it at the party.

The party was good -- I think everyone had a good time. The strange thing was that about 10 individuals or couples said they were coming and didn't come. I also had a few people cancel just before the party. Unless you were gravely ill, I just don't get this. However, those who did come seemed to have a good time and enjoyed the food. I have yards of food leftover though -- lots of beef, tons of veggies, about a million cookies.... When the beef roasts went terribly wrong, I went to plan B which was a 9 pound pork loin in green chile sauce, with mini corn tortillas. This went like gangbusters! I think I only have about a pound left. But as far as everything else went, we have been having a lot of leftovers this week.

Cousin Kate arrived on Thursday, the day of the party, and spent the afternoon with me making eggplant pesto rollups. I am sure that she didn't plan on spending her time doing that, but it was great to have help. We have done a few touristy things and toured the Saguaro National Monument park where Kate got some fantastic pictures. This morning we went to the San Xavier Mission where we visited the church, built in 1783 by the Franciscans. We had to cut that particular visit short because the museum wasn't open and we were being attacked by 40mph winds. A wind that strong on a plain is really something to walk in!