Christmas Traditions

I have two families. My Idaho family, and my New York Family.
Each year, I look forward to spending Christmas with my Idaho family. I LOVE being home for Christmas.
With many of us being away from the city for Christmas, my New York Family has a tradition of picking a night in December to celebrate Christmas together as a 'family.' Over the course of the past 9 years, our NY family has grown from three, to four, to six to eight. The tradition usually involves a sleepover party where we make tons of food, sit up watching our 'best of' movie clips, and reliving our favorite stories and memories from over the years. Without fail, we exchange gifts with everyone and usually end up with more loot than we can carry home without a rental car.
This year was a little different. Due to extra busy schedules, early flights, limited budgets, etc... we decided to skip the extravagant gift buying, and instead go to a nice dinner together and write each other letters as 'gifts.'
Paul and Patrick did a great job of picking the restaurant- 'Landmark' at the Time Warner Building overlooking Central Park (and HELLO... they serve plates of cotton candy for dessert).
As much as I loved our old tradition... I think we may be on to a great new way of celebrating the season.