Christmas in July

This is my sister’s only weekend in Australia so we are spending with friends in the blue mountains. There is a bit of a tradition to go to the mountains where it’s even colder to get into the Christmas spirit and share a large dinner with friends. I must admit that last December I wasn’t in the Christmas spirit until I got back to the US because it doesn’t feel natural for Christmas to be in the middle of summer!

The Blue Mountains is a 1.5 hour drive from Sydney.  We rented a few houses, our little family stayed in a house separate from the group to ensure Rae was able to get away for a decent bed time and not be around all the drunkenness (well some drunkenness).

 

 

In total about 10 of our friends gathered for a WONDERFUL Christmas dinner.  We each were responsible for 1-2 dishes and we had quite the spread, some notable mentions are:

• turkey (it wasn’t fried but it was still good)
• home made egg nog
• carrot cake

Look at all that food!!  We could barely control ourselves.

All I felt like doing after shoving my face was laying down (don’t judge me!).  Rae and Reggie actually got up and tried to work off their meal.

 

 

It was really a good weekend and I have great friends here.  They went out of their way to ensure that Rae felt included in everything and thought out games (including the wii) that she would be able to play.  They were super nice to her and I really feel she had a great time as well.

We couldn’t leave without going to see the actual mountains so after brunch on Sunday we headed over for some pics.

Here’s me and Rae with the three sisters (so does that make it five sisters…let me stop!).

 

 

 

And here’s Rae and Reggie.  I loved that they got along so well and he took an interest in what she was doing and if she was enjoying herself.

The mountains were beautiful, the fog added some mystery to it.

We got home at a decent time (2pm) and crashed!  We woke up from our nap around 9pm and just got straight in the bed.