The biggest party of the year{the CCE’s wedding excluded) happened on the very last day of the year: Daniel and Erika hosted a most fantastic New Years Eve party. Elizabeth wasn’t up to going but as Aaron and I drove away, I thought ‘what a nice bonding moment for just the two of us’. Then I looked over at Aaron and he was sleeping. I guess he didn’t get the “nice bonding moment” memo. Thankfully he woke up in time to direct me to the right exit, thereby saving us from wandering around lost for the next 35 minutes. Actually, it wasn’t even the right exit after all, but he figured out how to get us back on track within 5 minutes. Maybe we did have our bonding moment after all!
We had intended to arrive early so we’d have time to help them get everything ready but because of the weather and the exit confusion, when we arrived it was more of a celebrity entrance. Maybe I was greeted like a celebrity because I had brought oreo balls and not because they were all glad to see me, but I like to think it was the latter. : )
So many times I wish that memories, like of all the fun we had at the party, could be put into words so you could just read it and feel like you’re there in the middle of it. They say pictures are worth a thousand words but sometimes that still just doesn’t do it (especially when you only took TWO pictures the whole entire time). Even if I can’t write about well, I can read this years from now and think about the pictures in my head.
We knew most of the other people there (Dani was there, oh the joy!) but by the time the party ended, it didn’t matter that we hadn’t known the others before; after talking, laughing, eating, and playing games for about 17 hours with people, you can start to have the “I’ve known you forever” feelings! We played all Apples to Apples and Catch Phrase–I could write a whole essay on that game and all the team building strategies involved–-then split up for other games until just before 12:00. At midnight we all blow our little horns and watched the confetti falling New York City. We only watched a tiny bit of the “entertainment” afterward because it really wasn’t worth spending time on.{as a side note, when you spend more time discussing why the performer should not be wearing the atrocious outfit then you do listening to the music, maybe its time to turn off the tv.} The most beautiful blue moon was shining in the sky so we all headed outside to take our first walk of the new year. We discovered upon returning from the walk that Al Gore would not have approved of our party because of the 17 people at the party there were approximately 12 cars parked outside the house. Talk about “carbon waste or someothernonsense.” But quite frankly, we’re not really in the business of making Al Gore happy. As the night was still young, we talked and laughed more until around 2:30 when we all decided we should think about bed. Thinking was as far as we got as no one (except Mr. Bonding Moments and his friend Jeremy who were the early birds) went to bed until 4. We were all too busy having fun to think about stopping. Just possibly we were all over-tired and didn’t want to think about moving, too!
I think everyone there can attest to the fact that we were all much slower in the morning then we were the night before! Everyone was much quieter too until the coffee perked us up and we played Catch Phrase for the rest of the morning. A fly on the wall would have heard this from me whenever it was my turn: “ok, it’s a….no, wait….you use it to…never mind, I’m getting a new word…it’s the opposite of hungry….if you want to…I DON’T KNOW!!” At least my guessing abilities are better than my translating words abilities!
When we left the next morning, we had made new friends, great memories, and were much more sleep deprived than when we arrived. It was a party we didn’t want to end and a wonderful way to start off a new year!
