2009 AND WE ARE DOING FINE!!

We celebrated New Year's eve at Sandra and Charles' home this year. It was me and John, Johnny, Tracy, John Pearson, Emily, Monica, Tim, Andrew, Matthew, Aaron, Sondra, Jonathan, David, Suzanne, Todd, Audrey, Ian, Benjamin, Sandra and Charles. The numbers keep getting smaller with adult children and larger with grandchildren,

Mark could not come because he had to be back to work on Friday. Sarah, Cody, Luke and Charlotte were in Nebraska. Freeman and Huntley went to Gulf for a few days, and Charlie, Jennifer, Charlie Ann, Cody and Nathan were in Kansas.

It gets harder and harder to keep these old traditions going. Sandra and I were trying to figure out how many years our familes had been getting together on New Year's, and we came to the conclusion that is is well over 30 years. It has been fun watching the kids grow from their infant and toddler years to their pre school to elementry years and Lord knows their teen age and dating years. Now all of our kids are grown and have families of their own, except Mark who is still available. And the beat goes on.

It was wonderful having Sondra, Jonathan and David back from Germany. Monica, Tim and the kids came in from Memphis and Mark was in for a day earlier in the week. Johnny and Tracy and the kids came over several times. They all fun catching up with each other after almost three years.

We had our ususal seafood feast on New Year's eve and we probably want want shrimp again until next year. Sandra and Charles did a great job.

On New Year's day we had the traditional meal.

Blackeyed peas - Health

Collard greens -Wealth

Hog jowl - Luck

Corn bread - Because it goes great with the above.

And this year we added Peaches which is for Love. This was contributed by Jonathan from when he worked at Morrison's.

All in all it was a fun filled week, but now I need to rest up for a few days before I return to work.

We wish you all a HAPPY NEW YEAR

I will add more pictures tomorrow since I didn't get Mark and Jonathan in this batch, also Johnny, Tracy and the Kids. Sorry!!!