Happy Thanksgiving, Happy Wedding and Mele Kalikimaka and Merry Christmas

It's been the busiest last 3 weeks of my life and I have missed you all!  A Thanksgiving in Dallas, our Thanksgiving at home, A Christmas Lighting for the Village of Bulverde that I am the chairwoman of (what was I thinking?) the day after Thanksgiving (that's my husband, Mr. Claus, and he's actually still speaking to me after committing him for that role), my daughter's wedding in Kauai and my 15th Annual Christmas Party at our home for over 80 people (we were suppose to be cutting back, whoops) the week we got back from Hawaii.  I'm exhausted.  It looks like we might have to skip Christmas.  I'm tired and afraid to check my bank balance.  Thank Goodness for some really great people in my life or I would have never made it.  The first is my extremely patient and amazing wonderful husband.  I gave him plenty of reasons to hide me somewhere and just say I was missing.  Just a little stress here, not really a huge amount :)  Who am I kidding, it was completely insane.  Second my amazing, wonderful, HILARIOUS little sister, aka "Texas Claire", who flew here to help me with all the food.  The food, one of my reasons for living, that I forgot to take pictures of for my blog, errrrr.  Note to guest:  Ritz Crackers and Cheeze Whiz were actually contemplated while I was on the plane home. 

Wedding photos, I'm a mom, so I have to share a few.  Elise was beautiful and Brandon was so wonderful and handsome too!

Elise looked so pretty

Rainbow on wedding day is considered a sign of good luck in Hawaii!

One of my favorites!  So romantic.

Photography for wedding by Helene Cornell, Award winning photgrapher from Canada flown in for our special event.  She was fantastic and her work is incredible, we could not recommend her enough!

http://helenecornell.smugmug.com/

My plan to cook the week we were in Hawaii was a total flop.  Simply too busy, but the food we ate out was amaaaazing.  If you're in Kauai, an absolute must is The Beach House Restaurant, incredible food, the best Ahi I have ever had!  We did cook out at Elise and Brandon's house the day before we left at it was an extremely varied assortment of really great tastes and textures, thank you Brandon for all the Hawaiian traditions.  Lots of good fresh flavors and a lot of fun!

So for the Christmas party, check back soon.  Yesterday I expirenced a terrible tragedy.  My special friend, my laptop died, melted the tip of the power cord right INSIDE my computer.  I am arranging for burial now and hoping during the autopsy, the computer nerds can extract my photos of a least a few pics of the things I served.  Listen to your intuition, I kept kept having a funny feeling about computer and what if something happened to it.  UHG.

Lastly, I hope you are all have a wonderful holiday season.  Our family got some fantastic news this week that has personally brought me closer to my faith.  I guess God does really know what he's doing.  Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Merry Christmas,

Leslie Michele