A New Year

I've about decided that the most fun New Years Eve parties are those you have with kids.  Ben and I enjoyed our peacefully quiet adult dinner out in downtown Annapolis with John and Dawn, but I was glad we were home by midnight to celebrate with the naturally silly ones, the gang of boys including the twin cousins who are eight (almost nine!) and Paul's BBFs from Pennsylvania.  They had spent the early part of the evening playing "manhunt" out in the clear warm-enough night with friends Alex and Tommy.  They left about nine, when the remaining boys moved inside to hone their gaming skills in rounds of Wii games.  

At midnight we were all ready for the main event, the dropping of seventy-two balloons from the big, long bag that had been hung out on the porch.  Once dropped, all those balloons had to be popped; just imagine the noise!  Very fitting for ringing in the new year.   

An hour later we were all done celebrating and ready for bed.  Through the miracle of hospitality which this old house seems to continually work, ten people stayed overnight, and I think most of them actually slept pretty well.  In the morning it felt like the aftermath of a big slumber party.  The adults brewed coffee, cooked waffles, took showers, and sorted out belongings while most of the boys headed back outside for another manhunt, this one with soft air guns.  John and Dawn's family left about noon, and Robbie and Bryan's family arrived soon after.  We had a casual lunch of sweet sausages, scrambled eggs, fruit, and biscuits, getting in a final visit before they headed home to Pennslyvania.   It was a great way to start the new year. 

I was quite taken by this quote from Mary Oliver which I spotted over at the SouleMama blog.  What, indeed, do I plan to do with the rest of my wonderful life?  Always a good question to consider at the start of the new year and one I'm mulling over today as I clean up, put away, and get organized for work which starts again tomorrow.