Christmas 2009 Recap

We had an absolutely wonderful (and exhausting) Christmas Day yesterday.  This year was really all about The Littlest Apple, and I plan to share some highlights of his Christmas as soon as we get our both of our cameras back.  We accidentally left the camera bag at The Picky Apple’s parents’ house.

In the meantime, I’d like to share one of MY favorite gifts.  This year, I can truly say that I absolutely loved every single gift I received.  But this one in particular made my day, maybe even my YEAR.

That’s right.  It’s a personalized, signed copy of The Pioneer Woman’s cookbook!!

I’ve mentioned before how big a fan I am of The Pioneer Woman’s blog.  It was one of the first blogs I started reading, and it is still a favorite, daily read of mine.

I fully intended to attend The Pioneer Woman’s book signing in Houston when she came to town on December 5.  I ordered the book, cleared my calendar, let The Picky Apple know that I needed him to watch The Littlest Apple for the day.  After reading tales of The Pioneer Woman’s book signing in other cities, I was fully prepared to stand in line for hours and hours to get my book signed and meet The Pioneer Woman.

But then the night before the Houston book signing, I wound up in the hospital.  Sometime on Saturday, in a haze of morphine, it occurred to me that I was missing The Pioneer Woman’s book signing.  And although I was mostly worrying about my physical and mental recovery from my emergency ordeal, I was also seriously bummed that I didn’t get to meet Ree and get my book signed.  Priorities.

But apparently, my sweet dad knew how much I wanted to be at The Pioneer Woman’s book signing and left my side at the hospital to run a “quick errand” on December 5th.  I was out of it that day, and didn’t know what my Dad was up to.  From the story he told me at Christmas, he had NO IDEA what he was in for at the book signing, not expecting the huge crowds, color coded ticket system, hours of waiting.  He realized when he got there that he couldn’t stay in line for 5 hours, but he also noticed an option to get a book signed and pick it up the following week at the bookstore.  So he did, and I got my personalized, SIGNED copy of The Pioneer Woman’s cookbook yesterday for Christmas!

Thanks again Dad!!  (And Mom too, because I know you obviously played a big role in this too, staying with me at the hospital that day while Dad and The Picky Apple were off running errands!)