Ladies' Night Out Christmas Party 2012

Last night was the annual Ladies' Night Out Christmas party for the Chase Park gals and it was the last one in which I was the organizer. That's right folks, after about 10 years of heading up this fun monthly activity I have handed over the reins over to someone else. I still have not written about my change in church congregations and will hopefully find some time to do that soon. We gathered at the home of Mrs. Irma as we always do this time of year and as she always does, her house was decorated from top to bottom far and wide with Christmas decorations.

We feasted on a plethora of salads and desserts (including one of my favorites strawberry pretzel salad) and just generally enjoyed each other's company before we got started with a game of dirty Santa. Mrs. Irma made the comment to me that one of the parents at church had asked what dirty Santa was. I thought that was pretty funny as I never imagined having to explain something like dirty Santa to a young child.

There were 30 people at the party so playing a game of dirty Santa took well over an hour but was still a lot of fun. There were a lot of great ornaments this year and for the first time in many years there was a lot of stealing of gifts. It seems like the last few years the girls haven't been in much of a "dirty" mood, but that changed last night and there was a lot of plotting and stealing which resulted in a lot of laughing. Rather than call the numbers in order (each person has a number, that's how you know when it's your time to play) I always make two sets of numbers and draw numbers so that you won't know when your number will be called. I was drawing and calling the numbers last night and as luck would have it, my number was the last one to be drawn. I promise I did not look at any of the numbers and I moved them all around each time I drew. I guess luck was just on my side last night. I ended up with one of the most coveted ornaments of the night which was an Alabama snowflake ornament and it looks quite lovely on my tree if I do say so myself.

After the game, Mrs. Irma, on behalf of the ladies, gave me a present as a thank you for my years as coordinator. They gave me a lovely card as well. The gift was a crock pot with a locking lid. I have always liked the ones with a locking lid. This, however, will make crock pot number four for me; so, I will probably be donating some crock pots to the local thrift store soon as no one, especially a single person, needs four. It gave me a good laugh and it was really nice that they thought to get me something as they didn't have to do anything at all.

I have really enjoyed working with this group over the years and I look forward to seeing them each month as I plan to continue to attend each month so that I can catch up with them and see how things are going. God has truly blessed me by putting these women in my life and I look forward to many more years of friendship with each of them.