My Detroit Christmas

Merry Christmas, blogland! I hope everyone had a lovely holiday, or long weekend. We traveled to Detroit to spend the holiday with my husband's family. Detroit is always an interesting trip; we stay right downtown, which is rather unheard of since, well, it's Detroit and it's everything you have read about and more. We then travel to his mother's and his sibling's homes in the suburbs for the family events. They live scattered near and far from the city, and the fault lines between those places are stark. For example, this is the house my mother-in-law grew up in, off 6 Mile Road. It's now one of the more desolate parts of the city.



The front door has been replaced by a wooden plank because squatters are living there now. It's actually one of the "nicer" houses on the block. So to speak.

This is the house two doors down. It's pretty common to see burnt-out houses in this area. Many of them have no roofs.



In contrast, here is the swanky hotel room we stayed in at the MGM Grand Casino downtown.




Here is the lobby of our hotel.



The casino/hotel itself, though, is in the middle of nowhere even though it is right downtown. That's how erratic Detroit is; even the downtown has desolate sections and populated sections. We've stayed in other ones that were closer to other restaurants and stores, but this one wasn't. Once we got in, we stayed in. Which is okay, since there was plenty to do. :)

Of course, we weren't there very much since it was Christmas and we were in town to see family. Christmas Eve was at my brother-in-law's house, with his little daughter the center of attention all night. Boy, she is a cutie.

This is the night the whole family gets together and opens gifts, so the older niece and nephew (twins) first had to hand out gifts to everyone so we could stack up piles by our feet. Then we open one present at a time, going from youngest to oldest. That lasts for about an hour, then it becomes a free-for-all. LOL!



My littlest niece's pile. This wasn't even what Santa was bringing!

My older niece is 16, so she and her brother are just about at the age where they are too cool for any of this. He was pretty quiet most of the night, but but she's not quite there yet; I was still able to get her to goof off with me!




As you can imagine, my eating was terrible. I brought clementines with me so my mornings started out well with some fruit and toast, but after that it was catch as catch can. There were salads and some microwaved veggies, but the starch to veggie ratio was about 6:1. I did, however, manage to avoid eating these mashed potatoes.



I was less strong in the face of smoked kielbasa, honey-baked ham, dinner rolls, cheesy potatoes (a family treat), two-corn casserole, and of course, Christmas cookies. Ah well, this week while I am home is going to be a bounty of daily cooking, so I'll be back on track soon enough!

My favorite gift is the Kindle Touch my husband got me, and the gift certificates for books from the rest of the family. I already downloaded and read my first book. I love it!



I had gotten out of the habit of reading these last few years, and I realize now how much I missed it. I plan on filling this puppy up, with beloved favorites and new books.

What was your favorite gift this year?