New Year's Eve - 10:04 check in

We ate all we could hold while watching Fred MacMurray and Annette Funicello (she's such a doll) in The Shaggy Dog. The actual dog was adorable and so funny when driving the little roadster in pursuit of the spies. I have to say, for 1959, those were some pretty good special effects.

The girls and I played a game of Pounce at the dining room table while my husband switched the television back and forth between football and -- get this -- country music videos. Yes, that's my husband, a sworn foe of country music, who is watching and enjoying these videos. He's laughing his head off at some song about a guy driving his International Harvester combine. Hoo-boy.

I opened up the bottle of bubbly a few minutes ago for a sneak preview. The little tag at the store identified it as a "light and fruity Asti, with overtones of peach and apple." That sounds pretty good, actually. However, the $3.99 price tag concerned me somewhat. But $3.99 is what the ol' budget allowed for, even though I looked longingly at the roadside sign of the local swanky wine emporium that was advertizing Dom Perignon for the holidays. Maybe next year.

I took the precaution of dropping about a quarter of a teaspoonful of sugar into my champagne flute before pouring. (I love that scene in Moonstruck where Cher is celebrating with her dad and drops a sugar cube into each glass of champagne.) The cork popped agreeably, making the girls shriek with pleasure; they were in the kitchen with me, opening their own bottle of sparkling apple cider.) I handed them each a flute and they poured their cider, with Meelyn looking wistfully at me as I poured my Asti.

"I wish I were old enough to drink champagne," she said.

"Well, think of Leisl in The Sound of Music," I said comfortingly. "She wanted champagne at the Captain's engagement party with the Baroness and he told her no and she was sixteen."

"It's a long time until I'm twenty-one," she said. "Can I smell it?"

"Sure," I said, holding out my flute.

She sniffed. "Ewwwwww!!! That smells like a dirty foot!"

I smelled my flute indignantly. It smelled apple-ish and peachy. "It does not! It smells very nice!"

"Yuck!" she said, rubbing her nose violently. Aisling giggled.

"Mommy's drinking foot juice," she taunted.

I took a sip. It was very tasty. "More for me," I said with dignity.

The girls trooped off upstairs to play video games for a while. My husband and I are getting ready to tune into FoxNews's Bill Hemmer and Megyn Kelly -- they are so adorable -- in Times Square.

It's raining really hard and the wind is howling. We are very cozy here, though.