He follows her toward the couch and settles down on the cushions with a satisfied sigh, leaning back with a content smile as he brings his mug to his lips to take a sip of the wine. It's a relaxing evening, in spite of all the activity around them, and he's relieved that it isn't as large a gathering as Mira's party had been--though he suspects that's mostly because Orchard House hardly allows for as many people in it at one time as Watersong does.

Spencer's needed something relaxing, especially because he's been doing his best to run the store while Joel's still healing, while his own shoulder had still been healing, and Charlotte's been helping but Spencer can't ask her to spend all her free time working at the store because that simply wouldn't be fair. Besides that, Ellie and Brian will be joining them for the holidays and that's why Joel had stayed behind, to make sure his parents settle in well enough for the evening in the guest room--the one that will soon enough become the nursery.

He turns his head to look at Raleigh, trying to get an idea of how she's doing just by looking at her and upon finding that he can't get quite a good enough reading, he opts instead to just ask. "Is there anything new with you? You haven't run off and gotten married while we weren't looking, right? There's been so much going on lately that it seems almost impossible to keep up with much of anything."