5 posts tagged “christmas”

  It was an easy going, quiet Christmas in Los Angeles.  We woke up to our little X-mas plant and opened a few gifts.

  The biggest Christmas surprise was tickets to Austria from Tim!  We will fly to Munich, Germany in just a few days be picked up by our friend Harry and then taken to his hometown of Bludenz, Austria, right in the middle of the Alps!  It's time for us to find some wool undies and practice our yodeling.  Austria here we come!
   Despite all the excitement we still managed to relax most of the day.  We played a long game of Scrabble while intermittently cooking Christmas dinner.  I made homemade Squash Tear-Apart Rolls.  This being the first time in my life I have ever made anything with real live yeast.  Although I hated the kneading I did enjoy the punching, especially after I lost the Scrabble game.   Tim managed to win the game and make just about everything else in the dinner.  He somehow orchestrated it perfectly where his last word down was N-O-E-L.  He was very, very proud of himself for that one!

  My family celebrated an early X-mas this year in Michigan.  We all got together to celebrate Uncle Bob's 25th Anniversary as a priest.  It was quite an interesting celebration as we got to watch Uncle Bob, with his very large Drambuie glass, roasted by his fellow brothers in the priesthood.  There was no holding back, and unfortunately no family members were allowed to partake in the roasting.  I think Aunt Vicki did get to scream a few things from her table across the room, though.  Shannon was the star photographer that evening and she took some great pix here.  Shannon, Kelly and I kept the party going at the end of the night when the D.J. showed up to play some tunes.  The best part being when Shannon asked him to play Baby Got Back to a crowd of mainly 50 year old and above parishioners.  I'm sure we amazed everyone (and possible gave a few heart attacks)  with our sweet dance moves! 

  A couple days later during heavy snowfall we got together to open gifts at Aunt Jackie's house.  She and Uncle Tim had prepared steaks and Aunt Vicki brought over shrimp scampi.  It was quite a feast and there was delicious cheesecake to top it off.  Gift opening was the highlight of the evening.  Not only was Shannon the star photographer this trip, she was also star gift giver of the "kids" having had gotten everyone a gift!  How can I possibly outdo the digital camera she gave to mom and dad this year!?!

  The entertainment during the gift giving event was G-ma, of course.  None of her gifts were properly labeled.  Some had just been thrown into trash bags and others came in already ripped wrapping paper with the gift half hanging out.  I don't think we laughed harder then we did as G-ma handed wrong gifts to wrong people!  Good times!  We got to see our Uncle John who flew in from Phoenix and I walked away with a waffle maker.  Score!  ;)

  HO!! HO!! HO!!  MERRY CHRISTMAS!!! 

  This morning we planned on waking up early, but got up around 1 p.m.  Kayu was first to call this morning to wake us up and say Merry Christmas.  (Kayu can you please stop stalking us!)  :)   I wanted to rip open the presents as soon as I got up, but Tim insisted that we eat first- he was on the verge of fainting. 

  For X-mas I got some bubble bath and bath salts (90% of my time at home is spent in the bathtub, Tim thought I might like them)  flyswatters (in HIS and HER colors, Tim bought these because we have a huge gnat/moth problem in the apartment.  He says we can wear them all day on our hips), and Santa miraculously found us here in Hollywood and got us both Horseback Riding Lessons!  The description states that we will learn "grooming, mounting and dismounting, horse psychology, saddling and bridling, riding ettiquette, equipment, and basic balancing positioning at the various gaits."  I am most interested in the horse psychology, I hope to be a horse whisperer by the end of six weeks.  And then maybe Santa will finally get me that pony I always wanted for Christmas!  Oh, and Tim's favorite gift from me was a tie, pictured above.   (He is very easy to please!) 

  I bet you wonder why I post so many pictures of food.  Perhaps I am a weirdo or I am merely connecting with my inner Martha Stewart OR maybe I am a starving artist in Los Angeles and eating anything besides peanut butter and jelly, pasta, or bean burritos (homemade, not Taco Bell) causes me to break out into song and dance to celebrate...and take lots of pictures!  That lovely loaf of bread is a Cherry-Almond Bread with Amaretto Icing I made last night, and that's Tim glazing the ham.  yuuummmm!  yummmy!!!  We have not eaten yet, but we will soon!

  THANK YOU SHOUT OUTS!!!

  Mom and Dad:  Thank you for the money.  It will be going towards rent and bills.  Yipppeeeee!

  G-ma:  money, money, money!!!  good stuff!

  Shannon:  I love the picture and I look at it everyday before I walk out the door!  And the cookies were gone in 2.5 seconds, in case you were wondering!

  To everyone else, thanks for chatting with me on the phone.  I LOVE you all and will definately be there next year for X-mas!!!!!!!!

peace out, hommies!  ;)

     

Christmas was the bomb-diggity when we were younger!  Here are some of my fave X-mas memories:

1)  Waking up before mom and dad and sneaking to look at all the presents under the tree and looking in the  stockings...by the way, it would take FOREVER for them to wake up!!!

2)  Watching Lucky and Taffy play in the wrapping paper after the damage was done.

3)  Finding our new Christmas Barbie that year from Aunt Jackie and Aunt Vicki

4)  Being videotaped having to say thank you to every single person after a present was opened (by the way did they ever get that tape!?)

5)  Staying up as late as I could to see if I could hear Santa bringing my presents in.  I swear I heard him wheel in my 10-speed bike one year.

6)  Decorating cookies and leaving them out for jolly, fat St. Nick

7)  Shannon and I trying to guess what each of us had given each other for that year

8)  Making Christmas dinner and Shannon suggesting that we sing "Happy Birthday Jesus."  I was less then enthused but I went along with it anyway

9)  Having all the X-mas decorations in the house, and watching all the cartoon X-mas specials

10)  I still remember rushing to take stuff out of my stocking only to compare it to Shannon's stuff to make sure she got nothing better than me!!!  ;)

 

What are your favorite X-mas memories?  (leave it on the comment!) 

  Christmas Eve after attending church at 6 p.m. we headed over to Griffith Park to see the Festival of Lights.  It took us two hours to drive thru, but luckily they had Christmas tunes blaring to make us forget that we were sitting in a car forever.  Here is some pictures of our little baby X-mas tree.  And thank you for everyone for the Christmas cards!!!