1 - holiday compromises: for those of you that have dealt with splitting holiday time between your family and your significant other's family, you know how tough it can be to keep everyone happy. well this year, alex and i dealt with that for the first time and we struck an awesome compromise! we moved "Christmas morning" with my family to Christmas Eve morning, went to church with my family, and then on Christmas Day, we drove 11 hours to PA to have Christmas dinner with his family. we spent the next 5 days with them, and then it was off to Indianapolis, where we spent New Year's with my extended family. we got quality time with everyone and no one felt left out!
2 - outrunning a snow storm: on Christmas Day, the forecast had called for an big ice storm in the midwest, so we'd be praying all week that the traffic wouldn't be bad on our drive to PA. well, lucky for us, the storm hit after we already left and we didn't hit any traffic at all! it was awesome!
3 - long down coats: for Christmas, i asked my parents for a new coat - a long, down northface to keep me warm while walking the dog, scraping off my car, etc. well, they were great enough to get one for me and it is awesome! it keeps me so toasty, it has a hood, and it reverse-zips (unzips from the bottom) so i can sit down in the car without feeling restricted.
4 - wii canoeing: for a Christmas present, my brother, alex, and i all chipped in and got my parents a wii, which is awesome, but what's even MORE awesome is the wii resrot sports game that my aunt and uncle got them to go with it. you can do all sorts of things, but my favorite to watch and play is canoeing. you hold the remote and paddle side to side just like you would with a real canoe paddle. my mom even loves it! i have never laughed so hard as when i watched my mom and dad race each other in canoeing, paddling their hearts out in front of the tv, and talking smack to each other. awesome AND hilarious.
5 - daily calendars: alex knows how much i love calendars (he does too), so for Christmas he got me a daily calendar of quotes from the office! i have to say, there is something incredibly satisfying about ripping off a new page every day and having the restraint not to read days ahead. it's awesome because it gives me something to look forward to every morning at work. he also got one for my brother that's got entries from the blog "stuff white people like", which is also awesome.
6 - family pot lucks: this is one of my favorite things about alex's family get-togethers - everyone brings food and everyone's food is delicious! this time the unintentional theme was meatballs...alex's mom, grandmother, and uncle all brought fresh homemade meatballs and the all had different sauces! it was really fun to sample all of the different kinds, and believe me, they were all awesome.
7 - fresh snow: today chicago is getting a fresh snow, about 12 inches or so. when i walked the dog this morning, everything was so peaceful and clean and quiet. the snow was fluffy and coated the trees and the plows hadn't been through yet, so there wasn't a speck of brown, dirty snow in sight. it was awesome. when we talk about God making our hearts as white as snow, that is what i think of - clean, beautiful, and peaceful, just like the morning after a fresh snowfall.
3 comments:
Sounds like you had a wonderful break! I feel like I would definitely have to invest in one of those long jackets if I lived in Chicago, too! That's a lot of awesome stuff!
those are all awesome things! that wii canoeing sounds really fun! i'd like to see your parents doing that!
love this idea AND wii canoeing!! My bro got wii resort for xmas too and we spent a lot of time on archery... so fun :) keep the awesomeness coming!
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