Christmas 2010

A few days before Christmas Andrea came over to Boise and I went with her and her dance team to the Rockettes Christmas Spectacular! It was super great. I love to watch dance any time, any place, so of course it was great. The Rockettes are awesome. Best kicklines ever. And the show was pretty cute and entertaining. I don't know that I'd go again, just because I think that $57 it cost me would be just as well spent at a musical or something a little bit longer. But it had lots of great dancing, singing, and fun Christmasy stuff. I was so glad it ended with an awesome live nativity too! While Andrea was here she helped me do some deliveries (long story, but well I did some stupid, funny-to-Andrea things), watched The Santa Clause, and once Collin got home we all headed to Red Robin for treats and to watch the BSU bowl game. Collin was a little annoyed at us girls because well, we talked mostly through the game so he didn't get to watch as much as he wanted. SORRY!

The next day we headed to Idaho Falls (after sadly dropping Lucy off at the kennel due to unresolved issues with my parents.....)!

We had a great drive, Andrea and I watched Home Alone and played guess-the-singer with my ipod. The weather was great, which was awesome!

Once in IF we had a great time just relaxing, not having anything to do, and eating tons and tons of junk food! It was so great to have all my siblings there but Cory (who gets home from his mission in less than 2 weeks.)--Sam and Megan, Tara and Paul (newlyweds!), Alex (who will be leaving on his mission in 3 weeks), and of course the little girls (To me they will always be the "little girls" even though Andrea is now taller than me!!).

Jodee, Andrea, Megan and I made gingerbread houses while watching some questionable Christmas movies.... my mom has all the pics of that on her camera, unfortunately. We had some fun sing-alongs at the piano and otherwise... we went to visit THE ANDERSONS (total inside joke, if you will), and had our delicious Christmas Eve meal of Ebleskievers by candlelight!

Then came the Christmas Eve program, which is somewhat of a family joke just as much as a tradition these days. Megan had a great "guess the Christmas Carol" game we all played--which I won! I guess it would be embarrasing if the piano teacher who assigns out 60+ Christmas songs each year didn't do well at that, right. So anyway, we all always have a big "program" where our parents make each of us do a musical number. For example, Collin and I played a piano duet! (yes, it's true. I wish we caught it on tape. Collin learned "Up on the Housetop" all by himself and even practiced a lot! :)

Then we had the infamous "Nativity Pageant", which we learned this year that my parents are banning until further notice. What, you don't think our costumes are appropriate?

Okay okay, we don't always dress like this. Although Tara and I have, through the years, gotten more and more creative with our shepherd costumes. Then the wisemen started joining in. Now, even Joseph seemed to look like....Dumbledore?? Anyway, even as I type this I am laughing thinking back on all the beyond hilarious outfits people have come up with for this thing. And since we knew this was our last year, we all decided to go out with a bang. Let me also be sure to mention that the green M&M canister Collin (as a wise man) is holding represents "M for Myrhh." He was very proud of that.

So, Christmas was great. I got a snowboard! woot! I have been using Collin's brother's old one for the past 3 years I have been learning, and his feet are just like a half size too small for me! So the boots have been super uncomfortable. But I got new boots, new board! And some other awesome things that I can't remember at this time. Everyone was super generous and it was fun opening gifts together. Collin got a new grill! Well, we didn't have a grill at all before so I should have left out the new. I didn't cart the whole grill over there just for Christmas, I just wrapped up the cover and some of those grill utensils and he opened that. woo hoo! We are having BBQs here every weekend this summer! Just wait! And by the way, that grill has an interesting story that I will have to post on here some time. Let's just say it has to do with me, the 500 lb grill box, icy sidewalks, and a skateboard.

To finish up the Christmas trip, we all had a fun Sunday listening to Mom speak in church, and then had a rowdy game of Farkle, which turned out to be INSANE.

The next day everyone but Paul and Tara went up to Kelly Canyon for the day. It was not my favorite snowboarding trip! I felt frustrated most of the time, I guess I had thought it would be awesome having a new board, but it took some adjusting (since I am no expert!!). Plus I think I am a little spoiled having Bogus be where we usually go because it is WAY nicer than Kelly, as in way more lifts, runs, and caters a little more to snowboarding. But it was fun to go with everyone and a good way to end our visit!