Christmas!

I love Christmas. I love everything about the season; the food, the fun, the family, the spirit, the love, honestly the list could go on forever.

So what did we do for Christmas this year?

Well, we went up to Bryan's family's house on Christmas Eve. (We would have been there earlier, but we got the opportunity to work some extra hours and we jumped at the chance.) There were a ton of people staying there (11 of us!) but we were cozy. I don't know what to say about what we actually did. We ate good food, talked, watched movies, and just generally hung around the whole time we were there. Of course we did open presents on Christmas morning (which was tons of fun).

Let's see, I think one of the most memorable things was Bryan getting dressed up like Santa on Christmas Eve night. He had a suit, beard, the whole shebang. So, he went to the Christmas tree and pretended to put presents under it while our two nieces (who are both pretty young) were woken up to "come see Santa." It was pretty great to the the older one get so excited to see him. It reminded me of the magic of Christmas; how exciting it can be.

Something else that was new to me this year was being in a different house for Christmas. It was my first year not spending it with my family. I have to admit that I was a little homesick at times, but it never lasted long because I had an absolutely wonderful time with the Belts. It was fun to be included in new traditions and spend time with that part of our family.

I wanted to find pictures of Bryan dressed up like Santa, but I guess those will have to wait. :)

Two weeks!

One week left of classes and then a week of finals! Woo hoo! I'm so excited to be done with the semester.

Oh yeah, and I'm pretty excited for Christmas too.

We put up our decorations and listened to John Denver and the Muppets. We get to go see the MoTab Christmas concert this week and look at the cool lights on Temple Square.

Have I mentioned that I love Christmas?

Here are a couple pictures that I have been saving up from Halloween and Thanksgiving:
We went to a halloween party as "guitar heroes". We had a lot of fun dressing up for that.
My whole family (seven of us) crammed into our tiny apartment. A little crowded, but tons of fun! Earlier in the morning we played ultimate frisbee at the park near our apartment. We had a great time, but we wore my dad out. He got sick later that night, but thankfully got better so he could enjoy the rest of his vacation.

I just think that this picture is hilarious. Mostly because of the look that Kyle was giving my sister's cat that I am holding. He was terrified of her (the cat). Happy Birthday Liz! We celebrated her birthday on Black Friday. We all went shopping in the morning and then had a party that night. We played Catchphrase and we were really loud. Our neighbors halfway across the complex could hear us.

Overall, we had a great week. Lots of fun and good memories. I'm glad we had a chance to be all together again, especially since Kyle is leaving next year on a mission and Liz and PJ leaving so they can finally be out of the grasp of school. Even Bryan and I are only a year and a half away from moving out into the "real world" Who knows where we are going to end up!

PJ got the job in LA! Bryan and I are pretty excited for them. It's going to be hard when they move though...