I'm Dreaming of a . . . Pink? . . . Christmas

An Ode to Our First Christmas

'Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house

Not a creature was stirring, not even my spouse.

The nylons were hung by the chimney with care

In hopes that something pink soon would be there

The siblings were nestled, all snug in their beds

While visions of Wii games danced in their heads

With Zac on the floor and I in my bed

Waking up early is what we did dread

With a sound like a jet, there arose such a clatter

I peaked open my eyes to see what was the matter

"Santa has arrived in a plane!" I said.

But it was only the heater at the foot of my bed.

More rapid than eagles the morning it came

We heard Cameron shout and call us by name.

"Now, Zatry, Now 'manda, Now Kia, Now T-revor

It's time to wake up--I've been waiting forever."

And then, with a yawn, we went down the stairs

And flopped, quite tiredly, into our chairs.

The unwrapping began, the paper it flew

There were games to play and candy to chew

There were tickets to games and nice clothes to wear

Shiny, bright jewelery and things for my hair.

And then, of course, my favorite gift:

A program for editing .JPEGs and .GIFs

We got cookbooks and knives, blankets and honey,

A sheep we named Nigel, gift cards, and money.

Christmas leaves us oh so inspired--

Except the instructions: some assembly required

So with Athena's presents we began to tinker,

Noticing the room was somehow much pinker.

Our presents unwrapped, on the floor they did lay

Downstairs we did go, the Wii fit to play.

I talked with my family on phone and online

For all those in Utah I tried not to pine.

The vacation was over, it really did fly

Our bags were much heavier and we all knew why

We heard Cameron say as we drove out of sight:

"Merry Mitmas to all, and to all a good flight!"

................

Some pictures of our white Christmas:

Thanks to everyone for making our first Christmas together great!

Thanksgiving

We had a great first Thanksgiving together, mainly because I didn't have to do any cooking. We traveled to Utah to see our much-missed family and had a blast seeing everyone. Here are some of the fun things that we did:

• We went to Salt Lake City to see the lights at Temple Square. The lights were beautiful, and we even got a personalized tour of the President's room in the Joseph Smith Memorial Building. Actually, it's not quite as cool as it sounds because it was just a room with pictures of all the modern Prophets in it--but it was still a pretty neat aerial (almost) view of the trees on Temple Square. The red tree that you see in this picture is a cedar of Lebanon, which is the tree that was used to build the Temple of Solomon.
  

We also took some pictures inside.

And some outside

• We also made gingerbread houses. I must say, making gingerbread houses with my family, who were ranked as professionals by the local newspaper, is quite a different experience than making gingerbread houses with a bunch of college students. I think our house turned out well, even for two amateurs.

 

• The BYU-Utah rivalry game happened to fall during the Thanksgiving break, so of course we had to watch it. I'll let the next picture sum up the outcome of the game. (Go BYU!)
  

• We also had a great time being spoiled by all of our grandparents and family members. 

I believe I can sum up our trip in just a few words: the food was delicious, the company was entertaining and enjoyable, and the drive was . . . well . . . long (but worth it).

When we got back to our humble abode, we decided that we would decorate our apartment a little bit so we didn't feel like Scrooges.

Thanks to everyone who contributed to our fantastic Thanksgiving break.