Christmas Festivities

Other than making gingerbread houses, while we were in Texas we:

1. Grabbed some blankets, music, and laid in the back of my dads truck to watch the total lunar eclipse! We watched for about an hour from midnight to 1:00 am or so just until it was all the way covered. It had really cool coloring, like a deep warm yellow/rustic look, andit looked so round and 3-Dimensional! You could see the spots and everything really well too.

(we about blinded ourselves taking these pictures, so please forgive the weird looks, we were trying to keep our eyes open)

this photo found through google images and located at: allyouwantfree.com

2. BOWLING!!! - Now I'm not a huge fan (I overdosed on bowling in High School - $1 bowling, how could you not go 2-3 times a week? - funny thing? I still bowl around a 60...). But Dimitriy and Alicia LOVE bowling and are always wanting to go, so we did, and it was a lot of fun! This place had everything you could think of: arcade, billiards, bowling, lazer tag, etc. Here are a few shots from the night:

Family :)

3. Delicious food, gingerbread houses, family games, shopping, movies (tangled!! - soooo good) and lots of messing around at home:

My parents got a new TV with 3D capabilities, and it came with these sweet shades :)

These little guys in our hair were part of our plate decorations, our personal servers if you will, then one thing led to another and we ended up with the following:

4. Some of the loot (Dimitriy and I did our Christmas exchange for FHE after we got home so we wouldn't have to take them there just to bring them back home). Here are the gifts we gave each other (pictures of gifts from the family forthcoming)

I gave Dimitriy one of his favorite boardgames that he's been wanting to buy/play for a while now. I personalized the properties to be places that were meaningful to us, and made us each a game piece out of pictures of our faces.

Dimitriy got me the yellow rainboots I've been eyeing and wanting! and also got me the Fray's new CD!! (I love them)!

Hope you all had a great Christmas too!!!

Not the buttons!! Not my gumdrop buttons!

We went down to Texas to spend some time with my family.

And we made gingerbread houses again this year! They were quite the improvement from our attempts last year. They were all clever and had really fun details:

(haha, I love that my dad had to use two icers at once)

Mom made a hobbit house, complete with a round door and snowman out front:

Dad made what he called "a hobbit hacienda", but I think it was a sniper post, because the "hobbit" on the tower has a gun and a repel line down from the tower.

Alicia made Santa's sleigh, with actual reindeer and santa!!! I was blown away by it!

Dimitriy made a sweet basketball stadium that even had stadium seating and little basketball hoops!

This year I made a train! I have a slight feddish with trains, and I'm not quite sure where it came from... but here it is. Its the love train apparently :) except for the part where the person is tied to the tracks and the culprit is hiding behind a tree. (there's also an igloo and pile of snowballs, and my favorite part: smoke coming out of the smokestack).

Great job everyone! I couldn't get enough of these!!!

(P.S. Sorry these pictures aren't the best, my camera was low on batteries, so I just snapped a few pics and turned it off, hoping what I got was decent)

"Life's like an hourglass glued to the table"

Time is a funny thing. It's one of the only things that is always constant in this life, and something everyone has equal. Everyone gets 24 hours in a day, and time always moves at the same speed, in the same direction, for everyone. So why does it feel like its a chameleon devil? It always seems to change into what I don't want it to be. One instance it seems like the day just won't end, or that event coming up can't come soon enough; while the next instance I just want to hold onto a moment forever, but it slips through my fingers and goes from the future to the past without it ever really seeming to be the present.

Sometimes time feels so heavy, like I can feel its presence and weight. Yet I've also experienced the lightness and eternity of time.

Sometimes time freaks me out: I remember what it was like to be a little kid, now here I am in my 20's, married, graduated, and awaiting my next adventure, and then my mind flashes to myself as a grandma, then dead, and I think "the end is so near, I'm going to be dead before I know it" and then panic about needing to maximize my time and experience all the things in life I can; then I set goals and become extra productive for a couple days until time changes on me again.

And have you ever noticed that the the more you do the more time you seem to have? Its like I become super motivated and sufficient and can take on the world when I have more to do that can possibly be done! But when I have nothing going on I can't bring myself to do all the things I want to and need to do that I can never get to when I'm busy; I can't bring myself to do hardly anything.

I think it is very fitting that clocks have pendulums... that depicts time perfectly: swinging from one extreme to the other: too fast, too slow; too much time, not enough; burdensome, light; empty, full.

And still it never REALLY changes. It's me that does. and why is that? what makes my perspective and behaviors change so drastically? Why can't time just be what you need it to be?

#21 - check!

Knocked off another ambition - #21 by going to The Festival of Trees!! this last friday!!!!!!! I've been so so SO excited about this, and it didn't disappoint! We grabbed some of our good friends and our camera and headed up to Sandy for a few hours of holiday spirit! They had it all, they had gingerbread houses, Christmas wreaths, quilts, performances, treats, center pieces, and of course: Christmas Trees!!! These were my very favorite! They had over 800!!!!! It was amazing to see how all-out people went for this! it wasn't just decorating a tree, it was a whole setting to go with the theme! This is christmas elves on 15 cups of coffee type of work!!! We want to do one one year. (we'll probably start with the small table top sized tree, then work our way up to the big 6 ft trees.) I think this is such a great idea, for all involved, esp Primary Children's Hospital. Unfortunately its over this year, but you should put it on your calendars for next year! This is something that everyone should experience at least once.

These are our good friends Audrey and Tim. Audrey's favorite holiday is Halloween and Tim's is the 4th of July, so here they are by their holiday trees.

It was really fun to see different ideas for the top of the tree other than a star or angel.

Of course there were lots of BYU v Utah trees... this wasn't even the best one, and you can see how decked out it is, even with grills, coolers, chairs, blankets etc.

They had some really cool gingerbread houses too. Here are just a couple we really liked:

The mountain one is really cool, and Noah's ark is clever.

Yes, this has a train, Farris Wheel, and merry-go-round... i think there was something else too, but I couldn't get everything in the picture, there was just too much going on to fit.

Overall we got some good ideas for our gingerbread competition coming up, and got in some good holiday cheer.

Scotland

Next on my virtual travels (it was a long shift... I had time for two today), I am off to Scotland! Why Scotland you ask? Why NOT Scotland! - Beautiful countryside, the best accent I've ever heard, bagpipes, don't have to learn another language to communicate, plaid, soccer... what more can you want?! I blame my uncle for my obsession with all things Scottish. My dear uncle Bob is Scottish, and he's one of the coolest people I know, so if he's that cool, the country that he grew up in MUST be cool too. I'm guessing that was my thought pattern when I was younger?

And guess what? - It is!!!

Pictures:

Music:

Fashion:

I LOVE plaid!!! I'm actually wearing a plaid shirt right now... ha

News: http://www.bbc.co.uk/scotland/index.shtml

History:

Emerald-hued hillsides and craggy castles dominate this beautifully filmed travel documentary about the history, culture and scenery of the land of bagpipes and brogues -- the country that makes up the northern third of Great Britain. Armchair travelers will visit ancient sites, explore the countryside and tour the country's urban centers to take in the history and heritage of the Scottish clans.

Available now on NetFlix:

Family: Especially my favorite Scotsman.

Someday I will go there for real... I don't think virtual traveling will cut it for this one. But it does get me more ready and excited!!!!