Christmas Break!

Ok, it's time to play catch-up. This semester has been absolutely insane (as I will explain further in another post). So now it's time to bring cyberspace up to speed.

My Christmas Break was super great. It was so fun to hang out with my whole family. Scott and Ashley got to visit from Pennsylvania and Melinda, Ben, Emerson, and Sammi got to visit from Ohio. Since we probably won't all be in one place again before Brad leaves on his mission, we decided to get a family picture taken. It was so fun with everyone here! We went to Ocean City for our traditional Christmas Eve Chinese food, we watched a bunch of movies, played trains a whole bunch, and just soaked up each other's awesomeness.

One of my favorite activities (and one of the few I actually documented) was making a gingerbread choo-choo train with E.


One of the movies our family got for Christmas was Toy Story 3. E would ask to watch Toy Story 3 over and over and he'd usually cozy right up to Aunt Nat :)

The rest of the break was good. I hung out with my friends and we had a couple of movie marathons. We had a Heath Ledger marathon where we watched "10 Things I Hate About You," "A Knight's Tale," and "The Dark Knight." It was a hit and everyone had a great time. Of course we had our traditional gigantic pizza from The Pie. Unfortunately, a pretty awful blizzard hit that day and what was usually about a 5-10 minute drive to The Pie became a 45-minute venture in the snow.

My friend Lundy hosted a Matt Damon marathon where they watched a couple of Bourne movies and Oceans 11. Then on New Year's Eve, Lundy hosted a New Year's Party slash X-Men marathon. That one was super fun. We all had a good time and made some new friends. It was SO fun to hang out with my guy friends again! All my best friends in high school were guys, then when they all left on missions I felt like I didn't have any friends anymore! So now they're back (or will be back soon!) and it's been a blast.

This Christmas break was one of the best. It was a great combination of spending time with family and friends and needless to say I didn't want to go back to school. Luckily, I wasn't dreading it as much as I have in the past... usually by Christmas break I'm really sick of my roommates and want nothing to do with them. This year I was pretty lucky and didn't have to deal with too many crazies :)

Disneyland!

I was lucky enough to go to Disneyland (again) to visit some of the friends I made during the Disney College Program last year. It was SO much fun. It rained the entire time I was there, so unfortunately I couldn't see the parade or fireworks. Luckily I got to see a whole bunch of my friends Ali and Soheil and that totally made up for it.

The night I flew in, some of my friends threw a Christmas hotel party. It was so great to see so many of my old coworkers in one place! The next day I spent most of the day in Disneyland and I had tons of fun. Single Rider lines are my favorite. Oh, I got to meet Rapunzel and Flynn Rider. They were very nice. I visited my friend Soheil at work and then when he was finished he came over to my hotel to hang out. We went to Target and bought a buncha junk food, then went back to my hotel and watched Zenon! We were like a couple of teenage girls. It was so great. Does anyone remember this song? It's probably one of my favorites.

Then on Sunday, I met up with Ali and Soheil for breakfast, and Ali's work shift was canceled so we got to play in the park ALL DAY. It was super fun! Then we had dinner at the Blue Bayou, watched World of Color, and then we had a slumber party! (Zenon:Z3 was on... TERRIBLE movie. It wasn't nearly as entertaining as Zenon: Girl of the 21st Century)

Unfortunately, Ali had work early, but Soheil and I hung out for a little bit and then he drove me to the airport. It was a pretty eventful trip, especially considering it was only a few days long.

Here are some pretty pictures:

Mickey and Walt looking out toward Main Street. Can't blame 'em, it's awful pretty.

Me and Minnie! I didn't even have to wait in line to see her.

A picture of my favorite spot in all of Disneyland :)

For your viewing pleasure:

Now do you understand why the Christmas Fantasy Parade is one of my favorite things on EARTH?! Eh, didn't think so. I'll just love it enough for the both of us.

Thanksgiving (Part 2)

So I guess since it's Christmas Eve, it's about time to write about Thanksgiving. So the day after I drove home (I got to go home on Monday night, which was SO nice!), there was a gigantic blizzard. Everyone in Salt Lake downplayed it a lot (because honestly, there wasn't much of a tangible blizzard) but in the Logan area I guess it was awful, so I'm really glad I missed it.

So I got to be home for a few days before partaking of the divinity that is my mother's Thanksgiving dinner. I was so excited for the food and the lovely company that I never took pictures of the finished product... But here's a picture of the best mashed potatoes EVER (mid-production):
It was really fun having some of the Mumford and Healy clans over to join in the festivities. Dinner was fantastic and it was fun to hang out after. The next day, we all went to see "Tangled." It was hilarious though, because they started showing the wrong movie. We were all sitting there, the theater full of CHILDREN, and they started showing previews for creepy, violent, R-rated movies like "True Grit" and "The Black Swan." Then "Love and Other Drugs" started playing. It took everyone a minute to figure out what was going on, then all the parents started covering their children's eyes and I'm pretty sure at some point I yelled, "Shield your children!" Someone went out and told them the wrong reel was playing and they turned on the right movie. It was pretty hilarious.

Then over the weekend we got to go to the Utah v. BYU football game! It was so much fun. It was bloody cold, but we had a great time... Especially since we won :)

Here we are all decked out in our U stuff.

The final score

Steph and I celebrating after the game

Welp, that pretty much sums up Thanksgiving! I'd say it was a success.

Thanksgiving! (Part 1)

I'm seriously slacking at the blog. Oh well, I'm sure you'll get over it. :)

So on Sunday evening my roommates and I decided to have our own little Thanksgiving dinner. We decided to invite over some neighbors (the Garage House boys) to pay them back for a breakfast they made us about a month and a half ago. Everyone contributed: Jessie made a big gigantic turkey, which was pretty impressive; Shandy (and Amanda) made mashed potatoes; Amanda made cheesecake and pumpkin chocolate chip bread; Laura made a super tasty broccoli salad and a green salad; Stormie made a fruit salad; Sloan made stuffing; Mallory brought drinks; the boys brought homemade rolls; and I made pasta salad, key lime pie, chocolate chip cookies, and (at the last minute) homemade gravy from scratch. It all tasted lovely.

I can't deny I was impressed with everyone's domesticity. Everyone claims they can't cook, but the food was way good; I was stuffed afterward. And we got to enjoy the leftovers the next day, which was arguably just as great as the dinner itself. Now I get to enjoy Thanksgiving with my family! I'm very excited.

The group!

Top left: Sloan, Kraig, Ryan, Dave, Andrew, Matt, and Aaron. Bottom left: Shandy, Laura, Amanda, me, Jessie, and Mallory. Stormie was there, her presence just wasn't documented. Unfortunately our cute Sophie couldn't make it at all. We sure missed her!

Isn't my apron so cute?!

Halloween!

So my Halloween this year was super fun. I think it made up for my crappy Halloween last year. I was in Disneyland, and while it was fun to see other people dressed up amongst the festively-decorated theme park, I never got a costume for myself... I had to work and by the time I got home it wasn't worth finding a party. Anyway, this Halloween was so great. On the 29th, I had a Halloween party with my roommates! We had a spooky dinner, carved pumpkins, and basked in each other's awesomeness.
Here's our spooky dinner!

Our spooky spread Runny Nose and Goblin Snot (chicken noodle soup and broccoli cheese soup, respectively) in bread bowls, Vampire's Blood (Hawaiian punch & Sprite), Slimy Brains (pasta salad), Zombie Toes (pigs in a blanket), Body Parts Dunked in Earwax (veggie tray with ranch dip), Moldy Skin 'n Scabs (green salad with tomatoes), and Eyeballs (deviled eggs). We also had dirt cups and apples with caramel dip! I think it was a hit.

Left to right: Stormie, Jessie, Shandy, Amanda, Sophie, Laura, and me!
Not pictured: Sloan and Mallory

On the 30th (Saturday), it was the Howl at USU. I wasn't sure if I really wanted to go, but it ended up being SO fun. DeeDee and her roommate Hailey came up to Logan and we all went to the Howl together. They dressed up like "Risky Business" and I was Hermione Granger. People always say that Halloween is the one night of the year when you can be whoever you want to be. For some people that just means dressing like a slut, but for me, I got to BE Hermione. I've always felt like I connected with her ever since I first read "Harry Potter" in 5th grade. Speaking of which, for Halloween in 5th grade, me and my two best friends dressed up Harry, Ron, and Hermione. Unfortunately I don't have a picture of the 3 of us. But here I am! Aren't I cute?

Sorry about the crappy quality, it's a picture of a picture. Maybe I'll scan it someday.

So now, ten years later, I reprise my role as Hermione Granger:

Yep, I'm wearing my time-turner.


Hailey, me, and DeeDee

So we went to the dance after waiting in line for about an hour, then we went to see We the Kings! They were so great! Their music is fabulous and the band is pretty funny. They came onstage wearing Jack Skellington masks. All I could think was "Geez, that could be anybody under there. I hope it's the real band..." and they ended up taking their masks off after a song or two. I was getting squished when I was up really close, but when we moved farther back (after I got elbowed in the face) I took some pictures. Sorry they're kinda crappy, they were taken on my phone.

At first I neglected to give the details of the rest of my weekend! My apologies. On Sunday morning, after about 4 hours of sleep, I drove home to Murray for my friend's missionary homecoming. He spent the last two years in Brazil and it was SO great to see him. It was like a mini high school reunion, so that was interesting too. Then I got to have our traditional Halloween dinner with my family! It was just as good as I remember. Homemade chili (complete with pumpkin-shaped cheese slices to go on top), monster claw breadsticks, yummy orange punch stuff, and pumpkin squares for dessert. It was lovely. Then I had to drive back to Logan. It was kind of awful, but at least my weekend had been great.