Christmas in the SLC

Well, I'm back to work after a nice long holiday break (well, long, but never long enough). This was the first year that Whit and my families weren't living in the same state and therefore the beginning of switching off years in Utah and California. This year we went up to Salt Lake City to celebrate Christmas with my family. We headed up on Wednesday the 23rd. It was crazy to board our plane in sunny Long Beach, close the shades, watch some tv, eat some Doritos mix, drink some ginger ale, then open the shades and descend into a completely snow covered land.

We headed up to the Kleins household and spent time with the parents, then Whit and I went down to Provo to have lunch with his grandparents. It was good to see them again and have some time together. Then while we were down there, we went to Payson to visit with my friends Darci and Ben and their two little ones, Riley and Malia. They have a beautiful home they designed and built there and they had the hugest Christmas tree ever. I hadn't met their little baby girl yet, so I was so glad to finally see her. Riley is a hilarious, dramatic kid. I'm always so happy to see the Cooks. They are the best. In the evening we got together with our dear ATP friend, Classie, and ate some curry. It's always great to see her and good to know she's doing well and happy, then we ended the day by finally seeing Precious at the ol' Broadway cinemas.

Thursday we saw Elizabeth at Channel 2, then headed over to a new restaurant (well new to us) called Acme Burger to have lunch with our friends, Joel and Patty Huff. They are great. They live in Chicago, so we were thrilled to meet up with them. And may I add the burgers were so good. We had a plate with three little burgers: one was lamb with a carrot/raisin chutney (my favorite - so yummy), one was bison (also great) and the third was elk (meh). Fun place. Then Whit and I headed back the Broadway to see The Road. Really good movie, mega frightening, Viggo is so cool.

That night we had our traditional Christmas Eve program with my parents and Elizabeth. We shared stories and sang Christmas hymns around the fire. It was really nice - glad we could be there for it.

Next morning Elizabeth, Jerad, Alex and Dylan came up for Christmas. We opened gifts (everyone is way too generous) in a frenzy and then ate a turkey lunch with all the fixins. It was filling and delish. Then after the sibs left, it was quiet. Whit watched basketball (thank goodness there was a game on ABC as there's no cable at my parents' house) and I took a nap (I never take naps, but when in Rome).

The next day (Saturday) we headed out to Sandy to spend the day/night at the Nighs'. They got the wii for Christmas along with wii Mario Bros. and it was so fun. That game was making us laugh so much - four people can play at a time and it was chaos as all the little characters try to stay alive ("You'll kill us all!"). We also played a super fun board game, which I had never played, Aggravation. It was really aggravating, but a great game and little Dylan won. Speaking of little Dylan, he is taller every time I see him, but still sweet and funny. We picked up Cafe Rio for dinner - I sort of forget until I start eating it again, but man, that salad with the sweet pork is so yummy.

We stayed the night and in the morning Whit played Lego Batman with Dylan for a couple of hours, then we went to IHOP for breakfast - pumpkin pancakes? Yes, please.
It was really fun hanging out with Eliz. and the Nighs and playing games, good times.

Sunday was also our 7th Anniversary. Times flies. We thought we'd do something special, so after seeing my parents and saying our goodbye's to my dad, we went to the Inn on Capitol Hill for the night. This is where we had our wedding reception and we hadn't been back since then. The lady at the inn upgraded us to a room of our choice when she heard, so we stayed in such a gorgeous room. It had its own deck with had a view of the whole city. We could see the temple a glow. We had a warm fire place, plush bathrobes, huge jet tub - all really perfect. We didn't really want to go anywhere for dinner, so after lots of attempts, we found a pizza place that was open and had a really yummy pizza delivered and watched Dumb and Dumber while we ate. It really was a fantastic anniversary - nothing better than chillin' with my baby.

The next morning my mom drove us to the airport and we were on our way back to California.

I'm sorry for those friends we couldn't see this trip - Joseph Clayton and Liz & Dave but as is usual the days always go too quickly. But I hope you all had a wonderful Holiday. I'm really glad for the people we could see and grateful for all the hospitality we were shown.

The greatest thing about coming home was knowing I had a whole extra week off of work - thank you WB. So this last week we continued work on the apartment - still lots more I want to do - painting and decorating mostly - and we saw more movies from the expansive list we had. We saw: The Lovely Bones (disappointingly just ok), Avatar (I'm afraid I liked it less than everyone I was with - it was cool looking, but meh), The Young Victoria (so fantastic) - I think all we have left that we'd like to see is Sherlock Holmes, Nine and Crazy Heart. As I was a little under the weather I also caught up on a lot of movies I had had on my dvr for way too long: By the People: The Election of Barrack Obama (really interesting and rejuvenating), American Gangster (pretty good), Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (can't believe I had never seen it) and finally, embarassingly, Schindler's List - obviously, it's so amazing - much more uplifting than I had anticipated - what great performances. We also watched our netflicks, The Last Hangman aka Pierrepoint starring my favorite actress, Juliet Stevenson and one of Whit's favorite actors, Timothy Spall. Oh, and last night I finished up Chinatown - enjoyed it, who knew Jack Nicholson was so hot back then? So it was a movie filled break, which is fine by me, we gotta enjoy it while we're young and childless.

I hope 2010 is a fantastic year. I feel in a good place - I've got a great family who are all relatively healthy; I've got a fun new apartment which is so nice to come home to; I'm in a good ward with new friendships blossoming; I am so lucky to have my job at a great company with fantastic bosses; I am healthy; I have a wonderful husband who is funny, talented, interesting and I love hanging out with every day. So here's to 2010 - let the good times roll (and hopefully let a baby bounce!)