Christmas 2008 in Rexburg

Christmas Eve

Scott and I got up and made sugar cookies to take to some friends. It was a good thing I had not gotten ready yet because apparently I am quite clumsy when it comes to working with flour. But on a side note: I love that robe. It is so soft and warm and it is the first thing I put on in the mornings. I want to be buried in that robe.

Anyways...we got ready, gathered the cookies, and headed out the door. Getting out of our parking lot was a little difficult. We have had sooooo much snow the past couple of weeks. I think this is the most it has snowed since I have been up here. We went to Idaho Falls to run some errands and drop off cookies. We went to lunch at TGI Fridays--where I was very grumpy and hungry. I get in the crankiest moods when I am hungry. I pity Scott when I am pregnant and having cravings. Poor man.

I lost my bracelet--found it--ran some more errands, and then we stopped at the Horchs. After a lovely chat we headed home.

We stopped at Walgreens to pick up a chocolate orange for Scott (Santa had forgotten). In the parking lot was this HUGE mountain of plowed snow. So we climbed it and were just silly. We dropped off a few more cookies, looked at Christmas lights around Rexburg and went home to open our Christmas Eve presents.

It is a tradition in my family to open one present on Christmas Eve--our Christmas pajamas! I loved mine for this year--they are a pj bottoms and a bejeweled sweater from Victoria's Secret. Scott got some Nike basketball shorts. I wish I took more pictures, but I feel silly taking a picture of me in my pajamas and putting it on this blog. We had dinner, read the Nativity, watched "A Christmas Story", put out our stockings and went to bed to await Santa! :)


And Santa came!!!!! So did a blizzard. We put on the Christmas lights and music and opened presents. It was my first white Christmas, and it was very pretty. After presents I made crepes with lemon creme filling and strawberries and some bacon and hot chocolate. Yum. We lounged around in our pajamas and played Seinfeld Scene It--which was so much fun. Scott and I are big Seinfeld fans. He put up a good fight, but I was the champion!

After struggling to get our car out of our parking spot for about 15 minutes, we went with our friends and neighbors, the Jacksons, to see "Marley and Me." It was cute, but definitely not a kid movie like I thought it was going to be. (Scott got teary-eyed at the end :) Then we went back home, and had dinner with the Jacksons.

Later, we went with our friends, the Bundys, to see another movie. haha. We saw "Valkyrie." It was pretty good. I learned a lot about the German struggle with Hitler. Then we came home and went to sleep. It was a wonderful, but busy couple of days.

I was sad not to be with my family, but it was fun to celebrate a holiday with just Scott. He is the best present I could ever get.

Free at Last....but....Sick

Yes, I am sick. Of course, I can't enjoy my freedom from school. I have to be sick and stuck packing up my apartment.

A lot has been going on in the past couple of weeks. Finals, graduation, family in town, packing the apartment, sick, blizzards, lost my wedding rings (then found them)! All the stress has just finally caught up with me and wreaking havoc in my sinuses as I sit here in my sweats, with kleenex all around me, watching "The Cash Cab." I must look the epitome of pathetic-ness.

So finals were good. I had to have 25 books read and summarized by the end of the semester for my Young Adult Literature Class. I had to deliver an advertising pitch to a real-life client. (I just found out that my group won! The client chose our campaign over the five other groups and it will be implemented in next semester's Activities advertising campaign on campus. Cool, huh?) My visual media class was easy at the end, and my Senior English course was kind of a nightmare. I had to turn in a portfolio that showcased how I have grown over my four years at BYU-Idaho as a writer.

The day my family came I was in the library for 7 hours straight at the Mac computers finishing up my portfolio in InDesign. And I didnt even finish. I rushed to my incredibly messy house and tried to make it look presentable for my family. My wonderful family got there and helped me clean. They are so wonderful.

Then, I couldnt find my rings. Uh-huh. They had dissappeared. So then I was freaking out about that rummaging through everything. I went back to the library to see if they had fallen off there. Nothing. I came back. We said a prayer. And then my sister Brittany found them. As I was flinging clothes, trying to clean up before my family got home, they had flown off. The freezing cold outside had made my fingers shrink.

The next day was graduation. I had to finish up my portfolio, print it off, turn it in, get my cap and gown, return my textbooks, pick up my tickets, get ready, then go. My mom, dad, Brittany, Scott, my mother and father-in-law, my brother and sister-in-law Jason and Nikki and their kids all joined me for the Graduation Banquet which President Uchtdorf was at. The food was ok. I was paranoid and thought my chicken was a little pink.

Then I had to go to the Hart Field House and stand in line for almost 45 minutes to walk into the auditorium and sit down. It was actually kind of neat. As we walked through the Hart to the auditorium all of the faculty stood on either side of the hallways in their robes clapping for us. I felt like Harry Potter at Hogwarts, wearing my black robe and having the professors cheer for me. :)

President Uchtdorf spoke. I love him.

Then we broke into our colleges. The Language and Letters College was held in the Barrus Concert Hall. All the graduates sat up on the stage. A couple of students spoke. One girl was just weird. And the guy read a creative non-fiction story he had wrote about his mission and a sweaty, drunk guy that hugged him. It was just weird, and a little inappropriate. But then we were called up and given our diplomas. I was happy because the Dean of my college is Brother Ivers. I love that guy. He was my Spanish teacher virtually the whole time I took Spanish. So then I get my diploma and totally go the wrong way! And of course everyone is following me. I run into some boxes and have to climb over them to get to my seat. Yeah, a little embarassing.

So then the rest of the weekend was just spent hanging out with family and being sick.

I was supposed to go see the Russian Moscow Ballet's Nutcracker last night, but it was canceled because of the weather. I am sooooo mad. I was looking forward to it for about a month and a half. They might reschedule it, but who knows.

Scott is snowboarding right now because its his day off and I'm just trying to get better. I have pictures from graduation that I will be putting up soon. I am also going to take pictures of my apartment since we're moving after Christmas.

So until then...Happy Christmas!