Merry Christmas and Happy 2009!

Naturally, I spent most of my extra-long Christmas break in Idaho with the fam.  Or should I say, a teeny portion of the fam.  This year it was just me, Leslie and Alex, and the parents.  Definitely a quieter, low-key Christmas.  

Let me paint a picture for you. Christmas Eve: we went to a movie, and when we got out of the theater we realized we didn't know what we were doing for dinner that night. It was after 6:00, so we just drove around to see what was open. Maybe Costco dogs? Nope, closed. Fast food? Good luck. The typical neon lights of Yellowstone were unsprisingly dark. Oh, look, the bar at Mama Inez is open! And Dominos! When all was said and done, our Christmas Eve consisted of cheese crisps, pizza, and Dad winning at Phase 10. (I was happy for him - he's such a trooper when we play Nirtz.)

Anyway, we all enjoyed ourselves, with lots of trips to the taco truck (I miss that Mexican food), the movie theater (I never see as many movies as when I'm at home), and Lowe's (naturally, we worked on a few home projects...we repainted the kitchen and it looks AWESOME. And Alex and Dad went to work on installing a cabinet. And I started peeling off the wallpaper of the upstairs bathroom!! Is anyone else really excited that this room is finally getting some attention??).

And I got to take a trip to Pebble Creek and get my skiing fix!
It snowed a LOT! Which I really loved since DC seems to have a definite shortage of the fluffy white stuff. Doesn't Chink's Peak (yes, that's the real name) look like a painting?
Dad and Alex had to snowplow the driveway more than once. The walls of snow on both sides of the driveway were at least a foot and a half tall!
The downside is that it snowed so much that we couldn't go to Spokane to see the SpokanderLouws. The days before we were supposed to go, it snowed about 2 feet (or 3? 4?) in Spokane and PLENTY in Poky. This was a bittersweet tragedy for all. We needed our kid fix. I missed the nieces and nephews. And since none of them were around, I realized how much of my time I usually devote to the kids in exchange for the adults when I'm around my family. Interesting.

I also got to visit Sarah-Dawn in Costa Mesa. Yay, Southern California, warmer weather! Right? Not so much. But we still had a great time. She literally lives minutes away from the ocean, which is basically her dream come true. We went to a couple of beaches...

...had a bonfire (most efficient fire ever made) and made s'mores on one of the beaches while we watched the sun set...

...went hiking through a canyon...

...and watched the fireworks and played with hats in Downtown Disney.



And we ate at In-N-Out and got Boba drinks. Twice!!