Christmas!!

Christmas was far better than I expected this year. I've had enough crummy Christmases that I worried. Nope. This one was good. Starting with waffles and cartoons Christmas Eve morning. Plus some yoga and housecleaning (sadly, the vacuum cleaner broke halfway through the first room -- humbug).

The evening was spent with my favorite cousins. Hooray!!

Nativity populated entirely with tiny humans for the first time since my brothers and I were kids.
Finally!!

Uncle Martin does a great job narrating

This tiny babe was everyone's favorite. Her mom even let me hold her for a little bit.
There is no sadness in the world that holding a tiny baby can't cure.

My nieces and nephew are the coolest.
(Also, they remind me a lot of their dad. A LOT.)

Aaron played guitar while his girlfriend Anna sang. She has a lovely voice. He is smitten.

My cousin Bryce invited a girl for the first time ever. Isn't she pretty? Doctor, too.
We're trying not to be too pushy ;)

There's a reason I look forward to seeing these people. And talking with them.

Relationship goals 

Taking sweater cutes from my mom

Christmas morning, Dave and I ate breakfast with Mom and Dad, then spent a few hours helping Mom prep for the big afternoon meal so that Mom wouldn't have to worry about it when everyone else arrived to open presents. Dad took the opportunity to remove snow for the second time that morning. Hooray for new snow on Christmas!

Perfect American breakfast for the perfect American family (2 kids - one boy and a girl. If only, Dave!)

Mom says this is the first time the money bread has ever come out of the pan perfectly.
Had to document it!

When it came time to open my gifts, I was far more spoiled than I ever expected. My parents are so generous to all of us. I don't deserve them.

Dad gave all the families a package with chicken sausage and ham. He also gifted us with Red Lobster biscuit mix, campfire roasting sticks, puffy vests for the boys, and sweaters for the girls. My dad is a true original, and sweetly thoughtful.

Mom made PJ a Busy Book. She said she made most of it up, so she'll never be able to recreate it. I may make her try to recreate it for me anyway ;)

A package of Red Vines bigger than Dave's head. Haha!

Now for some gorgeous shots of children:

This little guy wasn't feeling very well, but it didn't keep him from eating most of a package of graham crackers

The girls had quite the group of helpers to put together their new Lego sets

Mom's turkey dinner was delicious, and I especially love cherry pie

I stayed up past midnight and listened to as many Christmas songs on FM100.3 as I could before they clicked off. This year, they kept playing Christmas songs through the next day. Haha! I'm so glad. I love Christmas music. I wish it played a little longer every year. I will listen to "Feliz Navidad" over and over and over again as long as they will let me.

I hope you all had a very Merry Christmas. I know I did!

A pathetic potluck

The past two years, my company sent my coworkers and I to Tucanos for our annual Christmas lunch.  This was already a downgrade from the breakfast -- for us and our families -- and gift certificates they did the first couple of years I worked there.

This year, we had a potluck. Apparently we blew our budget on the summer party.

When the time came to start our Christmas party this is what the food table looked like:

I brought the vegetables

The saddest potluck you ever saw.

The irony is that we've had quite a few fun potlucks in the last six months or so. But, either because the power went out the day before and everyone worked from home so we missed the signups, or we just couldn't believe this was our real party. Those of us who came sat around for a while and watched QVC in the break room. Others gave up and went out to lunch (one guy snuck out to see Star Wars). After an hour another coworker came with a bunch of different options for soup. They were quite tasty!

The head honchos were kind enough to send a gift-wrapping service to us. I only had 6 gifts, so it didn't do me a ton of good. Although, I like the paper they offered. One of my coworkers -- the one that snuck out -- had about 50 gifts. Apparently, when his wife heard about the deal she sent all of the kids gifts. He had them all on a two-decker trolley. Smart guy. Smart wife.

But, you know, after the parties we've had in the past, the potluck felt a little like a diss from corporate.

Hopefully next year will be better. Ah, well, as a wise woman once said, "A terrible party makes for a good story!"

FL trip day 1: Disney Animal Kingdom and Hollywood Studios part 1

My trip to Walt Disney World was every bit as epic as I hoped it would be. I hadn't been since I was about 12, and it was worth the wait.

Keep your hands and feet inside the ride at all times, kids. There are a LOT of blog posts coming and I shan't apologize for the abundance of photos.

Tip #1: Go with someone who is familiar with the parks

My partner in fun, Jillian, has vacationed at Disney World multiple times with her family. She also completed a Disney College Program (DCP) a few years ago. Disney World is a big place. The parks themselves are a bit of a maze, and getting from one to another is quite the production whether you have a car or not. I am very grateful she was with me. We definitely made the most of our time!

Day 1:

Jillian and I flew overnight to Orlando, checked into our hotel, and made our way to Disney Animal Kingdom (DAK) to meet our friend Kiershta. Kiershta works in EPCOT guest relations and very generously used her guest passes to get Jillian and I into the parks for FREE for the first three days of our trip. Amazing, right? She even had a little time to play with us that first day. She is such a sweetheart.

The Tree of Life at Disney Animal Kingdom

Kiershta taught us about the Disney World app. Unlike at Disneyland, you can set up just about every aspect of your trip online through their app. Fastpasses, restaurant reservations, memory maker photos, attraction wait times, show and character times are all available through the app. You can even link with the other people in your group so you can see their trip-related info and schedule stuff together. The drawback is that it takes up a TON of space on my phone. After a couple of days, I had to upload my photos to the cloud and delete them from my phone to keep up.

"It's Tough to be a Bug"

I'd say this is the view of Expedition Everest but it seems I downloaded the cropped version. Whoops!
We make pretty good monsters, though!

Hakuna matata!

You may notice that Jillian and I are wearing long pants. It was about 85 degrees in Orlando that day. It was the only day we made that mistake.

Russell's face is pure joy. I couldn't not smile when looking at him.

The meet-and-greet with Russell and Dug from UP! was rather hilarious. Jillian told Russell that she's almost elderly and needed help crossing the street, and then the attendant yelled at the poor kid for wandering off. Then Russell spotted my Dr. Who/UP mash-up tee. I thought he'd be excited about Carl and Ellie, but Russell pointed to his sash and I saw that he has a badge with a fez on it. We were instant buddies after that. Fezzes are cool.

Other fun things we did there:

• Dinosaurs! ride
• Expedition Everest (single rider is the way to go)
• Viewed the monkeys, bats, tigers, and antelope
• Kali River Rapids (surprisingly, we barely got wet)

Dinosaurs!

Next, we made our way over to Disney Hollywood Studios (Studios) to meet up with my friend and Jillian's boyfriend, Andrew. (You may remember Andrew from my production of Is He Dead?)

We headed first to the Tower of Terror. It's similar to the one in Disneyland, but had an extra scene in it. Probably the best moment, though, was during the introductory video when the attendant stood over a little girl, waiting for her to turn around and jump (she never did), and when the video ended with "will take you directly to" the attendant whispered "The Gift Shahhhhhhp!" It was hilarious.

Then we ran over to the Streets of America for the The Osborne Family Spectacle of Dancing Lights. We arrived just in time to see them switch on and Oh. My. Goodness. We even managed to be right in the middle, almost the best viewing spot (thanks to my scooting in behind a cast member who was forcing his way through the crowds with a cart). It was glorious! The lights danced to Christmas music and it was so fun and festive. Even Jillian, who despises Christmas decorations before Thanksgiving, was enchanted. We sang "Feliz Navidad" at the top of our lungs and laughed and danced. It was the last year for the lights. I'm thrilled I didn't miss it!

Note: Aerosmith's Rocking Roller Coaster in Studios and Expedition Everest in DAK were my favorite roller coasters in all of the parks. I cannot decide which I liked more.

It was worth waiting to ride in the front row

Andrew dubbed this "The face of fun." I need more roller coasters in my life!

Tip #2: If you're already on line for an attraction when the park closes, they have to let you through

Lastly, we did something Jillian has never done at Studios: rode Toy Story Midway Mania. She said the line is always insanely long and Fastpasses run out first thing. But we jumped in line about two minutes before the park closed, and only waited about half an hour. A Disney miracle!

Too bad I'm not a better shot

The detail was fantastic

The cast members wouldn't let me take this pretzel on line, so I wolfed it down quickly. Worth it!

The day ended with something of an adventure. Andrew's friends Geoff and Kristen were supposed to pick us up, so we took a tram to the middle of the parking lot. However, the parking lot entrance was blocked off for a race scheduled for the next morning. We walked back to the bus area just in time for the last bus to leave. Fortunately, a security guard took pity on us and drove us in the official guard van over to the Yacht Club. We were so grateful that Jillian wrote down the guard's name and hometown so we could let her supervisor know how much we appreciated her. Geoff and Kristen then drove us to a grocery story so Jillian and I could pick us up some supplies before we passed out in our cozy hotel room.

Day 2: First day at Epcot
Day 3: First day at Magic Kingdom
Day 4: The Wizarding World of Harry Potter
Day 5: Magic Kingdom with Aaron
Day 6: Typhoon Lagoon and Food and Wine
Day 7: Disneybounding at MK
Day 8: DAK and Studios again
Day 9: Last day at Epcot and MK
Day 10: Characters and hotels