We went home...

But just for a visit or two!

I traveled to Spokane to meet my parents over Veteran's Day Weekend. On Saturday my Dad and I drove down to Pullman for the Cougar Football game against UCLA. I couldn't miss the opportunity to see my cousins!

I ::FROZE:: in the stands. Oi. California has made me a wuss when it comes to cold weather. But I persevered and we stayed through three-point-five quarters before my Dad finally relented. The Cougs didn't win, but they did manage to make a small comeback (we listened to the radio broadcast from the car.)

The other reason we met in Spokane was for a family friend's wedding on Sunday. It was a beautiful winter wonderland theme and we all had a great time! 

My parents and I also managed to dress exactly alike without any planning. I have no idea how this happened, but I guess good taste runs in the family. 

The next morning I flew back to Sunny San Diego and my parents drove home in the snow. Ha!

November seemed to fly by, because about two weeks later Tim and I both flew home for Thanksgiving. Only this time we flew to Bellingham - there are two direct flight from San Diego to Bellingham and we took them that week! Tim loved driving his car again, especially after having to drive rentals while we've been here.

Thanksgiving day was celebrated at my parents' house.

 We completed our traditional puzzle in what felt like record time.

 And that evening Tim and I did some Black Friday shopping from about midnight to 2AM. Tim was still on graveyard and would have to go back to work Sunday night, so we made a point to stay up later than usual during this trip.

On Friday the Cougars were playing the Huskies for the Apple Cup, so we donned our gear and watched the game at my Aunt and Uncle's house.

While everyone else watched with eager anticipation...

Tim slept.

 Thankfully he woke up in time to see them play the last quarter and overtime, where we WON!

 GO COUGS!

After the game, Tim and I drove to his parents' house for some post-Thanksgiving celebrations. On Saturday night we went bowling with the family and after one 'normal' round, we gave 'crazy bowling' a try. 

 Every frame is a different stance or style of bowling.

On Sunday we went out to Breakfast and then Tim, his parents, and I went to look at cars before they took us to the airport. I may have test-driven a Mercedes...

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Fourth of July FAIL

To celebrate America's Independence, we headed to Old Town where they were celebrating like it was the 1800s. 

Of course, you can't visit Old Town without eating Mexican food...

 We let our delicious, but massive meal digest while we watched square dancing in the square.

There were several people dressed up in period costume - this was one couple who sat in front of me and were dressed to the nines! She was even wearing a hoop skirt.

The Old Town State Park has several shops and small museums around the square, this one happened to be sponsored by Wells Fargo and outlined their contribution to the developing West. I was shocked to learn that 18 people could ride in one of these carriages and it typically took up to 24 days to reach San Diego from St. Louis. (Can you imagine!?)

We wandered around for a bit and then made it back to the square for the Annual Pie Eating Contest. It was quite funny to watch and I was thankful that we weren't participating!

The end of the contest was also the end of the festivities, so we jumped back on the Trolley and headed to the Gaslamp District for a movie. We ended up seeing Ted, which was pretty funny.

After the movie, we went home, ate dinner, and left to go to the waterfront for the Big Bay Boom fireworks extravaganza. I was so excited. See - this is me excited:

Oh look, the fireworks are starting early...

and that was it. The entire 20 minute show went off in 15 seconds. It has made national news. And I promise, it was not as cool as everyone who WASN'T THERE is trying to make it seem.

Since no one told us what was going on, everyone waited another 40 minutes. Eventually the cancellation leaked out and everyone left. We made it back to our condo in time to watch the live stream from Seattle of their firework show - which DID work.

FAIL SAN DIEGO. FAIL.

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Oh, Christmas Tree.

Welcome back! It was a good (and much needed) weekend off for the blog.

I thought I'd post some pictures of our super sweet christmas tree. 

Daytime...

Night time...

I found a tutorial online for taking pictures of christmas trees and it was all good and dandy, but you couldn't see Santa. At. All. So I made Tim pose for a picture with a candle. You can imagine how exciting that was for him...

Of course, no tree is complete without a little mickey mouse. :-)

And, just because it's awesome, here's our Hershey, PA nativity scene...

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Jingle Bell Card Display.

I love receiving Christmas cards.

But I've struggled for a long time on how to display them. Not this year.

This year I had a plan.

I google searched and I found the BEST idea.

Jingle Bells.

The inspiration...

From Centsationalgirl.com

My supplies...

I wrapped the green bead garland around the silver garland to give the bells something to "hang on" to, so that they wouldn't slide around. Plus, it was a pretty cheap silver garland, so the green adds just the right amount of pizzazz!

Laying it all out...

Our carpet is covered in glitter. As it should be.

The finished product...

 I made the wreath last year from some leftover ribbon and felt. Not too shabby. 

When Tim and I tried the bells the first time, the cards slid right out. It might have been because of the size of the bells (or the cheapness), but I made it work. 

It turned out pretty well, if I do say so myself! And the best part, is that I can disassemble everything at the end of the season and either re-use it or change it up. I think I might try a lighted garland next time...or maybe a holly garland...or maybe different color ribbon...the possibilities are ENDLESS! :-)

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Turkey Dance Party.

Entertainment courtesy of Just Dance 3. :-)

How did you spend your Thanksgiving?

P.S. Perfect sibling picture...

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A Day at Sea and Jungle Island

I figure it's time for me to finish up the posts about our New Year's trip to the Caribbean.  I apologize in advance about the length.  But, if you make it to the end, you'll find two great videos from our trip!

Our last day of the cruise was spent at sea, as we sailed back to Miami from Grand Turks.  The cruise provided a ton of entertainment throughout the day and Tim and I wanted to take full advantage of that!  Of course we forgot our camera for some of the most entertaining parts, which included an ice carving demonstration (the carver created a two doves and a heart in a huge block in less than 30 minutes and it was AMAZING!) and we had the "pleasure" of witnessing the Hairy Chest contest.  I'm sure you're all really disappointed you don't get to see those pictures.  :-)

 When we got back to the cabin, Tim decided we needed some pictures of our surroundings.  This included the hallway outside our room:

Our balcony, as viewed from our room:

 The lobby of the ship, as viewed from the glass elevators:

 This was on our way to a Towel Folding class!  While we waited for the class to start, I made an artistic representation of Mt. St. Helens:

This is what the class looked like, and while it does look like it was mostly children, we were not the only adults there...not by a long-shot!

 Here I am putting the final touches on my Elephant:

 Aren't they cute!?

 What could this possibly turn in to?

 Bulldogs!

 Of course that night was also the big New Year's celebration!  We went to dinner in the formal dining room and then caught the last big Vegas-style show in the Palladium theater:

Then we went back to our rooms, where our awesome steward surprised us with New Year's hats and noise-makers! Laurie and I went a little crazy with our noise makers!

We headed to the big party on the Lido deck with the rest of the boat, where they were streaming the live-feed from NYC.  It was the first time we had been in the same time zone as the "actual" ball drop!

 I don't know if you can tell from this picture, it's pretty dark, but the deck was completely full.  It was insane!

Laurie and I celebrated with more noise making...

Fun was had by all and we ended the night with a midnight buffet and then headed straight to bed for our early departure from the boat.

The next morning we were supposed to disembark with the other excursion groups, Patti had booked us a morning at Jungle Island to occupy our time between disembarkation and our flight later that afternoon.  Unfortunately for us, the boat docked an hour ahead of schedule and everything got bumped up earlier.  Without warning.  We got a call telling us we had 8 minutes to get down to our meeting point.

8. Minutes.
We're smiling in this picture, but we were all a little p.o.'d...

 We did make it to Jungle Island and we had a great time!  Unfortunately I don't have any of the "official photos" from the day, we didn't buy any, but imagine us holding parrots, an alligator, and a skunk.

 They have a lot of flamingos and the feeding time is definitely a frenzy and activity!

 These white birds kept landing and sitting on the flamingos like they didn't want to get wet.  It was highly amusing!

 Tim with a statue of a snapping turtle:

 Now for two videos:

Yes.  We did do that.  No. We won't do that again.

Are we the only ones that think this is hilarious?!?

We got a little animalistic towards the end...

But not nearly as much as this girl!

After our tour was done, we headed back to our bus and went straight to the airport!  Unfortunately our flight from Miami to Houston was delayed, but not enough to interrupt our flight from Houston to Seattle.  We were very thankful for that cushion time in Houston!

And now you're completely caught up on our trip to the Caribbean!  We had a fantastic time and it only took a few days to get rid of the rolling feeling from being on the ship.  Bonus!

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