The Big Start to the Holidays

So I'm a little late in posting this time because I wanted to wait until I had the pictures from Thanksgiving to post, but those are on my home computer, and I usually only have time while I'm at work. So, I'll be sure to post pictures of my absolutely beautiful turkey that I cooked on Thanksgiving really soon. (I'm very proud of that bird. I think I'll cook it that way every year. I don't know, we'll see.) We had Rob and Christina Snyder and John and Delys Tyler come over for the traditional Thanksgiving Dinner. It was a smaller group than last year, but it was still really nice. All the food was yummy; we were all stuffed; and we all had way too many calories for one day- but who's counting, right? After our delicious meal, we played a game of Settlers of Catan. It being Delys's first time playing, naturally she whooped us all and won by a landslide. We thoroughly enjoyed our day off of work to play with friends. It would've been great to be with family, but we just couldn't afford to travel anywhere for Thanksgiving.













Rob and Christina Snyder

John and Delys Tyler

As for the Friday after Thanksgiving, I'd like to say that "I avoided Black Friday like the Black Plague," but it was really more along the lines of "I didn't go shopping because I wasn't really sure what I wanted to look for yet." Instead, I made plans to put up my Christmas tree that day with the help of Dershin Wu and Anny Li, two Taiwanese girls in our ward. Dershin had never put up a Christmas tree, so I thought that she would like to help me. As I invited Dershin, I saw the look of wanting in Anny's eyes, and I realized that even though she has been in the United States for 7 years now, she probably has never put up a tree either. So I invited her too. Needless to say, they were both elated by the idea, and I was so happy to have their help.

Anny helping fluff the bottom branches

Dershin adding the first ornament

The finished product!!

Afterwards, Dershin was kind enough to take a few pictures of us so that I could have some for our Christmas cards. I used ones that she took on our camera, but I wish that I had seen this one from her camera BEFORE I printed out my Christmas cards. It's my favorite! Oh well!

Then, the rest of this week seemed to just fly by. Mark and I sang "Oh, My Father" for our congregation on Sunday, which seemed to go pretty well. We sang it straight out of the hymnbook, but we mixed it up with which parts we sang, and I even did an echo for part of a verse. It was nice and I think it brought the Spirit, so I guess we did what was asked of us. :)

Mark is now into his last week of classes, and he's been studying quite a bit. Our evenings this week haven't been too eventful, but Wednesday was certainly a long night. It was our annual wreath-making activity for the Relief Society in our ward. There was a short musical program (which was very well planned and performed) before the big event. It was actually pretty fun to be able to chat with a few friends that I don't get to talk to often. I like doing crafty things, but the perfectionist in me made this craft a difficult one to be proud of. I was too busy chatting with someone who I hadn't seen in a long time, so I didn't stake out a good spot to work on the wreath. I started later, which meant that I was left using the bits that the rest of the people at the table didn't want to use, so I had to piece the little branches together and it took a really long time. Most people were finishing with their bows by the time I was almost half way. Ugh! But all the pine smelled really good, and I'm excited to re-do the bow so that the wreath will look great when I finally get it on my wall.

I'm not really sure what the rest of the week will bring, but I have a feeling that Christmas shopping, along with maybe some crafts as presents, and trying to prepare to travel to Chicago might bring about one busy time. That's ok! I'd rather be busy than bored! :)