Tuesday, December 14, 2010

The Reason for the Season

           It's Christmas time...the best time of the year! I am loving the Christmas music and decorations and everything else that makes Christmas time so special. But I am so glad to have reminders about what this time of year is really about. We get to celebrate the birth of our Savior and hopefully spend more time thinking about him and his life and what he means to us.

        There has been no rhyme or reason to the seasons down here in Houston! We've had 65-75 degree weather all December. I'm not complaining about that, I'm just confused what season it is. In Utah, I know it's fall when the leaves start changing color and fall off the trees. I know it's winter when it gets cold and snows outside. But here in Houston, the leaves finally started changing a couple weeks ago and there is definitely no snow. I look out my window and it looks like fall. We go running outside in t-shirts and shorts and it feels like summer. But all the Christmas decorations are telling me it's winter! Just so you don't think I'm crazy, I took a few pictures to prove my point...
Keep in mind these pictures were all taken within the same week.

                                                                     Summer...



                 
                                                                           Fall...




                                                              Winter...





    Whether the seasons here make sense or not, I hope I can remember the true reason for the season this Christmas, our Savior Jesus Christ.

Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Thanksgiving Weekend

    This Thanksgiving was our first big holiday away from family. We were planning on going home but the plane flights didn't work out with Mitch's school schedule and we figured we'd be going home 3 weeks later for Christmas anyway. (Now the countdown is down to 2 1/2 weeks!) We had a great Thanksgiving weekend and made lots of  fun memories.

    On the morning of Thanksgiving, we went and played in a turkey bowl at a park with some people in our stake and we couldn't believe how nice the weather was. While our families were getting hit with a major snow storm in Utah, we were out playing football in 75 degree weather in shirts and shorts! To some people, a major snow storm may sound crazier than 75 degree weather in November, but being a girl who's grown up in Utah, this weather is throwing me for a loop. Not saying I don't love it though...






Mitch's cousins invited us up to their house for Thanksgiving dinner. They were first timers on cooking the big feast as well but everything turned out amazing! We had all the things you couldn't live without on Thanksgiving plus nine pies for 6 people. They had made apple and pumpkin pies and we just had to make our favorites...pecan and banana cream.




                                                            Could we have enough pie?

And how about some Black Friday shopping? I had been looking around for a few months to find a good deal on a tv and with Black Friday and all, we thought it would be a good time to buy one. We looked around at a few stores and finally found the best deal at Target. But...we didn't want to be impulsive buyers and buy it right then cause that's always a bad idea right? We went home, made some dinner (Mitch was starving), and looked online just to confirm we FOR SURE had found the best deal possible. We called another Target that was closer to our house than the first we had gone to and asked them if they had the same deal. They said they were sold out! We called the other Target where we had just been and asked them if they had any left. They said we have 1 left, but we're not holding it! We packed up our dinner, ate it on the way while Mitch gave me a pep talk about sprinting back to the tv. We made it to the store in a record breaking 5 minutes. I jumped out and ran to the back of the store, expecting a crowd of people staring at the tv, deciding if they should buy it, and me having to take it right out from under them. I mean it is Black Friday right? I got to the back and no one was there besides an employee. I told him we wanted the tv and he sauntered off  to check if there were any left. We were in luck! We really did get the very last one.

                       Our early Christmas present to each other. Oh and we got a dog too.
    Just kidding, we watched our friend's dog over the weekend and had lots of fun with her.

                                         We also got our house all decorated for Christmas...