Holiday Cheer

Greetings from Kansas City!

(We're actually in Phoenix right now, but I wanted to share some pictures of our

warm and cozy Christmas-ized apartment).

Finally, a Christmas tree I actually like to look at! For 3 years, now, I've decorated and redecorated, purchased, returned, and dealt with ugly trees trying to be beautiful. This was actually the second attempt. As you may recall from my previous post, I went shopping with my mom and sister and spent far too much money on Christmas decorations. Well, it turns out those were just ugly, so I took them back, spent less money on different ones, and redecorated. Who knew someone would be crazy enough to decorate a Christmas tree twice in one year? (I realize that most of you won't appreciate this, a lot of you may even think it's ugly, but I like it, and that's all that matters!) You can't really see it that well - it's not a great picture - but it's your standard artificial tree [that once looked huge in our little Logan apartments and is now dwarfed by the height of the ceiling in our KC apartment] with white poinsettias, silver and white berries, silver, white and clear balls, glass stars, and silver icicle droplets.

On a side note, Alec doesn't like it and we will have something different next year.

We've always wanted a fireplace, and now we have one. So what better thing to do than string some garland, lights, and candles for a little sparkle and warmth?

Sasha likes to get into the Christmas spirit as well. (Mostly she like to chew on the tree branches and use the ornaments like toys, but that's okay... No harm done... yet...)

Help!

Okay people, this is something I never thought I would have a problem with, but I guess you never really can count on too much when it comes to your own brainpower...

Alec and I are having a REALLY hard time finding a name we like for this child of ours (a boy). Yes, there are a few options that are okay, but nothing has really jumped out at us. So, we are enlisting your talented, wise, and open-minded suggestions. Just post a comment with your ideas, and then look forward to another poll as the big day approaches.

*A caveat: Please don't give us suggestions if it's a name you've always wanted for your own kids. I'm a little superstitious about baby-naming, and therefore don't tell people names I like for fear that they will get stolen... Don't make me be a name-stealer, please. Thank you. :)

Breaking News!

Well - it isn't really "breaking" - it happened about a month ago, but our camera has been MIA for a while, and I knew no one would believe me without documented evidence...

Attention one and all: I just wanted to let you know that the world is ending. Hell has frozen over. Pigs have flown. And my husband has bought a coat!

We were just innocently shopping for some church clothes for him, and I simply asked him to try one on so we could know what style he liked...if he were to ever own one. And I guess that just did the trick. He tried it on, and didn't want to take it off. We even went to another store to see what they had and so he could think about it, and we ended up going back to the first one and purchased.... VICTORY!!!

The First Freeze

So, we've experienced our first Midwest Ice Storm. It actually hasn't been all that bad. It comes because of what they call freezing rain - it's warm enough up in the atmosphere somewhere to be rain and not snow, but when it hits the ground, it's cold enough to freeze it. However, the freezing part hasn't really been happening - at least on the roads. I guess the friction of people driving is enough to keep things wet and sloshy... so what ends up happening, is people walk on the road rather than the sidewalk, because the sidewalks are a bit hazardous. (And it's been a little weird to have to break the ice off your door handle before you can get into the car).

Campus was closed yesterday, and there was a chance it would be today, but sadly, no. Alec will, in fact, be expected to show up at his History of Design Technology final this afternoon.

One thing that has been kind of crazy is all the power outages that have been happening. We haven't been affected by it, but on Monday, the governor declared a state of emergency and sent the National Guard out with water and generators for the 90,000-some-odd people who lost power further south and west of us. Also, there is not salt to be had to melt the ice... Not only can your average residential consumer not walk into their neighborhood ice-melt-supply store, but the actual city of Kansas City itself is out of ice... Who knows when that will be taken care of... Not to be critical, but Alec and I both think that one bad night of ice should not deplete your entire supply of ice-melt... But what do we know, we're only used to those mild, non-icy Logan winters...

Thanksgiving

I know, I know, it's a little past the main event, but I thought I'd give a quick recap:

My family came into town for Thanksgiving, and it was really nice to have them all here - though a little hectic, and we're still trying to figure out where some of our dishes were stashed away to when they so kindly cleaned up after themselves.

My parents came into town from Utah on Tuesday after having spent a few days with my sister in Des Moines, followed by my brother, Lee, from DC on Wednesday, and my sister and her husband (Erin and Matt) later Wednesday night from Des Moines. All in all, we had 7 people in the apartment for most of the week, and it was kind of crazy. The kitties didn't know quite what to do with themselves. Max holed up under the bed for the better part of the week, while Sasha made the rounds socializing and exploring all the new stuff lying around.

Games were played by all ... (mostly)...

Food was had by all ... (definitely)...

Even the kitties had a special Thanksgiving treat - they didn't much care for the cranberry sauce, but the gravy was a BIG hit.

On Friday, we travelled to Independence and Liberty (both about 20-30 minutes away from KC) to do some church history touring. We also visited the Community of Christ (the church formerly known as RLDS) "temple." They gave us a tour and we watched a video about how it all started... It sounded vaguely familiar - the whole Joseph Smith going to the woods thing - while key pieces were left out... Then it turned into some hippy propaganda where we need peace and love and tie-dyed banners in the assembly hall... All sort of strange, but now we can say we did it.

While the boys stayed home to watch the BYU-Utes football game on Saturday, the girls went shopping. We had a great time, spent far too much money on Christmas decorations [if you ask Alec, any money I spend on Christmas decorations is too much, because I never end up liking what I get, so I just get more later. Oh well...] We came home to Dad (Alec) and Grandpa (my dad) setting up the changing table. We already had the crib set up before everyone got into town, but these two decided this would be a good activity while they waited for the women. (They're not really into sports anyway). It was pretty cute.