the holidays. . .

 i promise i've been meaning to write about our Christmas trip, but

every time i sat down to actually write something about the holidays 

i would think about the millions of pictures i took and i'd

give up before i even tried.

i took so.many.pictures.

it's actually kind of embarrassing how many pictures i took.

tonight i finally realized that if i didn't just pick some

pictures and write the post it would probably never

happen-so here it is!

i decided the glorious utah mountains are officially

my favorite thing in the universe.

i never appreciated how beautiful they were because 

i got used to looking at them everyday for years & years,

but now that we're currently residing in a mountain-less state

i have a whole new appreciation for them and all their splendor.

 

i also forgot how much i love sitting around and literally

doing NOTHING with my family.

we did a lot of that over the break.

sitting.eating.laughing.

it was divine.

logan & i got to spend time with both sides of our family

which was great.

with the help of the new front runner train getting back & forth

between SLC & provo was a breeze!

on Christmas eve we got to skype with James which was

super fun.

it's crazy to me how much he has grown over

the past year and a half-he looks like my dad

which freaks me out.

can't believe he will be home in MAY!

Christmas morning will always be my favorite day of the year.

i still remember the glory days when my parents would make

us kids wait at the bottom of the stairs before we could come

up and see everything santa brought.

every year my dad would set up the camcorder and record us opening

all our gifts.

it is HILARIOUS watching those old videos now and seeing

how excited we would get as we opened barbies and beanie babies.

i got some pretty good loot this year too.

santa was good to me.

no Christmas morning would be complete without my mom's berry

french toast and some hot cocoa.

thinking about how much food we ate over the break right now

makes by belly ache.

as we were planning our trip to utah i had quite a long list

of things i wanted to do & places i wanted to eat, etc.

temple square was on the top of my list.

even though it was freezing cold the lights were 

merry & bright & it was beautiful.

 

like i mentioned before, we made our trek several times

between SLC & provo using the new front runner train.

i'm actually glad we could use that option because something

i did NOT miss was driving in the snow in utah.

it was a blizzard almost every day we were there.

we got to see my grandparents a lot over the break

which i really enjoyed.

we chatted with grandma lucele about her 15 minutes of fame,

and of course had to make a trip to brick oven with grandpa ted & grandma doris.

 

whilst in the SLC i got to put in some quality time with

my besties.

i will love these girls forevs.

shout out to ash, em & han.

LYLAS for life.

 

 the stars aligned & i was also able to meet up with

none other than britt & ky.

the other day i noticed i still refer to them as "my roomates"-

even though we haven't lived together for almost 3 years now. . .

 

logan & i decided we were going to try and be less-lame this new years

& actually do something fun.

the last couple of years we've ended up falling asleep before midnight.

we went to dinner with some besties & then geared up for a midnight 5k.

you read that right- a run outside at midnight.

it was like 2 degrees.

we heard they gave out prizes for the best costume so we dug around

my house and found some winning items.

i beat logan in the race but he beat me in the costume contest:)

 i'm glad we decided to run the race on new years because

heaven only knows how many calories were consumed

during our trip & i'm convinced i ate enough cafe rio, india palace,

ruth's diner & kneaders to sustain me for all of 2013.

for reals.

 

at the end of the day the trip was all about family & it was really

hard to leave. 

my new niece is the cutest.thing.ever & i loved

spending time with my parents & logan's family.

 until next time utah!

xo!