excitement of the holidays

alright we should recap the few days where i have neglected to blog (although, andrew covered my butt for yesterday, so that's cool) because we don't want byron to have a heart-attack. :-)

after our calm, quiet night before christmas, we got up around 9 for our christmas day festivities. first, we went to my parents' house in chapel hill for the opening presents/family time. that was a lot of fun! andrew got a great present from my aunt:

matthew shared his spoils from cameroon:

mom hugged some "chinese-sweeties" (her favorite treat from childhood and a present from her brother):

dad was strangled by a scarf:

and we had a great time just hanging out:

later that afternoon, we went to my aunt's house for a very british sort of dinner comprised of potato/leek soup, yorkshire pudding, mashed potatoes, asparagus (though andrew says i make it better), and really good roast beef. complete with "poppers" those pull-apart things with crowns and toys in them (i really must get some pics from mom of those - they were funny). we had an assortment of desserts, and we exchanged presents once again. the coolest thing we got was a handmade vase from missy as a belated wedding present. it's really pretty and will go well with the picture/frame and fabric matthew got us from africa, as they all have the same sort of feel. they're not exactly what i would call "my style" but i love them for their meaning and their own unique beauty, so we're definitely going to display them in the house somewhere. pictured here is missy with her ADORABLE daughter, lila.

yesterday was pretty uneventful with the exception of half our house losing power again. we're going to get it taken care of eventually, but we decided to get out of the house in hopes of waiting it out and it turning itself back on like before. we braved the crowds at the mall to return/exchange a few things and enjoyed the sales at crate&barrel. we also went to whole foods and picked up a pork loin roast, acorn squash, and spinach for dinner. we got home, and i tried to bake the roast, but unfortunately the power wasn't back on. we had resorted to lighting the stove (it's gas) with a match and cooking it in our dutch oven, when the microwave gave its "we have power again!" beep, and we quickly turned on the oven in case it went off again. cooking by candle-light and without an oven was going to be quite the adventure, but i'm glad the oven worked because the roast was really good! the acorn squash, however, tasted nasty and has confirmed my decision that butternut is the best squash to make - period.

after that, we went out with some of andrew's older theatre friends who were in town for the holidays. we met up with gina, erik (sp?), jeff, byron, ken, will, remi, mary, laura, kerry, amber and john, and probably some other people i can't remember at tir na nog. they are a fun bunch, and after drinking and eating there for a while, the majority of us went over to the rockford to continue the festivities. i had a good time, and it's always fun to meet truly fun, nice people that are friends of andrews since so many of his friends live in other states or countries! i'll put some pictures of this outing up when i get them off my camera.

that is all for now, must get back to my lesson planning and the purpose for this caribou visit!