12 Days of Christmas

I was tagged by my mom to do this, so here it goes:

1. Christmas is my absolute favorite time of the year, no matter how bad the weather is or how mean people can be when shopping, or anything else. I never let anything bother me because I love it so very much! I love knowing that my family will all be together, and looking forward to our traditions.

2. Speaking of traditions, my favorites are the sparkling cider in my stocking from Santa each year, as well as all the candy and an ornament from my parents.

3. The ornaments from my parents in my stocking each year has really made my ornament collection grow into a full sized collection! It is so awesome to have all my ornaments be ones I received from family.

4. We always enjoy a yummy Christmas breakfast made by mom and dad after presants are opened.

5. I became pretty suspicious about the whole Santa thing. One year I asked for a chunk of gold, and lo and behold on Christmas morning, there it was in my stocking! Thats when I just KNEW he was real! A few years later I became a little suspicious again so this time I went to the extreme to really prove whether this guy was real or not, and so I asked for a real baby on my front porch that I would get to keep, and the police wouldn't take it away. Well... I got a bike.

6. My mom found herself being quite clever one Christmas and instead of putting names on our gifts she put peach, pear, plum and orange. She liked how well that drove us up the wall, that the next year she put numbers 1-4. It was awful!

7. Every year we get to open a gift on Christmas Eve at my Grandma's house, and for years its always a gift card which I love! I can always look forward to shopping after Christmas.

8. I love driving around looking at Christmas lights every year, and there are 2 houses in particular that are always decorated beautifully up on the south hills. I drive up there several times around Christmas and every time there are tons of cars lined up. Its so pretty and its fun to see everyone driving up there to see them.

9. My favorite gifts that I get are always the hand-made, crafty gifts. Both my mom and Kyla have cross-stitched pictures for me and last year Jill made a cool wiener dog that sits at the window seal, or the bottom of a door, that blocks air from coming in through doors and windows. I also have some hand made ornaments that I love as well. I just love having things that people have made for me.

10. I love that I still get the same feeling on Christmas morning that I did when I was little. It still feels so magical and fun!

11. I don't like how occasionally Santa forgets to put his name on the gift from him. He still stuffs our stockings, but I have a hard time finding his gift to me, mom and dad always just claim it and put that it is from them.

12. I LOVE all the Christmas music! I play my Christmas cd's over and over, and I never get sick of them! They are always so cheery and happy! I start playing them at the beginning of December and I don't stop til after Christmas!

I tag anyone that reads this!

Chuck E Cheese's and Santa

Chuck E Cheese's just opened yesterday here and I have never been before so I was SO excited to go! A few of my friends and I were supposed to take another friend to a birthday dinner, but she cancelled so we decided to go to Chuck E Cheese's instead and it was SOOOO fun!!!!! The food wasn't that great and they actually had to bring out our pizza 3 times because they messed up twice, but the real reason I was there... the games... was amazing! Then good ol' Chuck was more than willing to have his picture taken, so I whipped out my phone and started snapping away!

Chuck E posing with a little kid

Chuck E modeling for me, what a stud!

Me and Chuck E!

Shauna, Chuck E and Erica!

The only set back to Chuck E Cheese's is that there are TONS of little kids running around and not being closely monitered so I had a few little ones "helping" me out... But it was funny. So after a very fun-filled evening, we started back to our car, and what do we see???? It was SANTA!!! But wait! Santa wasn't getting into his sleigh...

Santa drives a Honda?!

Well apparently the elves are working on the sleigh, and the reindeer must be resting up for the big night ahead. There was a lot of people taking pictures and calling others telling them of the news that Santa was getting into his Honda and talking on his Cell phone. It was quite the sight!

Winter break!

Well now that I'm on winter break, I have lots more free time. So something I'm really irritated about is that at the U of O (and I'm sure most other schools) when you get a (-) or a (+) on a grade, such as and A-, it drops (or adds for a +) your gpa 0.3 points! I haven't had a 4.0 gpa yet since i started college and I really thought I was finally going to get one this term, but I got an A- which is a 3.7! But my other A brought it up to 3.85, which is closer. I just think that is rediculous! An A is an A! Oh well, maybe next term.
My friend Erica came over yesterday to do a photo shoot, and it was lots of fun! I am really loving my camera and it is fun to try different things with it. Erica and her brother want to take pictures together and get them framed for their mom for Christmas, so we were doing a practice run with just her and it was pretty fun. Here are just a few of the many pictures we took:

Erica with my furry child Marvin.

Outfit number one!

Looking like a true model!

Close up mug shot in outfit number 2!

Oops! Caught her lovin the tree!

Erica's favorite hat!

I'm holding Erica's hat for her.

And back to seriousness, this
is a really pretty picture also!

And after uploading the dozens of pictures
and playing with the kodak program, we came
up with this lovely picture! Love it!

So there are so many more pictures but these are just some of the ones I like most. I have more to talk about but I will save it for another day!