the pre-Christmas part of Christmas Break and also I don't know which words to capitalize in a blog post title.

Christmas break.  The time of the year that basically everyone looks forward to, but I would say especially students. You know how it is. You've been going crazy with approximately one MILLION projects and tests and presentations and then finals and too little sleep and too much time at the library and too many times that you forget to eat dinner. Actually, scratch that last one because I never forget to eat food.

I suppose now is the part where I mention that I'm not actually a student anymore. I graduated but I still live near the school because now I work at the school and so basically since I'm surrounded by students I feel that gives me the right to still feel like a student. Except I guess all those things I mentioned in the previous paragraph don't actually apply to me. But they did! And sometimes it still comes back to haunt me which is why I will continue this post pretending like I'm still a student. It's totally unfair, but I'm doing it.

Anyway.

Yes, the life of college student definitely makes you look forward to the time when all you are required to do is sleep and eat and occasionally help around the house. Your mom makes you dinner and you can eat food out of any cupboard instead of just the one shelf that is yours in your apartment. It is glorious. It's Christmastime and the counters are essentially covered in candy and all you can think about is how you don't want to go back to school because when you go back that means you have to go back to work and studying and you have to do your own laundry and it's the pits, yo.

But let's not focus on the fact that I'm already back and have already gone back to work and also I might even be getting sick so that's really cool. No, let's go back to the very beginning of break. The before Christmas part of the break.

Yes, before Christmas was a glorious time.  When I first got home, it was just me and my parents and my two younger brothers so baaaaasically it was a party. I convinced my parents that we absolutely NEEDED to go see the new movie Frozen (seriously, I'm obsessed. I don't know if I've ever seen a movie twice in theaters, but this one was worth it).  And I mean, since we were going all the way over to the movies, we might as well go to In-N-Out, am I right?  So that was awesome, and yes, the movie was also awesome. But for real.

The next day was church so we got all dressed up and off to church where e'erybody was so friendly and was happy to see me but let's be honest, they were mostly all wondering where Levi was. Oy. But it was cool.  Then Tom drove me home and was apparently a little ashamed to be driving a minivan home with his crazy older sister because wasn't too stoked about having his face in the picture. Hmm.

The next day was Christmas Eve Eve, which apparently we're calling Christmas Adam now because Adam came before Eve? I don't know if I can get on board with that, but whatever. Anyway, as we always do, we headed to my Aunt Stella's house and she made probably the biggest piece of meat I've seen in my entire life. But for reals. Also, it was at my aunt's house that we met up with my older siblings and their wives and the family was almost complete (Jalyn is still on a mission in the Dominican Republic).

Then Jake got a new watch from Aunt Stella for Christmas and it was a little bit too big so instead of going to the watch store or something, Danny decided to fix it himself using various items throughout the house that were small enough. I thought it was funny, but also very smart. But then again, funny and smart are the first two words I would use to describe Danny (not a joke), so I guess it makes sense.

And finally, the next day we headed to my Grandma's house for Christmas Stacy! (Adam also came before me, so I've decided we should change Christmas Eve to Christmas Stacy. Who's with me?!) Anyway, it was glorious and we had a marvelous turkey dinner and my Uncle Brian and Aunt Julie were there and we read the Christmas story out of the Bible and sangs some Christmas songs and read The Living Christ, which I highly recommend you all do. It was great to be with the fam and to think about the real reason for the season.

Afterword, we headed home and I still had to wrap a million presents because I guess I like to leave things to the last minute?  Well that, and also some packages didn't arrive until we were gone, so give me a break, please!  Also, it should be noted that I had to wrap the gifts my dad was giving, too (as I always do). Apparently wrapping gifts isn't his forte. But they were very good gifts, so I'll let it slide.

And that my friends, is how not to write a brief blog post of the days leading up to Christmas. But who's surprised?

thanksgiving like a boss.

you guys.  I just got back from my most fabulous surprise trip home.  That's right, a surprise.  You see, I don't just normal style go home for thanksgiving every year because my home home is many much miles away from my current residence, but you see the thing is, my sister is leaving on her mission to the Dominican Republic in just over two weeks and I wouldn't even get to see her over Christmas break and it came to my attention that this was a very appropro reason for my dad to fly me home (okay, but I just want to say that I offered to pay.  It's just that the guy is such a jolly man and offered to pay for it all himself!  And then my mom let me eat all of the food out of her pantry! (And let's be real, girl knows how to eat.)  I mean, really!  Those guys are neat!)  Aaaaaaaanyway, what I'm saying is that I surprised them!  Dad said he had to pick some global pass blah blah blah up at the airport and they believed him!  And I surprised them!  And so many sentences are ending with exclamation points!

We ended up having a most glorious first thanksgiving on Wednesday with my grandma and uncle and some of their friends (who I'm sure at this point think my entire family belongs in an insane asylum).  It was glorious.

And then we headed down to LA where my brother lives to have another(!) thanksgiving with them and and do a mini celbration of my birth and also to ride bicycles on the beach (or in my case, a tandem bike with Jake---whhhhhich, btdubs, cost my dad one whole dollar less than if we had each had our own bike...I'm still not sure why he didn't make my other siblings do the same thing...).

And here's something--I don't know if it was just this tandem bike, but it turns out if you're the one riding in the back, your pedals are connected to the other guy's and you have to pedal exactly when they are and as hard as they are and when they all of a sudden brake, you suddenly can't pedal anymore and you're left wondering whether or not your pedaling actually has any value.  And so you end up looking like this:

...for the entire ride.  Not actually a joke, guys.  So anyway, we rode bikes and ate one million different food items for thanksgiving (did you guys notice that I just used "one million" in an almost appropriate way?  take that, english language!).  I had a most glorious time just hanging out with the faaaaam.  Also, my siblings played hot cross buns on the water glasses.  It was actually quite impressive.

The next day we headed back to northern California (the land of milk and honey or maybe it's actually just wine) and on our way we we able to stop and visit Danny and Lena who were having thanksgiving with her family and how neat is that?!  They were at this ranch and it turns out ranches sometimes have one BILLION peacocks and a herd of llamas. Also, llamas are weird.  I mean, look at this guy.  Is he really a llama?  Or is he actually a demon?  Or maybe one of those creepy creatures from lord of the rings? Honestly.  Poor guy really got the short end of the stick because he is just unfortunate-looking.

Then we finally made it home and I watched The Avengers for the first time (all of it!  No sleeping for me! Mostly because Jake sat on one side of me and Jalyn on the other so I couldn’t even lie down which may or may not be a major factor in whether or not I stay awake for an entire movie).  Then on my last day in town I went to church and a lady in the ward told me that she could “see my future husband just on the horizon.  Trust me, you will find him soon!” so that was encouraging.  I also found a baby that is whiter than me and that also provided a good amount of comfort for my albino soul.  Then my mom made me favorite dinner as a little bit of an early birthday celebration. And then I was off to the airport to catch my flight (which, turns out it was actually a ward flight because there were two guys from my ward on the flight).  The flight was fairly uneventful other than the fact that the 18-year-old girl in the seat next to me was on her first flight and the fact that the guy in the row behind me collapsed in the middle of the flight….soooooo, nbd whatever.

And now here I am, back at school and suddenly realizing that blogging is not what I should be doing because I have an insane amount of stuff to do in the next two weeks and blogging doesn’t actually get any of it done.  Weird.

But, important comment!  Christmas season is just about to commence!  (I say, "just about to" because we all know Christmas season doesn't start until after Thanksgiving or after my birthday, whichever comes second.  And for the first time in the history of ever, my birthday is super one million after thanksgiving and has not yet occurred and so the Christmas season must hold on for just one more little minute).

But that doesn't mean we can't have a Christmas tree!  It's so beautiful!

Also, p.s.  The guy that collapsed on the plane was fine.  Just a little light headed, I guess.

holly jolly.

{me and bubs with the new scarf he made me!}

Not sure if I told you, but I had a fantastic Christmas.  Christmastime is one of my very favorite times of the year.  Mostly I just eat and hang out with my family and then eat and then roll out the door to go shopping and then I come home and eat and then hang out with my friends and then I usually watch The Lion Movie (the disease exists at home, too!)

This Christmas I didn't give anyone my heart and baby, it definitely was not cold outside (what's up, California winter!).  Most of the break, I've just listened to the She & Him Pandora station and some of my main man The Biebs.  We also seemed to watch a lot of Jerry Rice career highlights on youtube (not actually sure why we did that).

We listened to some old tapes from when were super young and let me tell you, those were straight up gems.  Apparently back in the day (at approx age 5) I did not appreciate being called Stacy Stink and demanded that my family call me "Stacy Star A".  It appears that they needed a reminder about that, and now that we have listened to the tapes, they have actually started calling me by my requested name from so long ago.  I'm glad to see a little respect around here.

It's been a pretty busy break--I've been able to hang out with some of my favorite people (family, friends, etc) and some of my least favorite people (dentist, doctor, etc.).  Santa done good this year.  In fact, I'm writing from my brand new laptop!  So fabulous.  Some of the awesome things about it that are very unlike my old laptop: I can fit all my pictures and music on it, it takes less than 20 min for it to turn on and load up, it doesn't die after just being on for 30 minutes (even when plugged in!), it doesn't always have to be plugged in, and best of all! it doesn't light on fire every time I use it!  A huge shout out to my little brother Thomas who picked it out for me--homeboy knows how to get a good one.

I like Christmas!  and muffins! and family! and fun times!

And now I must psychologically prepare myself for 2012 (which my littlest brother constantly reminds me is the year the world is going to end). I plan on reading a book, making a music video, writing a talk (rude) for church tomorrow, and getting all sorts of new year's eve crazy with my family.

Let's do this.

And now, some pics from Christmas day!

What? Is that me hiding under the blanket avoiding all light sources?  Never...

Tim Tam Thomas was super stoked about the computer program he wrote for Danny.  Just following in his footsteps...

...and of course, a family pic with a missing mom.

p.s. If you aren't already, don't forget to follow this blog over there on the right!  

"Who Let Jalyn Drink Out of My Water Bottle?"--Danny

When I went home last month, the fam went down to Grandma's house for the day.  The following is a pretty accurate description of any day spent with my family:

When we got there and after quickly saying hello to Matthew and Mykel (who I haven't seen since Christmas), we all made a bee-line to the backyard to pick and eat as many of Grandpa's world famous raspberries as we possibly could.  Once we were too full to eat anymore, we ate some more because I'm telling you, you're not going to find raspberries that good anywhere else in the world. (Also, I'm kidding about the part where we raced past Matthew and Mykel--I really did miss them...I'm sure I spent a good 4 minutes conversing with them before proceeding to the previously mentioned raspberries).




Because it's grandma's house, we're almost guaranteed to have a barbecue, which I'm a huge fan of.  As you might notice, there is a hamburger on my plate, which is super weird because I always choose hot dog over hamburger.  Unfortunately, Grandma only had "Casper Dogs" which make that nasty popping sound when you bite them.  This of course makes eating a hot dog even more questionable than it already is, so I passed.

Of course, eating must be documented, because if it isn't, we'd miss out on close-ups of Jacob's face and and an up close and personal view of his burger. We'd also miss documentation of Matthew's plate over there on the bottom right which consists of olives, chips, and a hamburger bun, sans burger.  That's right folks, he's going to be a dentist.  That's why he eats so healthy.





In addition, you should know that sometimes Dad thinks that getting your picture taken is not a good enough reason to stop stuffing food in your mouth. (In his defense, I think Uncle Dave totally supports this decision)



After we've all finished eating, we'll likely sit around the table for an hour joking about things like when Jalyn backwashed into Danny's water bottle in Italy ("Who let Jalyn drink out of my water bottle?")


There's a good chance that various "What About Bob?" and "What's Up, Doc?" references will be made.


 

Of course, there will be many jokes about the times before these young lads even existed.



There's a good chance Jalyn will recite (word for word, mind you) various comedy sketches and pretty much every movie she's ever seen.  I'm telling you, the girl's got talent.  Someone should alert the people who run "America's Got Talent", because this girl's about to give Susan Boyle a run for her money.


The identical brothers made sure to show us their matching zits, which we all truly appreciated.  Another important thing to note about this picture is the little hearts thing behind Matthew's neck.  Each heart represents one of Grandma and Grandpa's descendants, and I can guarantee you one of those hearts has been pulled down.  That's just how we roll.


 

At this point, we are probably being told to gather 'round to take a family picture, but we're too busy telling stories about my arch nemesis who doesn't believe in snoozing. If we're not doing that, then we're probably tell some other story and getting upset with each other when one of us beats another to a joke related to that story.  (Seriously, that happens all the time--especially to Danny, which is awesome, because if you beat Danny to a joke, then you're straight up talented.)

After we've been convinced to gather for an awkward self-timed photo, we make sure to take the awkward title to the extreme.



Finally, mom will convince us to be serious and a relatively decent photograph will be captured.

That, my friends, is a delightful day.