Two Christmases, A New Year, and a Wedding...

Well, the past several weeks have been quite full for the three of us, starting with a quiet Christmas Eve at home. Our neighborhood association sponsors Christmas Eve Luminaries every year, and this is the second time we have been home to enjoy them. We took a lovely walk around the neighborhood and just enjoyed the peace of the night...

Then we returned home and continued our tradition of reading various and sundry Christmas stories, including the original from Luke 2, and the ever popular How the Grinch Stole Christmas...

We also opened our traditional Christmas Eve pajamas, and then snuggled in for a long winter's nap...the next morning, while wearing our cozy new pjs, we snuck down the stairs to see if Santa had visited during the night and, lo and behold, he had! We browsed through our Christmas stocking goods...

... and then exchanged the gifts we gave each other. Sarah made and wrapped her gift for Tim all by herself...

Then, as soon as the gifts were opened, and the fresh cinnamon rolls devoured, we piled in the car and drove to the airport where Sarah and I boarded a plane for Utah, and Tim headed into the hills for some solo winter camping. We found a huge moose in the Minneapolis airport...

... and spent some time playing with the 'Travelers Insurance' displays in the Hartford airport (a great diversion if you have to spend any length of time there with kids)...

We arrived in Utah just in time to enjoy Christmas dinner with the Fam, and then spent the next week playing with cousins, and generally having a wonderful time!

(dinner with all my siblings and their spouses)

Of course, we celebrated the new year, and in the true style of my family, it had to be huge! My brother got it in his mind that the only way to celebrate a new decade would be to simultaneously light Two-Thousand-and-Ten bottle rockets... well, my dad jumped right on that idea, and started working on it. He found a big piece of craft plastic (you know, the kind you can do needlepoint stuff on and turn it into a little house shaped napkin holder, etc.), and spent the whole week leading up to the new year stuffing bottle rockets into it. We started the night with some standard store-bought fireworks, which Sarah LOVED, and then concluded the evening with the 2,010 display. If you are interested to see what 2,010 bottle rockets look like, feel free to watch the video below...

As you can see, the men had to keep running in to light the bottle rockets that didn't catch from the other ones, and by the end the plastic had totally melted, so the bottle rockets were no longer shooting straight up, in fact, many of them were shooting straight into the crowd. Luckily, most of my parent's neighbors were in attendance for the audacious display, so the cops did not get called to come arrest the perpetrators.

Unfortunately, Tim did not arrive in time to witness the show, but he flew in a few hours later, and we were so excited to see him!

And, now we come to the true reason for our holiday visit to Utah... My baby sister got married! What a fun celebration! Unfortunately, I did not have my camera handy for most of the event, but if you are interested to see random wedding photos of someone you do not know (peppered with a few images of people you might know) click here.

(Tim helping decorate the car)

(Dancing the night away!)

(ditto)

Sarah got to help the newlyweds open their gifts (several days after the wedding)...

... and we finished our trip with a great trip to the zoo with cousins! What a wonderful time was had by all!