Christmas 2009

WOW! It's been forever since we've updated this blog! This year has been a very crazy one! ups and downs, kids, school, work, you name it!

I guess I will update this since Alina reminded me that we had a blog.

Christmas, was a very joyous one for us. We went to

Utah and visited Nana and Papa. Kris came up from Monrovia to join us. We celebrated Christmas with Nana, Papa, Mariah, Jason, Jeff & Jen & kids - Andrew, Garrett, Logan, Kenzie, Sadie, Brynlee and Cade, Aunt Sheri, Uncle Bo & their kids Malory & Chelsea, Aunt Sandy & Uncle Eric, Miranda, and Elisha & Paul & their son Andrew.

Garrin and Brenna was unable to join us this year so we had them open their gifts on Sunday prior to going home to their mom.

We left Cameron Park Wednesday night or Thursday at 12am and arrived Thursday at 11am (Utah time, which is an hour ahead, so travel time was 10 hrs). No traffic! It was extremely cold going through Nevada though (-15 degrees!). We stopped in Winnemucca and got Dee some cool boots and stopped in Wendover aka Bendover to refuel. The trip was pretty smooth and neither of us were really tired.

Christmas Eve, we had appetizers for dinner which is a Card Family tradition. Krissy bought a Wii and Mariah brought over her Rockband game. It was lots of fun! We all got together and played it. Papa and Devin even sang "eye of the tiger". It was hideous..hah! We pretty much just hung out at the house that evening and relaxed.

Christmas Day, we woke up and gathered around in the living room to open presents. The girls (dee and trin) had a great time opening gifts. Devin surprised me with a beautiful ring which brought tears to my eyes and eventually brought tears to his eyes. Devin is a softie what can I say? hehehe..After gifts, we all got up and started cooking and getting ready for guests. I made my crockpot ham the night before so not much serious cooking needed to be done that day. Just the little appetizers!

The family arrived around 1pm. We ate around 2pm I think, which is unusualy for me because when I'm with the Lorente's, we eat dinner very very late. The kids had a blast hanging out and playing with their new cousins. I tried to play with Cade but he just stares at me and every now and then laughs.. but still wont let me carry him! boo!

After dinner, Dee and Trin went with Aunt Sheri, Mallo-wee and Chelsea to their house while Uncle Bo, Devin, Andrew, Jay and I went to go see Sherlock Holmes at the Megaplex theatre. That place was crazy packed! We had to catch the showing at 845pm versus the original time of 630pm we had planned on. The neat thing about this theatre is that you get assigned seats. As you walk in this theater there are a whole bunch of places to eat and you can actually eat a meal on a laptray during the movie! strange! but neat!

Day after Christmas, we got up and went to Cabella's with Papa and Jay. Cabella's is this hunting store that is full of dead stuffed animals and an aquarium. There was A LOT of people there, mainly hunter looking type people. hahah.. Afterwards, we hooked up with Uncle Bo and Aunt Sheri and went shooting. It was my first time shooting and I had a lot of fun. The girls got an opportunity to shoot also and did very well! Now I want my OWN gun!

Later that evening, Uncle Bo, Aunt Sheri, Mallo-wee, Chelsea, Mariah, Devin, Dee, Trin and I went to Temple Square. The temple is BEAUTIFUL! I can't wait until we get sealed there. It was very very very cold... several times it felt like my face was iced and cracking off.

Sunday, we drove back home to California and arrived 10 hours later. We made good timing. I think Kris left about an hour before we did and got stuck in Las Vegas traffic and I think we both arrived home at the same time.

We had a great time with family and just being with them helped strengthened our testimony of the gospel and our love for Christ and our church. Families are definately forever and I'm very blessed to have such a wonderful family. We are looking forward to seeing them again in February for our sealing and for Jason and Megan's wedding.