Christmas Eve Eve

Shaelee, Heidi & Marnie

 The day before Christmas Eve is one of my favorite days.

I spend this day with Marnie and Shaelee. We started this tradition last year, in our first year of friendship. Our tradition includes an expensive dinner, temple square lights, and City Creek.

This year, we decided to eat at the Cheesecake Factory. We knew it would be busy but that is just part of the holiday. We started our reservation and then explored the lights on temple square. Can you say cold? haha. There was a chilly wind and so we made our way quickly to City Creek. Re-created our picture from last year. Played in the Disney Store. Walked around Macy's. Basically passing the time till we could order our food. Once we were seated at Cheesecake Factory we quickly ordered, ate our food, and ordered cheesecake to go. I ordered Parmesan-Herb Crusted Chicken with mashed potatoes. Oh my goodness, it was heaven. I would definitely recommend it to a friend. Once we paid, we headed home. We were all excited to give gifts. You could tell that we really knew each other this year compared to last year. It would be safe to say that we all left happy campers. 

I love Christmas.

Traditions, Traditions, TRRRAAADDDIITTIIONNSSS

If you didn't sing the title like the song from Fiddler on the Roof, you may need to reevaluate your life. Lately I have been trying to think of blog posts that I could write.  It is difficult to "blog about my life" when my life rarely changes. I wish that I was more exciting and I had more to share. But I don't. So for now, I will just make things up and we will see where this takes us.

I was reading on some blog that I found on Pinterest that an enticing post could be to write about traditions. 

This seems fitting considering the time of year. 

My family traditions are 'bizarre' or so I have been told. Just kidding. They are fairly normal. Bizarre is just my favorite world to describe my family because that is the world my sister-in-law used at her first Thanksgiving with us. Memorable moments. ha. Anyways, my Christmas typically spans over three days. 

CHRISTMAS EVE:

It starts on Christmas Eve when we go to my Grandparents on the Anderson side. The basement is always decorated and everyone brings lots of food. We have ham or roast. It's a surprise. We all gather. We pray. We eat. It's always a good time with the cousins. Once everyone is finished we clean up. Many hands makes light work. It is insane how quick that downstairs is transformed. After dinner we do a pinata. I know. We are white. Get over it. On a general rule you have to be under the age of 12 to even attempt the pinata. I think the best part is watching the pinata almost hit people. Never sit by the counter if you come to the Anderson Christmas Eve Party. Next up, presents. We do draw names in two groups. One for the children and one for the adults. Yours truly has been in the adult drawing for two years. That's right, I'm an a-dult. The last round of the Christmas Eve Party is the Nativity. I was always an angel. Obviously. The last few years I have been 'directing' or singing also known as getting out of the acting thing. At the conclusion of the Nativity the family sings Silent Night together. By this time it is usually 10:00 and so everyone heads home and anxiously awaits the arrival of the man in the suit.

CHRISTMAS:

 Since all the kids sleep downstairs, Santa leaves the gifts upstairs. Every year, us kids would gather together and we would sneak upstairs into the living room. If you know our house you know that to get to the living room you know we have to walk past the family room which is off limits for obvious reasons. Once we are in the living room, one brother would play Christmas songs as we all sang along: 'caroling' if you will. Once we felt like the parentals knew we were upstairs we would go and convince to come out of their room. They always try to tell us Santa didn't come and that the presents aren't as good as we think they will be. Once we go to the family room, we are always blown away by the sight. Christmas morning really is magical. The kids open presents one by one so we can all see what everyone got. Well that and to make the Christmas magic last just a little longer. Once all the presents are open I always want to go back to bed because I am overwhelmed. That is just how I feel after receiving so many gifts. But going back to bed isn't exactly an option. The day has just begun. We head off to the Grandparents on the Larrabee side. We eat yummy food all day. Sausage fondue anyone? Visiting, naps, testing the new gadgets, and more gift giving is how the typical day goes. Since I'm not married the day is pretty lax. The poor married siblings have to juggle so much more than I do. After the party is over, we head home and watch some Christmas movie. (and by we, I usually mean me and any other individual who wants to join.) 

DAY AFTER CHRISTMAS:

This day is practically as religious as Christmas. Believe me. I worked the 26th last year and I was deeply missed. This is the day we celebrate Christmas with the Anderson family. This day we travel to each house of the cousins and we 'show' our Christmas. It is an easy way to tell everyone what you got in one large sweep. If you know how big my Anderson Family is you will understand how repetitive it can become. This tradition comes from years before I was born when all the older cousins were young. It was a time for the cousins to basically play with the toys that they other cousins got. I love the day after Christmas because we spend many hours with the cousins. 

So that is an outline of my Christmas. And I am pretty excited to Celebrate fully this year.

Meme, Brandt, Jennie, Joe, Keshia & Heidi
Christmas 2014

This Was Something Devine (see what I did there?)

I still can't believe that I met Hailey Devine.

I have been following her on social media since I moved to college.

I feel like Hailey is one of my friends.

She is inspirational, talented, and not to mention, her daughter is the cutest.

I apologize for my squinty eyes but that is what happens when I am extremely happy. And this was an extremely happy moment.

If you don't follow the Devines, you need to get to it, right now.

You won't regret it. And if you do, are we even friends?

Follow Hailey here.



Friends Do Things Together

Friendships are hard.

Well, relationships in general are not a walk in the park. I struggle with friendships because I like being alone. An introvert if you prefer. 

All my life I have had this rule that I could hang out once a week. (I made this rule in elementary, not my parents, but me.) Of course, as life moved forward I was dancing multiple times a week, working, and singing. All of these activities had some of my 'best friends' and because of this, I didn't really need to make an effort to hang out with people. I loved doing all these extracurricular activities because each activity had different people. What I am saying is, in high school it was easy to hang out with friends. But then I graduated and my friendships haven't exactly been the same. 

I have learned in the past two(ish) years that best friends forever doesn't mean diddly-squat. More like best friends for the day, month, year. -And I really don't mean this to hurt feelings or point out certain people I am just saying how things are for me.

I love my friends but I honestly don't have the time and energy to fit everyone in on a regular basis. So if we communicate in some way at least twice a year, consider yourself very lucky. Adulthood makes everyone busy and I understand that. I have a few friends from high school that I am still in touch with. I consider Jami one of my best friends even though we rarely talk and hang out. Our lives are crazy busy and it is hard to stay all caught up. Yet, when we see each other we get caught up with each other's lives and it is like no time has past. I considered this a great relationship because time doesn't affect us. But I also take it for granted. I forget to send her a message to see how she is doing. I just assume that life is okay and I will hear about it next time we hang out. It really is a bad mentality but I am only human.

Beside, it is okay to occasionally catch up with people's lives by looking at their Facebook profile. And I count that as effort.

Anyways, thanks for reading my ramblings.

Heidi & Jami