I'm Back!

Happy New Year everyone! I'd planned to blog over vacation, but as you can see, that didn't exactly happen. I always mean to blog from home, but I always get lazy.

It was a busy two weeks, so I won't do my usual recap. Our first week of vacation was spent mostly at the mall, shopping for all our Christmas presents. The rest of my free time was spent working on Allison's present. Despite staying up until 7 am on Christmas day, I didn't manage to finish it in time.

We did take some time off from shopping to take Bandit to Lake Del Valle. Melanie and her boyfriend drove up with Lucas and the 6 of us spent the morning at the lake watching the dogs have a blast. Bandit was a bit neurotic, chasing the water as it moved along the shore. We ended up with two very wet, very dirty dogs.

We did manage to get our tree up. I rearranged the living room and managed to clear out the corner to get the tree in. We bought the pets these little photo ornaments, but never got around to taking actual photos for them, hehe. We also made new stockings for me, Marc, Bandit, Stubby and Snuggles. We had a stocking holder set that spelled out S-A-N-T-A, so there wasn't room for Hammy.

Steve, Erin, Jacob, Allison, and Marc's mom were over at our house on Christmas day for presents and lunch. We bought a Honey Baked ham, and had picked up some rolls from Texas Roadhouse (we bought 5 dozen for the day, which turned out to be way too many).

Marc and I had gotten the kids some clothes (we found a really cute winter coat for Allison), and some books and a Leapster game for Jacob. Marc, Steve and Erin pitched in to get me a gift certificate for horseback riding lessons! I've been wanting to do that for a long time, so I'm super excited.

I got Marc a new watch for Christmas, which I was able to afford thanks to a furtuitous 25% + 15% off sale at Macy's.

In the evening we went over to my parents' house to celebrate Christmas with my family. My brothers and us got my parents a digital camera, and Kenny and us got Leslie and X-Box, which was a total pain in the neck to get. Apparently, they were selling out all over the Bay Area, and we couldn't find one in any of the stores nearby. We finally called up a Target in Pleasant Hill (30 miles away), which had 10 left at 10 am, despite starting out with 40 units that morning. So Marc and I booked it to Target, and managed to snag one before they sold out.

Among my haul from Christmas: money, Donkey Konga, "The Bush Survival Bible" (from Kenny, of course), a new blanket for sleeping in the car when Mom and I carpool, and a Cal sweatshirt. I also bought lots of presents for myself while we shopped for everyone. :) Marc got Seinfeld and Simpsons DVD sets, a new 49ers polo shirt, new slippers, a modem adapter for the PS2 so he can play golf online, and money too.

We were supposed to go skiing after Christmas, but Leslie ended up having to work, and Henry got the flu, so we cancelled our trip. We didn't ski at all this vacation, which was a real bummer. On Thursday, we drove down to San Diego for the Holiday Bowl. Cal really stunk it up, it was very disappointing. Leslie bought me a foam finger and Marc bought me a mini-football, so I guess that's an upside. We met up with Mark and Chris for dinner afterwards, and then hung out at their condo for a little while. We drove back home Friday morning in some crazy rain.

Marc and I also painted our bedroom on Wednesday. We painted it Windsurf Blue, which turned out pretty nice, although it took us all day to paint. We also started working on the fish tank again, doing lots of water changes, and getting a new clownfish (Nemo 3), who is in our quarantine tank for two weeks. The main tank was pretty rank, but hopefully it'll clean up soon. We also got some shelves for the garage, which now looks much neater and more organized. We were busy!

Henry and Vicki and my brothers hung out at our house for New Year's. We had some margaritas and sparkling wine, and Marc had fun with TiVo, replaying the countdown so we could do the confetti poppers, the toast, and kissing your significant other each time it turned the New Year. He's such a dork.

Okay, I think I've written enough now! Tomorrow I'll list my New Year's resolutions, which I'm actually making this year. Whether I'll actually stick to them is another question.

Oh yeah, the site got spammed with comments over vacation, so new comments won't show up until I approve them until I can find a way to block the spam. I'm also working on a new site design, so stay tuned. :)