I know, I know. Enough with the Christmas posts already! I just really wanted to document it all and there was a lot to document. This is the last one though, I promise. And you can tell it's the last one because there are finally pictures of presents being opened! Yay!!
Remember when Justin told me that his family had no traditions? Well, you guessed it- he was lying. Not intentionally of course, he just didn't realize that traditions can be things that you do every year without specifically saying "ok, now it's time for us to do the 'fill-in-your-own-blank' tradition." Peruvians celebrate Christmas quite differently than Americans. But I might have to say that the food is better :)
Here we are eating the big family dinner on Christmas Eve. We had chancho (pork), a dish Justin calls "raisin rice," papas a la huancaina (yum!) and of course, Inca Kola! Justin kept teasing Papito that he was going to eat the whole bowl of raisin rice by himself! What a nice grandson huh!
Justin, Papito and their forks!
Midnight is like New Years. Everyone yelled "Feliz Navidad" and kissed each other on the cheeks. Then we all opened one present each.
Tia Nancy y Carlos.
The bad thing about living in Utah is you think of warm gifts to give people. Justin and I gave Mima this lap blanket. It's super pretty but it was so hot while we were there I had to wonder when she'll use it!
Papito likes action movies so we gave him Red starring Bruce Willis. If you haven't seen it, I recommend it :)
The next morning we went to church. We attended the Spanish branch and I tried to sing all the songs in Espanol. It made it easier that we sang all Christmas songs so at least I knew the melodies really well. Not sure how good my pronunciation was but no one will ever know :) I was doing pretty well understanding Mima, Papito, Tia Nancy and Tio Carlos when they spoke Spanish at home but something about the microphone at church made it harder for me so I just read the Christmas story in Luke for sacrament. The spirit was still there :)
After church we finally opened the rest of our presents. We were definitely spoiled this year! Justin is now fully stocked on Gator jackets and gear again. I gave him a Gator cake pan because he's turning 30 this year (shhhh). He's a little upset about it so hopefully that makes him a little more excited for his birthday. My favorite gift was probably the box of stamps from Mama G. I love crafting!!
Christmas card picture for next year? We're actually holding our gift to Mom and she thought the bow I made was pretty...
But look at the bow on her gift to me! No comparison!
I had to choose which Gator jacket picture to post- he got 3! And since we live in cold weather he'll definitely wear them all.
One of the pieces of the "Big Box of Gator Stuff" I gave Justin. It's a hitch cover.
My reaction is to the box. It's Lia Sophia- I love their jewelry!
Doesn't she look gorgeous?!
The day after Christmas we finally met up with Jared and Andrea. They have 3 kids now which makes Christmas really fun! Ethan is hilarious- just like his daddy! We got to see their new house and Justin got to play with some of the kids new toys. After the little ones went to sleep we got to play some more challenging games (like Pass the Pigs) and kept the Krause's up way too late for a work night. Sorry!! Totally worth it though right? :)
Justin playing with Ethan's Wack-a-Mole game. It was pretty fun!
Look at the concentration!
We also got to meet up with the third member of the 3 Musketeers of Boone High, Gordon, and his wife, Morgan. The only part of our visit that overlapped theirs was lunch right before our flight home. Where did we go? Gators Dockside of course! Mmmmm wings!
Even though it was a long trip we still weren't ready to head back to the cold.
At least I had this to look forward to when we got home! I put our new Christmas tree skirt out (love it!) and took our "loot pictures."
The big orange thing is the Gator cake pan. Justin humored me for this tradition...
But did not understand the need for the close up shot. Bwahahaha!
Yes, three parts. I warned you this was an eventful Christmas! Disney World was indeed exhausting but Justin and I were able to sleep in the next day before we drove up to Gainesville for the Florida-FSU basketball game. Justin's cousin Carlos came with us and of course the two alumni had to walk around campus reminiscing. Why do we all like walking around the campus of our alma mater? It's not like we particularly enjoyed that while actually going to school! Ok, I admit it. I do it too when we go to Tucson :)
The three Heisman winners from UF. Tim Tebow's statue (left) was added recently and Justin and Carlos were really excited about it.
The statue was very detailed. Tebow's cheeks actually read "John 3:16."
Back to the trip. Before the game we hit up Satchel's Pizza for dinner. Justin warned me it was a bit hippy but delicious! Both warnings were true. Check out the mosaic table and the van booth. Really good pizza though.
This is an actual table you can sit at to eat! Hilarious! Probably a good idea when a FL afternoon downpour hits.
The trip was worth it as Florida beat FSU by 18 points! It was a good game. I also liked when the Gator mascots, Albert and Alberta, came out dressed as Santa and Mrs. Clause.
Although the giant Gator logo isn't quite as nice as a big block A it does make for pretty cool center court decoration :)
One of the presents I got to open in SLC was tickets to the Straight No Chaser concert on the 23rd. So the day after the Florida game we drove to Tampa (my first voyage over to the Gulf Coast). I wish I'd taken some pictures of the theater because it was a really pretty building but this is even better; SNC actually encourages posting videos of their concerts so here are some Christmas songs for ya. I would also recommend their version of Madonna's "Like a Prayer" and mash up of "Billie Jean/Poison." These guys are very entertaining. After busting out with a beautiful and soulful "Like a Prayer" one of them said "Nothing like 10 guys hanging out, belting a little Madonna on the weekend."
If it sounds as good as SNC singing it, I have no problem with that :)
We were up in the balcony, so kind of far back but they still sounded great and the stage was cool!
That's 2 in Portuguese. This Christmas was full of different languages. OK, just two- English and Spanish but Justin is still trilingual. This year was our first Christmas with Justin's family which meant we went to Florida. Which means we went to UF campus, a theme park, a huge mall and Justin did his best to exhaust me while I was on vacation. That's right, vacation! We did get to sleep in every day thank goodness or I would have gone crazy. I definitely don't function well on no sleep. But back to the actual holiday.
One of Justin's cousins gave us park hopper tickets to Disney World. Let me prepare you now- I've been to Disneyland and thought that was big. Disney World is huge! No wonder the one in Florida is named Disney World. It has four parks and the Magic Kingdom is basically Disneyland by itself. You have to take buses or the monorail or a ferry to get around. It seriously blew my mind.
The big ball at EPCOT! I've always wondered why this was such a big deal and now I know. There is a ride inside of this sphere. Disney engineers have the coolest jobs! Oh and Justin is proud of me for remembering that EPCOT stands for Experimental Prototype City of Tomorrow. So yes Tony Stark, Walt Disney thought of it first :)
This is the biggest gingerbread house I've ever seen. For a moment I thought we were in Texas because everything is supposed to be bigger there right :) Like I said, Disney World is huge! I found the recipe pretty entertaining.
They must have a huge decorating budget. They did a really good job making it feel Christmas-y in 80 degree weather.
There was a huge tree like this in each park.
This was my favorite part! Justin kept talking all day about the lights in Hollywood Studios. I didn't understand why even though I think I have heard of this before. This was just ridiculous!!
Look at how many lights are on one building- CRAZY!!
AWESOME!!
Justin's favorite part was the Star Wars show. There was a huge AT-Walker just to the right but it was too dark to get a good picture :( It was still awesome though. These are my favorite pictures of Darth Vader.
Sorry for the hand- stupid guy got in the way right when the flash went off!
I mean, how much did just the Darth Vader costume cost?!
This was pretty crazy too. And gorgeous!
Justin finally got his churro :)
Such a fun, crazy day but Justin's face sums it all up- we're too old for this! After 14 hours in the park we were exhausted!! We've already let Guissela know that we'll just send the kids down to her for a visit and she can take them to Disney World :)
This Christmas was so busy and eventful that it is definitely going to take me multiple posts to chronicle all of it. Which also should make it less boring to read :) Justin and I were really excited this year because we got tickets to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir's Christmas Concert. It was a-maz-ing! Those people are just so talented! My friends Misha and Jane were able to come with us and we walked around Temple Square looking at the lights afterward. Justin's favorite lights are all the red ones around the Assembly Hall so we always make sure to take a picture in that area.
Love this shot of the temple!
The following Monday Justin and I had our own little Christmas celebration in Salt Lake before flying to Florida. Our very first Christmas together we went to a restaurant called The Garden which is at the top of the Joseph Smith Memorial Building and has a beautiful aerial view of Temple Square. The last two years we have tried to make that a tradition and go back but they are always sooo busy we gave up and went to Texas Roadhouse (which I've never been disappointed with as our second choice). This year we finally got back in! Here's the view from the top, just to give you an idea why this restaurant is so popular- not to mention the food is pretty good :)
After dinner we delivered our holiday goodie plates and then opened the presents we weren't taking to Florida.
Justin with the stack.
James and Wendy gave us his and hers electronic toothbrushes. You can tell I was pretty excited about this one because my old toothbrush was on its last leg and I'm hoping that with the timer on the electronic ones Justin will brush his own teeth longer ;) How do men forget to brush their teeth before going to bed? Can someone please explain that to me because I know for certain that my husband is not the only one!
Everything I gave Justin this year had some school logo on it. These are the Arizona basketball shorts he helped pick out over Thanksgiving. Very nice! They've really helped his b-ball skills :)
This sweater is funny because Justin really wanted a new Utah sweater but couldn't decide between black and gray. We were at the bookstore one day, me trying to help him decide, and he finally settled on the gray because they didn't have the black in stock in his size. I snuck back while he was checking out and had them send a black sweater over from another store. I really thought Justin knew what I was doing but he either wasn't paying attention or forgot because he was really surprised to open this box.
Here are a few of my presents. Justin bought me a season pass to Snowbird. Hopefully I'll find winter here more enjoyable if I have an outdoor hobby.
And no Christmas would be complete without one of Justin's collage presents. There have been multiple times I've received explanatory paper presents like this one- they crack me up!
Straight No Chaser is an acapella group that is known for their Christmas songs. I love them! I especially love the footnote that I could bring a guest as long as it was Justin :) He also gave me the new Street Corner Symphony CD, my favorite acapella group from the last season of the Sing Off.
This was our gift from Mom and Dad. LOVE it! We really need more things like this to make our house pretty and this is a great start :) Muchas gracias!
