Christmas and New Years

I feel like I'm supposed to post about the holidays. But I don't really feel like it.

But I will anyway, because I want to remember it all. These are the things that we did:

• Went to California and visited the fam there
• Saw Chris's mom's siblings, which was fun. His uncles have some crazy stories.
• Had a really delicious Italian dinner at my brother and sister in law's house
• Exchanged gag gifts afterward, the most popular of which was the money soap. (We got it in the end.) There is a bill rolled up inside a bar of soap, and you have to use the soap to find out if it's a 1, 5, 10, 20, or 50 dollar bill. Give you one guess to what it was. I'll give you a hint. The smallest one.
• Took a bunch of pictures in the dark while waving around glow sticks with Chris's mom, brother, sister, and their spouses. It was really fun. No children present, just us building hula hoops and crowns out of glow sticks and taking lots of pictures.
• Watched Invictus, The A-Team, and The Town.
• Played with dogs at Joanne's (Chris's stepmom) house.
• Went to a nice dinner with Joanne.
• Came back home to Utah, spent 2 and a half hours driving from the airport to Provo. (Anyone remember that day when they were fixing potholes on the freeway? That was the day.)
• Went to both of my grandparents' houses on Christmas Eve, as per the tradition of my whole life.
• Neither of us had to work on Christmas Eve, the only day of the whole break that we were in town and had nowhere to be. Sadly, I slept until 11:00. But it was really nice to just hang out together.
• Slept by the tree on Christmas Eve, and opened presents together Christmas morning.
• I started a new tradition--The Book of Christmas Past. I made scrapbook pages of our last 2 Christmases, and am going to do it every year. Then we can get it out at Christmas every year and look at pictures and read about the previous year. Fun, huh?
• We went to my parents' house and opened presents Christmas morning.
• Played a new game with my fam--Wits and Wagers. My family was MADE for that game. We love trivia.
• Per Tanner family tradition, went to Mi Ranchito for dinner on Christmas.
• Drove in the Christmas fog.
• Flew to Arizona on the 28th, where my family had driven on the 26th, to go to an 80th birthday for my dad's parents.
• Went on a "citrus run." It's secret. I can't tell you about it.
• Went shopping. Bought a sparkly headband that I LOVE, and got an $80 cardigan for $17.59 from Banana Republic.
• Went to the 80th birthday party, where we ate food, watched a cute slideshow of their life, and played a Grandma and Grandpa trivia game.
• Spent New Years playing Apples to Apples with a couple of my aunts, cousins, and their kids.
• Said goodbye to the saguaros and drove back to Utah through the beautiful snowy mountains, admired red rock cliffs, played Who Would You Rather Marry? with Char and Blair, read books, had some interesting discussions, and played 20 Questions.
• Came back home and went straight to Kiley's 25th birthday party and celebrated.
• Went back to real life. BOO.

The upside of returning to real life, however, is that it's the new year! Which means New Year's resolutions. I am excited about mine. When I originally made them, I was very wordy, so the other day I got to the essence of what each one was and put into just a word. So, here are my 1 word resolutions, I'll keep the long version of what I'm actually going to DO to myself:

• Simplify (I know that's so cliche and stupid, but it's true.)
• Organize
• Complete
• Read
• Pray
• Trim down
• Go
• Shower the people I love with love

I have to say, I'm way excited about that last one. It involves writing letters and giving compliments and just being more warm and loving.

And I already told you all about the reading 50 books. I'm excited about that one too. 1 down, 49 to go!