Movies

Went to see The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug (Hobbit 2) today. Great movie!! I loved Orlando Bloom, and the story is good. But they cut it off right at the most exciting part. I guess they want you to come back for the third installment.

Christmas!

We had Christmas Eve dinner at the Mills.  Great time!  We both made a standing rib roast, and then I did some vegetables and dessert.  Played Catan after.

Christmas Day was at my house.  Monica, Frank, and Julie-ana came over.  And so did Julie, Dave, David, and Kellie.  Opened presents.  The boys pretty much got what they wanted.  Jean-Luc got a new HDMI monitor for his computer.  Anton got an iPad mini.  And Chris got a new laptop.

We had dinner.  I made a ham and vegies and desserts and stuff, Julie brought the turkey and vegies and desserts and stuff.  Monica brought the salad, bread, and made the mashed potatoes.  Frank had to work, he was set up in the office.  And then later, the Mills stopped over for more Catan.  Had a great day!

Christmas Photo

A nice Christmas photo of the boys.

Chris Reads during the Youth Led Service

Here is a video of Chris reading the lessons during a Youth Led Advent Service.

Christmas Party

Bill and I went to my work Christmas Party over the weekend in Virginia Beach.  The Christmas Party was nice, but it was a miserable weekend.  It rained every day.  I was up in Vienna for the week, so I was flying down on Friday night.  I get to the airport, get checked in, and am browsing Facebook when I got a text from the airline saying that all flights to Norfolk were canceled.  !!  So I went up to the desk to try to get it organized, and indeed, all the flights were canceled.  Including flying through other cities.  The earliest they could get me there was the next morning.  Bill was flying up from Florida, so I wanted to meet him so he wouldn't have to spend the night alone. So, I tried to rent a car to drive down.  It's about 4 hours away, not too bad.  I might get there this evening.  But it was $200 to rent the car.  !!  So I called my program manager and told him it was either spend $200 for a car or $200 for a hotel.  He said go ahead and get the car, so I drove down that evening.  In the rain, through rush hour Washington DC traffic, with about 50 miles of construction.  *sigh*  I still got there before Bill's flight, which had been delayed by about 4 hours because of the weather.

Our room in the resort were kind of oldish.  But they had put us right on the ocean on the fifth floor.  We had a nice big party room.  But, the smaller bedroom was right off the walkway, which was next to the elevator.  And there was a party couple in the room next to us.  And they were partying, all night...  Didn't get much sleep that night.  But the view out the balcony was to die for.  It was kind of cold, notice the lack of people on the beach...

The next day, we went shopping.  In the light rain.  The mall was nice, but there were very upscale stores there.  We got a few things.  Then we had lunch with Gem, one of our old Firefly friends.  We met at an Indian restaurant which was very good.

Then it was time to get ready for the party.  A few of my DBIZ co-workers had driven down, just three others and their significant others.  And I knew a few other folks there from the main office.  But there were a ton of people!  It was a very nice party.  Good food and a good DJ with dancing for most of the night.

And again, the partying couple next door kept us up all night.  *sigh*  Flew home in the morning to warm and sunny Florida. :)  At the airport heading home, we saw a US Airways plane painted with the Steelers logo when we stopped at Starbucks in the airport.  Talk about luck!

Winter is here

And all the colors are gone.  In Virginia for work.

Thanksgiving

Went to Nashville for Thanksgiving this year.  Had a great time with Bill's family.  Picked up JL on the way, and got there on Wednesday afternoon.  Roberta cooked a great Thanksgiving day meal!  Played lots of Uno, Hearts, and other games.  On Friday, we had a round of Dirty Santa.  Bill got a party appetizer (chips and con queso dip), and I got mostly scratchoffs that we shared with the others.  And we went to the Chinese Buffet.  Came back home on Saturday so I could get ready on Sunday for my trip to Virginia early Monday morning.