tubing with max

We were out on the river in december. Awesome!
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Uh oh!

I think it shook loose during tubing. Good thing I was at a dentist's house!
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Believe it or not

We are at ripleys believe it or not, my fave place ever. St augustine is warm and crowded. Feels like home!
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Believe it or not

We are at ripleys believe it or not, my fave place ever. St augustine is warm and crowded. Feels like home!
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Christmas Crackers Round 2

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Christmas Crackers Round 1

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merry christmas!

we ate our chinese last night... did our christmas crackers this morning while we opened presents... had a hot toddy each (thats good stuff right there!)... then some bellinis... did some laundry... talked to family on the phone... packed suitcases... washed dishes... vacuumed... watched return of the jedi (nothing says merry christmas like star wars!)... ate some of kris's lentil soup from the pajama party... all in all a wonderful christmas day.

for my christmas wish i would like peace at lax and goodwill from all the security guards who have to work on christmas.

jammie whammie partay

lance and kris hosted our first jammie whammie party (and my first co-ed pajama party ever) for christmas. we ate a fabulous dinner on her china (at a beautifully set table - way to go momma gibson for teaching that home ec class... right kris?) in our jammies then watched fred claus, that was a pretty funny movie. it was the only one everyone would agree on since some of us (me) dont particularly care for elf or its a wonderful life) and others (lance) dont like a christmas story. no one had seen fred claus yet so it was perfect. everyone had a great time and it was super relaxing. the best part was coming home and getting straight in bed without having to change!

lance won the prize for most festive costume. kris is one lucky girl.

owen won for most at home in his pjs since we see him in them all the time.

the shivelys are keeping cricket for us this week. we took her over yesterday and i thought

i kept hearing her scratch at the door all night asking to be let in from the cold rain. i missed my cat hat!

cricket's playdate

since we are going out of town for a week we need to find someone to watch cricky while we are in florida. it is hard because most people are out of town for christmas. thankfully ryan and kim are staying in town and they have a cat, harley. they so graciously agreed to babysit while we are gone. last monday jeremy and i took cricket over there for a little playdate to see how the cats got along. cricket loved harley's brand of catnip, was a little bit scared of the electric litter box, and wanted to play with harley. harley wasnt as excited to have a strange cat in her space. cricket tried to sniff her and play with her while harley hissed, albeit rather anemically and half hearted. it wasnt until cricket came all the way into harleys face while she was semi cornered in the kitchen that anything exciting happened. poor clawless harley took a swipe at cricket and cricket hit back. cricky poo still has her claws though. we separated them and neither was hurt. harley went and hid in her cabinet for the rest of the night while cricket played with her toys. the funny thing about the way cricket hit her was with her paws curled in slightly - the way she does when jeremy is playing with her. i think she thought harley was playing with her. kind of awesome.

hopefully they get along when cricket is hanging out over there.

christmas festivities

last weekend was the fourth annual shively cookie party. i baked shortbread as always, and took some of the peppernuts that grandma koci sent us because they are always a huge hit. we had a great time, ate some delicious chili and way too many cookies. we came home with a mix-y plate and have been snacking all week.

wednesday night was our live production christmas party, dessert potluck and white elephant gift exchange. jeremy took a fishing pole and came home with a headlamp from doug and i took a candle and came home with a scrapbook. we actually got things that we like and will use. some people got literal trash and that sucks. then we played the "slips of paper" game and had a roaring good time. shortbread was once again a hit.

christmas is fun at work too. our holiday party was last week and i couldnt stay as long as i wanted because of the show but it was a nice dinner and raffle. all week long people have been bringing in treats and gifts. lots of chocolate and holiday popcorn tins!!!! everyone at work starts asking around nov 1 when i am bringing in shortbread and peppernuts so this was the week for that. extra long morning breaks with coffee and tea and treats. could life get any better? i submit that it could if we werent at work but a girls gotta earn a living. money is freedom! ask marie from everybody loves raymond.

a christmas carl

the cast...

and crew of a christmas carl, a modern day time traveling spin on a christmas carol. it was pretty fun and had some elaborate set changes so it kept us backstage managers busy! esther joined the men in black this year and we had so much fun! sarah was directing again and she is awesome. cricket was thrown off her schedule by all our late nights but i took a sick day one day to stay in bed and snuggle with her. we had two performances and they both went really well. i enjoyed everything about it except the stupid made up christmas song that i know about three words to that i cant get out of my head! argh!

christine's baby shower

last weekend kim, kris and i randomly all wore black to a baby shower. when we got there, lots of other people were wearing black too. not super festive for a baby shower, completely appropriate for a funeral. i guess we were mourning the loss of doug and christine's freedom and sleep? :) the best was we all went to target for our gender nuetral baby shower wrapping paper and we matched!

we played some fun games, including one where teams fo two had to find pictures from magazines of what we thought the baby would look like grown up. since none of us knew if it was a boy or girl, the collages turned out to be very interesting... holly and i made a boy - we were the only ones. we made him bringing flowers to christine, his mom, for mother's day. she picked us as second place, but the first place people (kris and kim) had already won prizes so we got to pick candles - i got one that matched my house. yay!

christine and doug got some really good stuff and we all had a blast. holly made a pretty awesome cake. i made my first granny squares blanket (crocheting). i am very happy with how it turned out.

One more night

Got my hairs cut, my black on and I'm ready for the second and final night of the pasadena mosaic christmas show. Last night was great and tonight will be better!
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tuesday night

tuesday was a big night for us. jeremy's uncle mike was in town on business so we got to meet him for dinner. we ate in the hotel restaurant, a fancy french place. i had jidori chicken and it was amazing! jeremy and mike both got snapper in clam sauce (not mdf!). for dessert i had strawberry soup and it was yummy. it was so nice to see him and get caught up on some of the family news.

after we left dinner we headed to the mint becuase justin was in town playing with whitney duncan. we got there way early (they went on at 10 and we got there shortly after 8) and a guy that we know from mosaic, christopher wray, was playing. that was a fun surprise. whitneyduncan was a fun show - she is pop rock/country. we hung out with the band a little bit after the show and it was nice to see justin. it is weird that i wind up seeing him more than i see anna but still fun. the best part of the night (not for her prolly though) was that anna was still awake after the show was over (it was really really ridiculously late her time) and after justin talked to her i got to sing her to sleep. i bet that was the best night of sleep she ever had.

sarah tagged me. as if she hasn't been telling me what to do enough this week! :) (sarah is the director on the christmas show jeremy and i are stage managing so im glad she is around to tell me what to do...)

1. Choose the 4th picture folder on your computer

2. Choose the 4th picture

3. Explain the picture

4. Choose 4 people to do the same

on jessie's bed two years ago with my cousins. four hot girls in one bed. woot woot!

now i am supposed to tag four people but most people who read this and also have blogs have already participated so i am tagging two:

beka

becca

current pet peeves

1. people who don't tag themselves in pictures when you upload pictures to an album on facebook, just because it is your album doesnt mena that you dont have to tag yourself. you do. just do it.

2. people who have smartphones with full qwerty keypads and word recognition who use cutesy little text abbreviations seriously? like typing thanks instead of thx or you are instead of you are really takes that much longer on a full keypad? it doesn't. so please act like you graduated high school and passed english and write real words. i fully understand people using t9 who dont want to type it all out because it is a pain. all you berry and iphone users out there - im watching you!

3. speaking of grammar, and i know ive harped on this before but it still bothers me, your is NOT the same as you're look it up and use it correctly. the only people who have a pass on this are people who do not have english as their first language and people under the age of 8. (same goes for there they're their)

4. people who park their cars in the middle of the street and turn their flashers on all the while completely blocking traffic turning on your flashers doesnt mean we can drive through the space your car is occupying. get out of the freaking street. pull into a driveway or something if you are loading or unloading.

im having a bad day and my boss is grumpy and so im grumpy. this rant helped get it all out.

tonight should be a great night though - dinner with uncle mike then to a club to see justin play then maybe rehearsal if it is still going strong.

my favorite christmas carols

we went to one of mosaic's christmas shows on saturday night and stage managed service on sunday morning. all the trees and lights and christmas carols. its beginning to feel a little bit like christmas. we arent decorating this year for two reasons: 1. all of our shristmas stuff is in storage and there is no room for it in our little apartment anyways and 2. we are leaving christmas day for jacksonville and it seems rather anticlimatic to decorate and then leave. that, combined with the fact that it is between 60 and 80 degrees here makes for a not very christmassy feeling. but i have heard two of my three favorite christmas songs so far theis year and i am holding out hope for #3.

1. silver bells - grammer and i used to play this song all the time (i mean all summer and everything) while we burned incense and played poker and drank chocolate shakes... i had a great childhood.

2. little drummer boy - a surprisingly controversial song. most people love it or hate it.

3. o come o come emmanuel - it doesnt seem very chirstmassy but i love this song. i was reading the verses online and i have never even heard some of them but i still love it.

what are your favorite christmas carols and why?

don't call me israel but...

studio city tattoo, where i spent some of my afternoon:

isaiah 44:5 "one will say, 'i belong to the lord'; another will call himself by the name of jacob; still another will write on his hand 'the Lord's,' and will take the name israel."

Civic Duty Again

Jeremy came with me this time. Together we saved up to 6 lives today!!! Yay for blood donation!
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