Break Part IV (Is that the symbol for 4?)

Okay...so I'm kind of done with Christmas/New Years stuff, it's getting boring even to me. I took all these pictures (i.e. over 600) with grand ideas to blog and document for our little family, but waiting over a month to do so is kind of lame.

Now that that's off my chest...onto TEXAS! Taking a two day flying trip to Arizona wasn't enough for us over the break. We thought it would be fun to rent a car and drive 16 hours across the desert. Hey...we've been driving around in circles on a tropical island for 9 months...it sort of sounded sane.

So we piled little Mimi and all of our junk into a REAL rental car (vs. the not-so-real rental cars you get in the Caribbean) and set out for Texas.

I'm kind of anti-movie-for-kids, but I sure turned to it when we had a long drive ahead. We set up the laptop and Mia was set. Seriously. I couldn't believe how amazing she did. We didn't have to stop once, and this road trip turned out to be the highlight of our whole break. It was perfect to sit in our little car so close and just be us, talking and enjoying each other's company.

Our first stop was Sierra Vista, AZ for the night to play cards and listen to Christmas Carols with my grandparents. It was a very memorable evening, and we were very happy that we were able to stop and visit with them.

Then it was on to the next 12 hours of the trip to San Antonio. First order of business? Get all the cousins together and mess my sister Heather's house up!

Then we had to sneak some of Mom's famous apple pie. She actually let us cut into one on Christmas Eve. Couldn't believe it. Never happened before. Probably will never happen again.

(Man, that pie sure looks good right about now...)

We stayed at Shaman and Heather's house, and our Christmas morning was filled with love, lots of surprise goodies from Shaman and Heather, and lots of family. We were really glad that we were able to go home for the holidays.

It was our first Christmas without my brother John. It was wonderful to all be together, but very difficult because his absence was very marked. My sister-in-law Jacqui is wonder woman. I so admire her. I love her dearly.

Yep...you guessed it. Snuggies were received at Christmas. I have never seen two people more happy to get them until I saw the expression on my parent's faces. Snuggies were made for my parents. They both wore them the rest of the week we were there. I can bet you the $5 EC I have in my wallet that they're wearing them this very second.

We got lots of granola bars for Christmas to bring back with us. We don't buy them in St. Kitts. They are like a million dollars a box. Never thought I'd be happy for granola bars at Christmas.

Started to notice a trend as I was looking through my pictures. I wore this black sweatshirt like everyday. I didn't notice I was wearing it everyday over the break. I only noticed it when we got back and I was going through pictures. That's not only gross, but where has my fashion sense gone?

And this is where I gave Dave the "Stop taking pictures of people without makeup on looking nasty (me) at Christmas" look.

The End.