It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Christmas break is always one of my favorite times of the year. With the festive Christmas atmosphere, catching up with loved ones, and fun adventures, it never disappoints.

Here are some of the highlights of my 2007-2008 Christmas break:

1. Christmas caroling with my church's Teen Choir: Pauline, without fail, adds the "uh-huh" after the "when we finally kiss goodnight" part of "Let it Snow"; it's classic. But really, this time we were just grateful that the one nursing home didn't shut the door on us because our singing was interrupting their bridge game.

2. Disneyland with my sisters: they understand that an hour wait for the "Peter Pan" ride isn't worth it, and that it's important to stop and get your picture taken with the random costumed-Disney characters around the park. This trip also featured two rides on the Jungle Cruise, thanks to Skipper Greg, our neighbor back from when I was in elementary school.

3. The Christmas party at Pop-pop's house: it's a fun time to catch up with family, eat my pop-pop's famous potato salad, and watch Uncle Jerry (the self-proclaimed favorite son) open the Christmas card from his dad. This year my sisters and I gave my pop-pop a baseball hat from our respective schools. We may have done this to ensure that he wears his USC hat, which was a gift from my cousin who graduated from there, a little less.

4. Christmas Eve: We went to the mass where the high school kids put on a dramatization. It's always fun to see Mary and Joseph not make eye-contact with each other for fear of getting cooties. I had the responsibility of turning on the switch for the star over the manger. Talk about pressure. After church, we all went home and had our traditional Christmas Eve dinner: cold cuts. Then we watched "It's a Wonderful Life" in the glow of the Christmas tree lights.

5. Christmas: Jenn woke me up at 7:30am. We then chatted until we heard our parents get up. Then we woke Amy up by sitting on her while she was in bed. We opened our presents, ate a yummy breakfast, and got ready for the day. Then we spent the afternoon with Grandpa, playing/singing more Christmas songs and eating our barbecued meal later on. After that, it was time to go to Aunt Kathy's to visit Dad's side of the family. Amy played some songs on guitar for everyone, which was fun.

6. Going to LA to see Kina perform at The Mint: well, we got there early, so we spent more time than anyone should ever have to spend in the nearby CVS. But eventually The Mint opened, and we saw Kina play a 3o minute set - so great! The sets that followed her were pretty entertaining. When the citar player and electric cello player came out, I knew we were in for some good times.

7. The Grand Canyon: that Wicked Ditch of the West is pretty grand, let me tell you. I hiked 6 miles the first day. So that's three miles down and three miles back up. The hike back up wasn't too bad, actually. I think we actually went faster going up-hill, probably because we weren't as scared of falling. The second day we listened to a geology talk from Ranger Ron (it rocked!) and went on a nature walk with Ranger Jim. We also went out to dinner in a fancy hotel and saw a ring-tailed cat walking along the beams. At first we thought it was a raccoon, or maybe even a rat, but we were wrong. It was fun to catch up with Kelly and Casey on the trip, and to meet Casey's sister, as well.

I think that pretty much sums it all up. Happy 2008, everyone!