What can I say more than the wedding was fabulous. Chrizelle, our new sister-in-law is from South Africa and it has been about a year since she and Peter decided to get married. What they thought would be a 6 month processes to get her finance visa turned out to take about a year. Luckily it came through and Chrizelle came over without a hitch. She has only been here for about a month and in that time Peter and Chrizelle have had to work extra hard planning, preparing, and baking for their wedding. Even with such short notice it was the loveliest of occasions.
The wedding ceremony was just beautiful and the reception, while almost immediately after the ceremony, was great as well. Everyone had a lot of fun, we were able to visit with old friends and family we hadn’t seen in years and the best part of the whole thing is that Peter and Chrizelle looked as happy as I have ever seen them. Congratulations guys!
We had a very merry Christmas indeed.
That, I presume, is evident from this picture of the cabbage patch ear muffs I received from my father for Christmas. 
We had the great fortune of visiting with both of our families for Christmas. (Thanks to a wedding. Shout Out to Jesse & Laura!) Neil was quite festive on Christmas Eve jangling his jingle bell wristbands at my parent’s house. My parents always do an exceptional job of making things very festive. We opened approximately 1 trillion presents, including, but not limited to: a Spanish bull & matador set, an easter snow globe (which was then re-gifted to Neil’s granny), a squirt gun, 2 JC Pennys gift cards, 2 oversize DC sweatshirts, a sushi DVD set, and….look out internet users…. a digital camcorder. I suspect that the evidence of this gift will soon be posted since Neil has been video taping me at close range 24 hours per day since we got said gift.
It was quite the haul, filled with hilarity. Upon receiving a strange woolen vest with leaves sewn on it from my dad I said, “well, if I ever decided to be a kindergarten teacher, I’ve got an outfit to wear.” And, when Neil’s mother handed me a hand-made stocking she wants me to give our firstborn I dashed her hopes with, “well, we’ll be putting that one in storage for a while.” Approximately 45% of gifts we received were re-gifted during the selfsame season– to spread the holiday love.
Overall we had a (very) white and wonderful Christmas. The highlight of the season was when we visited one of Neil’s aunts in Idaho for “breakfast” and were presented with sherbet over canned fruit at 10am. Apparently in Idaho ice cream for breakfast is not just an unrealistic childhood dream, it’s a reality. Ice cream is a legitimate way to start the day in the Gem State.
