Happy Holidays!

{Warning: Long post ahead without any pictures. I thought I would update, but the camera is in Manuel's truck and he is at work. I will post the pictures later}

Well Thanksgiving break is over and I am just now starting to tell you all about it. I am sad that it went by so fast, but I was pretty busy and well..only a few more weeks of this nonsense called School for a while. I must say that starting in January, I am officially a Senior at BSU...whoop whoop..that makes me happy.

So Thanksgiving break started off with a bang...a long drive to Vegas to see a really good friend of Manuel's get Married. It was great fun. The Vega brother minus one clan plus two wives were on the road at 4 a.m. Friday November 21. I was so excited to get out of Boise and to be able to spend time with Manuel without the interruption of homework, I couldn't sleep before we left, I was busy packing, checking my list to make sure I didn't forget anything, packing more, and doing little odd ended things, 3 A.m arrived rather quick and we left to go get the other travelers. I thought sleeping in the car was a good idea, I could hardly sleep though, it just wasn't as comfy as a bed would have been. The drive to Las Vegas, was rather boring, it's such a long drive and not very exciting. The talks between us all were rather entertaining. We arrived in Vegas around 12 p.m I think on Friday and tried to take a nap before the evenings festivities but instead we got ready and went to some casino's, walked around and then the girls and guys split for the evening. The girls went and saw Thunder from Down Under, and that was an experience in itself. It was rather comical seeing all the crazy single women going well crazy and some of the brides to be were rather touchy with the Aussies and our group, we were just calm...seeing that we had probably never seen anything like that before, it was fun. It didn't start off so well, Vanessa and I got put at the end of the table and well everyone else sat in front of us and we were having a hard time seeing, but that didn't stop the laughter, we got lots of laughing in at the old brides to be and some of the rather un-shy ones as well. People amaze me, honestly. After the show, Vanessa, Ana (the bride to be) and my self went dancing. IT was fun, although there were some creepy men at the club and wouldn't leave us alone. there was one guy who was watching us, so we moved, he moved as well. we then decided to step off the dance floor and check our phones, well lo-n-behold, the man made his way to the bar, perfect eye contact to where we were standing. FREAK- honestly. We decided to meet up with the other girls and we went to Salsa Cantina, the girls danced, and Vanessa and I decided to head to the hotel, we were exhausted. Good thing we left then, because the other girls stayed out till 5, crazy dancers! So back to us leaving...we decided we needed to get some snacks for our hotel, so we walked to Walgreen's for some water and pop. WE then decided we would just take a cab from there to our hotel. Well the guy was obviously in a hurry to get back because he was driving all crazy and freaking me out, he was honestly the first cab ride I took with out Manuel and he was also the scariest. So Vanessa and I weren't quite sure on how to get back to our hotel, but we knew that some of the streets, would just result in us having to turn around. He was rather a rude man too, we would tell him where to go and he thought he knew the way, turns out we knew better than him. so when we finally got to the hotel, it was $8.10, I gave him a 20 and I told him I wanted $11 back...when I said that he repeated $11, $11..Me- the oh so nice person at times, said yes 11. He was the worst and most rude cab driver ever, he deserved his .90 cent tip, Jack-...I didn't count the change, thinking he would give me 11 back,...come to find out he didn't think .90 cents was good enough, so he took $2 and gave me $9 back, but I didn't realize until the morning. He was like a cab driver in a scary movie that would take the ladies down some dead end road and attack them and leave them there in the dark...that type of guy, scary right?

Saturday, we laid around, ordered pizza, then got ready for the wedding. We went, after which went and sat at a bar to watch BSU win yet another game then we met up with the newlyweds for dinner at a delicious buffet with my favorite, Crab legs and Shrimp. DELISH! We split after that and the Vega's found themselves on Fremont Street. I can't believe Manuel and I never made it over there when we were there last year for our honeymoon. We were in Vegas for a week and the strip was all we saw. IT was so awesome the light show above us was pretty cool, the music and the entertainment. We finally got a call from some of the other wedding guests and they were dancing so we decided to go meet up with them. There was a little miscommunication between Manuel and Franky, we took a $20 cab ride to the Palms hotel to meet up with them when in-fact, they were at the Las Palmas, which was right by Fremont street. So Franky came and picked us up and then we went back to our hotel and hung out, we never did go dancing which was sad because Vanessa and I really wanted to. That weekend went by way to fast and wish we had longer time to spend in Vegas, there were things we wanted to do, but no time to do it in. It was fun while it lasted.

Now on to Thanksgiving. My in-laws came up to Boise on Thursday morning so we had Thanksgiving Dinner at Manuel's brother Frank's house. It was a great day. It started on Wednesday when I needed to make 3 pies and then I needed to take stuffing and the rolls on Thursday. Being the Martha Stuart I am, I decided I would make the pie crusts, (the time I made them with Vanessa, the first batch I made, well it just didn't turn out at all), I made the dough, followed the directions to put it in the fridge for at least an hour. When I returned to roll it out, it was hard as a rock. I let it sit out for a while, rolled them and one of the pie crusts turned out and the other just kept crumbling as I was rolling. So I made another batch, in the meantime, I made the pumpkin filling, sliced the apples for the apple pie and made the chocolate filling for the chocolate pie. I must say for my first time making these pies, they turned out pretty well. With only one mishap with one pie crust. Anyway, besides that the food was amazing and the company was even better. I love being around family, especially this time of year. It makes me reflect on all the things I have to be thankful for. I am so thankful for my husband and the hard work he does for us, how he has an abundance of patience for me, I hear I can be a tough one to deal with at times ;) and the unconditional loves he shows me I Love him .I am also thankful for Family. They all make me smile and I love the time I get to spend with them.

Friday was my first experience with shopping on Black Friday, I have never been a fan of the crowds the day after Thanksgiving. I fell asleep on the couch, and Manuel woke me up around 4 asking if I still wanted to go, I first said no, but then realized I didn't want to be home alone, so I tagged along. It was rather crazy, I have never seen so many people at one store at one time. We went to Wal-Mart for a blu-ray player. WE found them and planted our feet. Manuel kept telling me to move aside because things go crazy when they let the items loose. So about 5 minutes before they opened the items I moved back and watched all the crazed sleep deprived shoppers. IT was rather comical. Manuel did get the player but after a few attempts of grabbing the same ones as some other shoppers, he decided to duck low and take from the bottom. he got and we were on our way. He wanted to get Iron man on Blu-ray so we searched the store but to no avail we couldn't find it. So we stood in line to make our purchase. We then headed over to Circuit city to see what they had, (only because Linens-n-things wasn't open yet) We headed over to Best Buy, went to Breakfast, went back to Linens-n-things, then we were going to go home but we made one last stop at Ross for an HDMI cable. The Dvd player didn't come with one and these cables run from $30-125 and Manuel remembers he saw on at Ross a couple weeks ago for around $10. So we waited for them to open hoping they would still have it so we wouldn't have to buy the more expensive cables. We couldn't find one but then Manuel moved a few items and one was hiding behind some ear phones or something. We got lucky! An awesome deal on a blu-ray dvd player and a cheap cable! Whoop whoop! WE were home around 8:15 and we landed ourselves on the couch to watch a new movie and nap. (Yes, Manuel hooked the player up as soon as we got home)

My parents and brothers stopped on Saturday on their way back to Burley. They went and spent Thanksgiving with Chanc, Randy, and Aidan. They had lots of fun up there and couldn't stop talking about the little guy, I can't wait until they come home for Christmas, so we can spend some quality time with him ( I mean Chanc and Randy too). After some delicious Sweet and Sour chicken, Mom needed to meet with my cousin Aaron to buy him some shirts for his mission, so we all tagged along, glad I did. We went to Desert Book and I bought a few Christmas presents and then I absolutely fell in love with this little nativity scene set, it was so adorable. I was set to go back next week to purchase it, I had already spent enough there in one night. Well to my surprise, Mom and Dad bought it for us and she set it up as soon as we got home, except it took me like 3 hours to realize and the only reason I looked was because Chace spilled his drink and I looked over in that direction. I was super excited {I will take a picture of it and post it later}.

Well that's all in the long-kind of nutshell version of our lives. It went by so quickly and I have school tomorrow. I didn't do as much homework as planned over the break and I think I might have caused a little stress in my life but hey I have 6 days of actual school left and I can't wait...only thing is after school gets out I am studying my little butt off because I take a test at the beginning of the year...wish me luck.