Thursday, December 25, 2008

Happy Holidays!

I hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday season. I always love this time of year. There is no better time to be with family and friends. It doesn't matter what religion you are or what you believe in...the winter has always been a very special time to spend with loved ones.

The reason I love the holidays so much is because there is just a sense of happiness in the air that is different than any other time of year. Mixed with the joy of the season is wonderful food, beautiful lights and seasonal music.

The other night I went to the Nutcracker ballet with my family. The ballet was really a great time. It was different than anything I'd ever been to before...there is no talking. The costumes and the dancing were beautiful!
After the ballet we went ice skating outside in downtown Milwaukee. I'm not quite sure if my skates were really dull or what but I was slipping all over the place. The skates were rentals so I'm sure they weren't the best skates... Either way, my sister, mom, dad and I all had a really nice time skating outside. The park we were skating in was all decorated with tons of holiday lights. Some swim fans recognized me and we snapped the photo below.
Right now my dad and sister are making Beet Gnochni with a Parmesan Cream Sauce with Prosciutto. It is going to be absolutely spectacular...Seriously the food at the holidays is simply outstanding (if very rich on occasion). Remember, eat in moderation and exercise and everything will be just fine haha...
My holiday season has been very enjoyable so far. I hope all of you have also had a great time with family and friends:)

18 comments:

Anonymous said...

We did a pot luck at work, but unfortunatly didn't have much time to enjoy it. Fruit pizza veggies with dip, meatballs, little wennie dogs, and stew were the orders for today. The only down side TONS of people in to buy last minute gifts and foods. Good thing i get paid well for it. LOOOONG day. But i have all day tomorrow to look forward to. I miss the indoor rink in SC when i lived there.
Go Stingrays!

Nicole said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Lauren Brent said...

I spent most of the day at my Aunt's house - had to get my family in the mood to go, but when we did, we actually had a great time... played a pretty epic game of Pictaphone! haha! Now we're just at home preparing Christmas dinner, and playing XBox and what not. :)

I'm glad your holiday went well, and I hope the rest of your time with your family goes just as well, if not better! :)

Also - LOVE the first pic - I'm a sucker for blue Christmas lights! They're so cool! :)

Donna Binkholder said...

Loved the blog and the pictures.It's true everything is sooo joyous this time of year it's wonderful. I had a great time with friends and family. My cuz brought her b/f down finally got to meet him, he's cool but my brother and him tagged teamed against me and Mary at pool and won..wasn't fair...lol. Oh the food was great and now I have to work it all off..lol. I'm glad you had a great time with family and friends. Merry Christmas!!

Soly said...

Glad your holidays went well Garrett! :o)

Garrett said...

Wow that sounds like a long day...

What is Pictaphone? Blue lights are really awesome...the more I see them the more I like them!

Tag team at pool...uh oh haha

Anonymous said...

The holidays are just great...especially christmas, because the family is all together...
The decoration it's amazing and those blue lights are simple and beautiful at the same time...

Hope everything went well for everybody...

Nicole said...

I got the Michael Phelps Olympics DVD. As soon as there was a spare moment with no guests my brother and I watched the relay twice in a row. We would have watched it more but we were being too loud. He knows most of the commentary and I just laugh every time he says part of it. It was AMAZING!!

Garrett said...

Haha that's really funny you watched the relay! I'm glad you liked it so much:)

Nicole said...

My one sister had never seen it before. She watched it for the first time yesterday. I can't even count the number of times I have seen it. Or times my brother starts doing the cometary...

K of the Chronicle said...

I love winter and the holidays! We would actually have a legitimate reason to use the fireplace since it's so cold. The family being together is also really great and all the college family members are back to make things crazy. haha

However, I was a little dismayed this season because we had bad food :( My cousin got food poisoning, too.

Lauren Brent said...

Pictaphone is a game... it's so fun! It's like a combination of pictionary and telephone.

Basically, everyone starts with a stack of paper. On the first sheet of paper, you write a caption. It can be a quote, movie or tv show title, song lyrics or title, bands, popular phrase, etc.

Then, you take your stack of paper and pass it to the person on the right.

The person on your right then takes the stack and reads your caption, and attempts to illustrate the caption on page 2. The stack is passed to the right again.

Person #3 then looks at the picture on page 2, and attempts to caption it on page 3, without looking at the caption on page 1. It's passed again, and person #4 illustrates the caption on page 3, without looking at pages 1 or 2. The process continues until you get your stack back.

The object of the game is to keep the original caption intact - but it's ten times more fun when it gets absolutely distorted. :)

there are a couple examples if you go here: http://limitless-ramblings.blogspot.com/2008/12/this-is-quite-possibly-going-to-be-my.html
just in case my explanation doesn't cut it. :)

Blue lights are pretty cool - and they seem to be booming this year. I don't remember seeing as many last year as I did this year. :) But I agree, the more I see them, the more I like them, as well. :)

Anonymous said...

They have all kinds of lights now a days. Gold, blue, pink, we even have orange and black or purple and black for holloween. I'm still amazed at how many people shopped christmas day. Not even for last minuite things either. I'm talking shopping like it was a normal day. Heard someone is haveing fun with a WII. I got dance dance revolution 2 hit party for my WII i plan on trying it tomorrow.

Garrett said...

I guess if you've seen it a few times it's probably pretty easy to pick up the commentary.

Oh no...food poisoning is the absolute worst feeling:(

I really need to try Pictaphone it sounds like a lot of fun! There definitely have been more blue lights this year than last.

Where were you working on Christmas day?

Anonymous said...

I work for Walgreens.
We got to pick which holiday we wanted off. I had Thanksgiving off (cold food so not good) so I worked Christmas. Drug stores are about the only things open on Christmas.

Lauren Brent said...

You MUST try pictaphone! The only thing I ask is that you share some of the results with us! :D But it really is a blast!

Walgreens... Sparkle, my friend has a frightening Christmas Eve Walgreens story that you just reminded me of... haha!

Sorry you had to work Christmas!! But that's awesome about the game! :)

Donna Binkholder said...

Yes at pool I love pool but I sucked..at the final countdown I freak hit in the 8 ball by accident and it just wasn't good..They we look just go ahead and say it guys rule. Im like rematch..hahah

Soly said...

I was going to ask you this last time Garrett, but I totally forgot. Are those cookies that were being cooked in the picture you posted on this entry? They look really good.


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