Playing Catch-up

I promise, we're still alive.

The holidays are over and we're getting back into the swing of things so I wanted to get back into the routine of this whole blogging thing.  Over the holidays, I surprisingly heard a lot of "I've been reading your blog!" type comments from friends and family.  I want you all to know, I thought that was awesome.  I've been doing this largely as a way to try and document all of the events have been coming and going with great speed for me and Nathan.  New jobs, new places, etc.  But, I did also hope that I could use it to let friends and family know what we're up to since I am absolutely awful with calling all of you as much as I should.  Just so you know, I am aware that I suck at that.  Unfortunately, I don't get to know what YOU all are up to this way, but that just hammers home that I need to get better with that whole phone call thing.  Anyway, I'm gonna use this post to catch up on the past couple months before continuing forward.  A couple of months, where I was fortunate enough to be able to spend time with many of you.  But, unfortunately, not all.

Oh, and as always, it'll include lots of pictures.  This is gonna be a long one.

Christmas
This past Christmas was both very happy and very sad all at the same time.  For instance, I got to see both of my awesome aunts! (yay alliteration!) BOTH!  That's almost unheard of.  Most of the time I will see one, or the other, but very rarely do I see both in one holiday.  Major downside:  Mom wasn't able to make it home.  I officially have not seen my mother since Christmas of 2010.  That sucks, and I miss her terribly.  Good side: I got to sleep in my old room at Dad's and see them, all of my wonderful cousins and their children on his side and got to see my always stylin' cousin Salena and her husband Brian from mom's side who live far far away and I also rarely get to see.  And even made time to go see my absolutely wonderful mother and father-in-law Jenny and John.  (also, all the puppies!)  Family was definitely the theme for this Christmas.  Downside:  Nathan had to work Christmas.  All of it, the day after and New Year's.  So while, I was able to see all of the family, he had to sit at home by himself.  I hated that.

Other bonus fun time:  I got to meet Jude finally!  The most awesome one-year-old ever and spend some time with his wonderful parent, Ashleigh and John.

It turned out I was too busy to take tons of pictures of Christmas, but here are a couple.

We couldn't all be together in person, but Skype is a wonderful invention. :)

Even though he wasn't there to see it, Nathan officially has his own stocking at Dad's

Santa Deer.

Christmas pt. 2 A.K.A. Kirby's Wedding

I had the week between Christmas and New Year's off.  Relaxing right?  Not really.  But definitely tons of fun!  After driving down to Mattoon for Christmas, I then drove down to Huntsville and Guntersville, Alabama, for my good friend Kirby's Wedding.  She was a bridesmaid for me, and I was more than happy to return the favor.  Now THIS one had tons of pictures.  It was a blast.  I hadn't seen Kirby since my wedding, so seeing her again was great.  Also, I got to stay with my good friends Amanda and Andrew.  I had not seen them in, I think, close to seven years.  I missed those two so freakin much, and it was so great to get to spend time with them again.  We picked up right where we left off.  Complete with Rotel and Milo's sweet tea.  I also, got to see Samantha!  I hadn't seen her in probably about seven years or more either!  It turns out I had really missed being in the south.  There's not many places you can be outside in short sleeves in December.  :) The downside to all of this again, was that Nathan was stuck working, but we made up for that with his own visit in January.

Bachelorette!

She was gorgeous

Sam!

She was incredibly busy, as brides often are, so we just took a picture with her back :)

Bachelorette Party!

Lake Guntersville, from my hotel room

They. Are. Awesome.

Did I mention Milo's?  Cause I should have.

I was gonna include our Winter-een-mas visit home in this post too, but I believe I'll put that separately.  I just now previewed this post and saw how freakishly long it was becoming and figured the Holiday Extravaganza deserved it's own post anyway.  I got back into Madison New Year's Day. around 1 o'clock pm.  It was snowing, of course.  In total, I had spent over 24 hours on the road by myself.  While there were both upsides and downsides, it was definitely time well spent.