Oops.. it's been over a month..

Time flies when you're not posting ;-) The holidays have come and gone and I'll give you a little summary of our Christmas holidays. I was off of work from Friday the 18th and returned to work on Wednesday the 30th, yes it was awesome. On the 18th Matt and I drove to Ann Arbor, Michigan in order to be there for my brother's graduation. We passed the 11 hour drive by listening to Harry Potter 7 on audio CD! Charlie graduated with his masters in Industrial Engineering with no less than an A in any class - way to go, Charlie!! My whole family went up for the event. Ann Arbor was a very cool city. Here are some pictures:

Charlie and I in front of one of his class buildings

Mom and sister

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Me and dad

Charlie, Matt and I

Ok I know you can't really tell from this picture, but Jeff Daniels was the commencement speaker which was really cool

Graduated!

So after the graduation on Sunday evening, Matt and I drove to Chicago (it's only 4 hours from Ann Arbor so why not!). We enjoyed two full days in the city seeing the sites and also visiting with my friend Jeff who is pretty much the only person I keep up with from high school. Jeff and I have known each other since kindergarten (I think) so it's really cool to keep up with him and he showed us around Chicago.

Matt and I in Chicago! (in front of Navy Pier)

Matt and Jeff in front of the yummy pizza place we ate at

Somewhere in Chicago

Snow!

Me in front of the "Cloud Gate" bean sculpture (notice the cute boots I had to buy because I didn't bring any waterproof shoes for the snow). Also, you can see a little bit of the snow in the top of the picture, the top of the sculpture was covered in snow and looked really neat.

Then on Wednesday Matt and I made the 11 hour drive back to Atlanta to spend the evening with some of his family for Christmas. Thursday we were up early again for the drive to Augusta! We spent Thursday and Friday in Augusta for Christmas with my family. We had our usual tradition of going over to our neighbor's house for Christmas Eve and then my aunt's house for Christmas lunch. And we got to spend a lot of time on Christmas with Emili too :)

Playing Beatles Rock Band at the neighbor's house

Christmas at my Mom's house

Cousin picture L to R - Charlie (brother), Zack (cousin), Erin (Zack's wife), Erin (sister), Kristen (cousin), me, Matt

Emili and me.. and Molly. Molly's first Christmas! Look how happy she is ;-)

Saturday morning we woke up and drove to Estill Springs, TN - 5 hour drive (one of the very exits we had passed on Wednesday)! We spent Saturday and Sunday in Estill Springs for Christmas with Matt's immediate and extended family. Sunday we drove back to Atlanta, home sweet home, after about 36 hours on the road (all worth it).

Christmas in TN - all of those gifts were opened in about 6 minutes, it was hilarious!

I spent Monday and Tuesday off of work at home recovering from our trip. I had a chance to clean, relax, and take down the Christmas decorations (always sad). And this past weekend, with having Friday off for New Year's, Matt and I worked on the house a little. He has been working on the basement and has done a phenomenal job preparing the basement for his music stuff and band practice. I did a little tiling in the bathroom to finally finish off the tile work that is in there. I also plan on sealing the tile in our shower this week so for now we are showering in our guest bathroom.

This is what Matt and I gave each other for Christmas - our first piece of furniture for our empty front room. I will also be getting a pillow or two for the top.

Tiles before being finished (and before painting and medicine cabinet too)

My handy tile work after (the top pieces)

One side of the bathroom

Basement "before" picture.. even before we took out the walls and floor

Basement "after" - the man-cave Matt has been working on for months and months

I'm sure there are many things I am leaving out since it has been so long. Let's see.. Biggest Loser starts tomorrow! I finally started running again! I have gone twice in the past week and that was the first time in 2 months since the marathon. My knees are not happy about it but I will press on. And yes I went running on Sunday when it was about 30 degrees out. Andy and Crystal are getting married in about 3 months!! We are very excited for them and can't wait to partake in all the wedding fun :) I have watched Julie and Julia about 4 times in the last week - MUST SEE. Seriously, I love it. We saw Avatar this weekend which is also a must-see. We opted to see it in 2D and I'm glad we did even though I'm sure 3D would be awesome as well. And here's to hoping I post again soon. Happy 2010!