This time of year is always busy for all, but we figured we should buckle down and post an update before Christmas rolls around.
We spent Thanksgiving in Michigan with Justine's family, and since I had Thanksgiving and the day after off from work, we had a nice long weekend there. Wednesday afternoon we piled in the car with Hannah, Rufus, and Cricket, and made the trek North. We were pleased to have a precipitation free drive and arrived early enough to spend some time catching up with Justine's mom, dad, and sister. The next day we all packed into a car and drove to Muskegon to have dinner with Justine's grandparents (on her dad's side for the Bells playing along at home). After quite a feast, those of us who won't be there for Christmas opened presents. Justine and I received some wonderful gifts including two pillows and a gift certificate to Home Depot. Once it got late, we piled back in the car and made the drive home.
The next day was Black Friday, and though we didn't wait in line all night, we did brave a trip to Kohls for some clothes. By the time we got in line to checkout, it was stretching almost halfway around the store. Thank fully everyone was cheerful and the line moved fairly quickly. Afterwards Justine and I went to Home Depot to buy a power sander which will be really helpful in finishing our bathroom wall restoration project. Justine has been making an impressive go at smoothing down the walls by hand, but she's looking forward to better results at a faster pace. That evening we spent some time with a friend in Lansing and played a couple hours of Castle Crashers together.
The next day we drove to St. Louis to attend the bag party with family from Justine's mother's side. The bag party is like Secret Santa where each of the women in the family is assigned another woman to fill a bag with presents for them. They guys are allowed to come to fill out the group photo at the end. There were lots of interesting gifts exchanged, including some that get passed around each year, and it was a fun time for all. Once we got back, we met another friend in town (Justine grew up with him, and I talk to him on AIM all the time) who was having a reunion with his band. After they played their set, we all sat around talking, and eventually we and our friend went out to Denny's to get a late night snack and catch up further. It was a late night, but fun to get a chance to talk in person.
Sunday's forcast was calling for snow, and right around 11am it started falling:
We had to get going, and Anna was about to make the drive back to Pitt with a friend, so we had a quick lunch:
And then drove back to Richmond on the snowy (but not too slick) roads. We'll be traveling to Virginia on the 23rd through Christmas, and then heading to Michigan around the 29th, and hoping the drive to and fro has good weather. We're looking forward to seeing everyone in a couple weeks!
No comments:
Post a Comment