B2 Family Christmas - Part 1

Okay, so this was my first B2 family Christmas, and I took a LOT of pictures. This will have to be a series of posts, just so I can post all the photos! After I write out all the posts though, I'll put up all of those photos (and MORE) on my picture website so you can check them out there too. I'll let you know when that happens.

On to Delaware for the B2 family Christmas!!

Chris and I left Raleigh around 10am, and arrived in Delaware at the B2 house at 4:30! We made such great timing. Here's the entrance to the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel.
The last time I remember driving over this bridge was when we were returning from Delaware the last time I visited Chris's grandparents, for Spring break in 2004. I had to pee so bad I hardly paid attention to the awesomeness that is this bridge (and tunnel).
We had dinner that night at the Georgia House (which was sooooo good) with Chris's parents and Tim.

Here's the flowers my family sent Chris's family!
The next day we got up and watched the WVU bowl game, and later on we went to the B2 grandparent's house for a pizza party with the whole family.

I learned that if you have B2 blood in you then it's quite likely that you are on your own internal time system, meaning your always late. Who knew?!

The B2 family Christmas dinner was planned for the next day (Sunday) at 2pm. Uncle David and I bet that it wouldn't be served until around 3pm. I think we finally sat down to eat around 3:30. Hahaha :)

Before we ate we did something called Pig in a Poke. You basically went around the circle and everyone beat on this bag with something in it with a hammer. Inside was hard candy (in the shape of a pig) and by the time everyone beat on it it was supposed to break into enough pieces for everyone to enjoy. It was an odd tradition, but I participated ;) Here's everyone beating on the pig in a poke...
FINALLY, we sat down to eat. Dinner was awesome!! Until recently I have never liked sweet potatoes. I made them for Chris for the first time this past Thanksgiving and tried them (big step for me!) and they were okay. I tried them at Christmas dinner, and they were sooo good! Thanks to Pennie I think I'll give sweet potatoes more of a chance than I have in the past. Hers were so good!

This was the "cool kids" table (where I sat, of course) which basically consisted of most of the cousins.
And here's the even cooler table, composed of the first and second generationers.
Here's Aunt Diane, showing off the awesomeness of her cooler kids table!

After dinner we went outside to attempt to take photos of this enormous family. Stay tuned for Part 2!

B1 Family Christmas

Merry Christmas from the B1s!
Chris made it to Winston on Christmas Eve, finally!
We opened our traditional Christmas Eve gifts (pajamas!) and then went out and viewed the Christmas lights around town. We ended up playing Family Feud that night (a lot of fun!) before we went to bed. It was the first year we didn't leave cookies for Santa - how strange!
Christmas morning we woke up way too early (thanks PJ!) and took our traditional annual photos before digging in!
Look at all those presents!

Chris opening up his stocking...
We got lottery tickets in our stockings, and between me and Chris we made 20 bucks!

And here's Chris drinking up his Dr. Pepper (which actually is a fake can that has a pair of boxers inside!)

Mom and Dad holding up their gift from me and Chris. I still do laundry at their house, so this was the perfect gift for them!

We also gave them dryer sheets and inside there were two checks (to help pay off my college loan to them).

PJ wrapped up in his new Hugh Hefner robe...
Mom and her new car speakers...

Dad and more gifts...

Me and my huge present from Chris and his parents...
He ended up weighting the box down with dumbell weights and a huge blanket, but inside was the tiniest little box - a brand new iPod touch! YAY!

Chris holding up his present from me...
And PJ holding up a matching gift from our parents...
Inside the Victoria's Secrets bags were a handweight and a note that said to go downstairs to find their real gift....
Inside the boxes was a standing weight set for each of them!!

And finally, inspecting the damage...

It was such a good Christmas!

Biltmore House - Behind the Scenes!

Our second day at the Biltmore was AWESOME!!

It was supposed to be rainy our whole weekend there, but when we woke up Sunday it was clear blue skies as far as the eyes could see! Still bitter cold, but perfect weather for viewing the Biltmore grounds.
Here's the view from the Biltmore. This is what Vanderbilt saw outside his bedroom window every day. Unbelievable!
There are so many great pictures from the grounds!

Then we went to the conservatory...
And some more photos of the house...

After all that picture taking we decided on a whim to pay for a behind-the-scenes tour of the house!! It was so interesting!!! We had our own private tour guide who told us lots of interesting info, and got to see rooms we didn't see on our original tour. I really liked learning about the electricity, plumbing and heating of the home. We even got to go on the roof! We were literally like tour feet away from the glass ceiling of the indoor garden.

And that's me with my special tour pass on the roof!

We even ended up getting season passes so we can go back in the springtime to see the Festival of Flowers!! I CAN'T WAIT! And I'm definitely bringing Chris back with me next time!

Biltmore Trip - Asheville

I'm finally getting around to posting pictures from the last two weeks away, so be patient - they'll all be up soon!

The weekend before Christmas I went with Mom and Dad (sans Chris) to Asheville to go to the Biltmore House. Going on the candlelight Christmas tour was something Mom and I had talked about for years, so it was so exciting that we finally able were to get it together and go!

Here's the tree in our hotel!
Our tour wasn't until nighttime, so we toured Asheville first. We went to Basilica St. Lawrence, which has the largest single dome in the United States.
After viewing lots of churches and domes in Europe with my family, I just had to see what this NC church had to offer. Pretty neat, actually. Sorry for a lack of a dome picture. They all came out pretty dark from inside the church.

Here's downtown Asheville...
We went inside the Grove, which had displays from the National Gingerbread Contest, held at the nearby Grove Park Inn. Check these out!
More downtown photos...
There was an old Woolworth's they had converted into an art gallery.
They still had to old food counter, so of course we had to go in so dad could take a picture of us!

After an awesome dinner at the Olive Garden we were on our way to the Biltmore for our Candlelight Christmas Tour!

Vanderbilt built his home far, far away from the road (on purpose) so that you could have a leisurely ride through the mountain/forest before finally seeing his huge home. It took us nearly a half our to ride from the gate to the house! On the way we saw EIGHT deer cross the road. I still talk about it - it was that cool.

I absolutely SUCK at taking night pictures. So these are really the best shots from that night...
That's me in front of the house before our tour. And below is my attempt at taking a picture of the house at night.
Even blurry and in the rain it looks amazing.

And this is the Christmas tree on the grounds...
Too bad they didn't let us take any photos INSIDE the home during our tour. Even though I'd been to the house before, I was still blown away by how large it was and the amount of bedrooms (over 100) and bathrooms (over 40!) that were inside the house!!

The next morning we toured the grounds in the daylight - stay tuned!

Merry Christmas!!

This Christmas marks four years since I received my digital camera! It's been through a LOT since then....college years, engagement, wedding, married life, 4 Christmases and other holidays, etc.

I am honestly surprised that it still flashes when I try and take a photo. And although it definitely needs to be upgraded (like, now) I'm still happy for all the Christmas memories (and others) its captured over the years.

Enjoy!

Christmas 2004
Chris bought me a pretty diamond bracelet - caught on camera!
This is still one of our favorite photos of us.
I think this is the first family photo we took with Chris in it. Mom still has it on her fridge after all these years!

Christmas 2005
Me and Peej taking our annual picture in front of the tree Christmas morning.
Those green silk pants I'm wearing? They're the reason I won't by silk pajamas anymore. Split right down the back that morning! Haha.
A bit hard to see, but this is one of my FAVORITE gifts that the husband (then fiance) has ever bought me. It's a miniature engagement ring (we had just gotten engaged the month before) and he had them engrave the date of our engagement on the heart!
Opening up our presents to each other on Christmas night. It was always so hard each year to wait all day to open his gift to me!
Christmas 2006
I still laugh when I see those gigantic Christmas balls! They had displays of these everywhere at the Bellagio in Vegas, where we went right before Christmas to finalize our wedding plans!
Me and the Peej, for what would be my final Christmas with just my bro by my side on Christmas morning!
Christmas 2007
My very first Christmas morning with my husband!
And family :)

Merry Christmas!

still no itchies yet!

December 22 marks my 7 year anniversary with the gamer!

That is a big chunk of my life!

I am in Winston preparing for Christmas, and Chris is stuck* in Raleigh working* so this will be our very first annivesary apart!

*meaning, he's having a blast playing games the whole time we're apart!

Every year we have tried to make our anniversary special. Since it falls just before Christmas, we always get dressed up and take our picture in front of the tree at my house in Winston. This will actually be the first year that we won't be together on the day and get our annual picture - sad!

I like to think back to the memories of our anniversaries, because, especially in those first few years, this was the only time we every went out to eat anywhere nice! We didn't have much money being in high school, and then in college, so it meant a lot to dress up really fancy and pretend we were grown ups!

December 21, 2001. We had been "dating" for a week, and Chris took me to a dance that night. The very next night he asked me to be his girlfriend. I should have said no, considering how long his beard was! It's funny to think back now and remember he was trying to win a bet by growing it out!
The picture on the left is from that first date, and the one on the right is from our five year anniversary. See how we've changed? Chris still was wearing the same jacket and tie though!

Our one year anniversary, 2002. Chris took me to see the Christmas Carol, the same play that he first saw me in way back in middle school. He bought me a necklace with a past, present, future diamond pendant. I still wear it :)

Our two year anniversary, 2003. We went out to dinner, and when he told them it was our anniversary, they sang a celebration to us and gave us a free dessert!

Our three year anniversary, 2004. We drove to Charlotte and ate at PF Changs, our new favorite restaurant at the time (still is actually!).

Our four year anniversary, 2005. We drove to the Durham Southpoint mall to Christmas shop, and I honestly don't remember anything else about that day except for this picture! I even asked Chris, and he can't remember either!

Our five year anniversary, 2006. We went iceskating! Then, we went out to dinner and to celebrate it being FIVE years, and I tried to squeeze into the dress that I had worn on our first anniversary. He wore the same jacket and tie. We have since retired these outfits :) Chris also surprised me with a beautiful diamond circle necklace.

Our six year anniversary, 2007. This was our first anniversary to celebrate as a married couple. Since we were finally married, it seemed silly to celebrate our "other anniversary" but it still is a special day to us. We decided it would be nice to celebrate every December and at least share a special dinner together, right before the craziness of the holidays. Plus, it's a perfect distance from our May wedding anniversary.

So happy anniversary sweetheart! SEVEN years and I'm not itching yet! :)

We'll re-evaluate on our seven year wedding anniversary :-P

christmas...break?

So I am about to embark on two glorious weeks away from work.

Even though I am so lucky to have this two week vacation, it's still sad to think about the MONTH I have had off for the last few years while in college/grad school!

This year the "break" is going to be CRAZY. Here's the plan:

Dec. 19 - Winston
Dec. 20-21 Asheville
Dec. 22-25 Winston
Dec. 25-26 Raleigh
Dec. 26-30 Delaware!
Dec. 31 - Raleigh...finally, RELAX!

In other news, I've had all my gifts wrapped for weeks, and I can't wait to give the gamer his gift! It is going to be SO awesome, and it seriously trumps all previous year's gifts :)

I won't be blogging much for awhile (but I already have some drafts that will automatically post - lucky you!) and I'm sure I'll tell you ALL about it when I get back!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

decking my halls!

Happy Holidays everyone!
Thank you so much to BooMama for inviting me on her annual Christmas Tour of Homes!

It is an honor to have you all come by and see my (our) home :) Welcome!
You all know that the gamer and I are pretty much still newlyweds...so that means we live in a tiny home and barely have any decorations! This is the best we could do this year :)
This is what you see when you enter our home. We bought this garland for the staircase last year thinking it would be our first (and last) Christmas in this house. Good thing I packed it away nicely since we're here again!

And here's our tiny little Christmas tree! I've had this tree for over 15 years, since my Aunt Debbie made it - out of wire hangers!! It's been the perfect little tree for our apartment living over the last couple of years.
We also have a small tree at the top of the stairs...
I love walking up the stairs before I go to sleep at night when it's all twinkling!
Here's the beginnings of our Nativity scene that we got this year. We're still missing the wise men, but hopefully they'll show up next year!
That's only one of the many bears I have around the house. I switch them out throughout the year depending on the holiday.

And here's Mr. Snowman. This is his first year making a home in the Gamer's Christmas house.
And here's our couch friends. Mom and I fought people at Black Friday two years ago to get two sets of these guys! They are all attached, neat huh?
And here's our coffee table, complete with Christmas colored place mats...
This is my favorite part of our Christmas decorations:
I made these stockings for the gamer and me last year (our first married Christmas!) and I am so proud of how they came out!

And here's our table (that we never, eat at!) but it sure looks festive...
And last but not least, I couldn't let you leave without some homemade cinnamon rolls! The gamer and I had such fun making these from scratch today. Thanks to the Pioneer Woman for her recipe!!
YUM! Thanks for stopping by and Merry Christmas! :)

letter of intent

Since you know I'm all about sharing everything that goes on in our lives, here's the latest!

Chris is signing his letter of intent today!

Basically it says that he accepts his acceptance into Elon. Plus, we also have to make a pretty hefty deposit. PT school isn't cheap...apparently ;)

So this pretty much formalizes his decision, and it is SO exciting! We both can't stop talking about moving, and this weekend the future Dr. and Mrs. Gamer will be going to Elon to look for houses!

Dr. and Mrs. Gamer! HA! How nice does that sound?!

this old house

In October the gamer's parents finally moved out of their Stanaford home, and put the house on the market.

When Chris and I were in town, we used his old key to go into the house and see what it looked like all cleaned out.

It was a bit of an emotional experience.

The gamer walked quietly through each room. He didn't say much of anything, but stopped at each room to gaze around. He is a contemplater.

I, on the other hand was freaking out.

You see, the gamer and I are approaching our seven year anniversary this month (December 22!). During our first six months of dating Chris still lived at home (he was finishing up his senior year of high school before moving to Boone to go to college).

That first half a year is so vivid in my memory.

I remember spending so much time with him in that house.

When I think back to when I fell in love with him, I think about that house. It's where we shared our first kiss. I also spent the first night ever at a boy's house there the night of our prom.

It's been years and years since then and we've been back tons of times, but walking through that empty house all I could think of were those early memories of Chris and me.

In all my time since meeting Chris, his home has always been a little bit cluttered. With three grown boys going back and forth from colleges, and moving back in and out with all their stuff, the house had it's share of clutter, boxes and mess. You just got used to it being like that.

Walking through the house empty was the first time I ever saw the house for how it was really supposed to look. For instance, in the seven years I've been going to this house, I never actually walked through this room:
It's so unfortunate that the family didn't get to experience all the new changes!

Even though the floors were done awhile ago, we never got to walk on them until now:
HOW PRETTY!

We said goodbye to the house.
It still feels so unreal that we'll never go back there again...

bro gamer's senior night

Not only am I the wife of a gamer, but I am also the sister of a gamer.

In the past year it has taken an interesting twist since bro-gamer and hub-gamer now both play WOW together. Meaning, if I am with one and not the other, I can communicate through the other while they are gaming.

My mom has also learned this trick, as she'll ask bro-gamer to ask hub-gamer a question that ultimately makes it's way to me.

It's another way of how I manipulate the gaming system.

Seriously, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em.

A few weeks ago I was spending time in Winston with mom, dad, and bro. The gamer stayed in Raleigh, but I was able to stay informed of when he played online, since bro-gamer would always tell me. Sneaky. Ok, not really. The gamer knows I do this.

But it makes for some funny instant reactions between the two of them, over a hundred miles away.

Take this:
Completely innocently, I happened to cause the internet to go out in the bro-gamer's room, while he was playing WOW with Chris.

Bro-gamer: (screams) AHHHH. (runs through house to fix internet connection)

Gamer-wife: (looks shocked) Wha..? What did I do?

Bro-gamer: I just want you to know that you killed Chris.

Which made for some seriously funny laughs :-P

So anyways, here are some pics from the bro-gamer's senior night when he was able to tear himself away from the computer for long enough. Congrats baby brother - I can't believe you're growing up!
In other news, tonight is *CELEBRATION* night! We're going out to Outback and I can't wait!

christmas tree cutting

So this year we decided to go to Boone to cut down our Christmas tree!

We have never cut down our tree before. Okay, and technically we didn't do any of the cutting this time either. The point is the tree was still rooted to the ground when we picked it out!

Up until high school our tree was a fake one. It was the tiniest tree EVER, and Mom had to stand it on a box, then cover that with a tree skirt, just to bring it to normal height. The tree was puny, but somehow after we decorated it it always looked amazing and so much bigger!

But in high school we convinced Dad to let us get a real tree, and ever since it's been a necessity in our house. I remember much laughing as we've driven down the mile to our house from the tree lot with a huge tree sticking out of our car trunk.

PJ has an SUV now, so we thought it be'd perfect to go up to the mountains, and join the rest of the caravan of SUVs that were hauling christmas tress down the mountain this year!
The tree farm was HUGE! In the first minute I found "THE TREE" but I wanted to walk around some more to see what else was out there. I never did find that tree again...
Check out PJ's pole for pole vaulting. There was a lot of laughs as he carried that ginormous pole around the tree farm measuring each potential tree.

I am very critical of our potential tree. I immediately judge them based on being too fat or too skinny. I pull and prod at their needles. I lay claims to certain ones and having family members stay behind to "hold it" and then abandon them when I find something better. It must suck to be a christmas tree.

Here is my family with "the one."
Okay, I was having doubts, but we had to just choose one. I was still focused on deciding that I never even got a picture of the tree by itself!
We actually all walked away before they cut the tree down. I had to run back and get this picture. You'd think we all would have been more excited to watch the process of the cutting since that was what made this tree so unique. I do hate the sound of a chainsaw though...
There's the tree on the top of the car! I am not even joking when I say that at least every fourth car had a christmas tree on it's roof on the way home to Winston.
And here is our pretty tree, safe at home! Slightly smaller than prior years, but he's special because he had roots just hours ago!

But the thing I am most proud of us is this wreath I made from scraps from our tree!
I have had the metal wreath holder for years, but I have never taken it upon myself to spend the time to shape the tree scraps into something presentable. I think it turned out pretty great!
And here's how the tree looked after Mom and I decorated it. Chopped down and decorated within ten hours. Can't get fresher than that!

burnin' down the house

I survived the first Thanksgiving at my house!

And there was only one small fire!

Haha :) Seriously though, all the cooking worked out perfectly throughout the day. Then, within five minutes of us getting everything on the table one of the burners on the stove...

CAUGHT FIRE!

Man, do I wish I have pictures of the chaos that happened during those few minutes. I think I just stared at the flames for a good 30 seconds and then Mom threw salt on it to put the fire out. Smart thinking, because I never would have known to do that!!

The smoke detectors went off and the whole house filled with smoke. We had to open the doors to let the air circulate...all in all, it was SO funny, because of course this would happen to me on my first Thanksgiving!

But we all sat down to an awesome meal, and I am thankful that my house didn't burn down :-P
And here's me with the turkey tenderloin and ham! You can tell I am so proud!
But the real fun didn't happen until after dinner...You see, while Mom and me were clearing dishes, the gamer boys decided it would be fun to play guitar hero...

With my dad!
Yes, that's right. That's my dad, singing karaoke to Michael Jackson's Beat It. Truly, the most hilarious rendition of the song I have ever seen! Everybody was laughing so hard!
After they got over the giggles, the gamer and the gamer-bro played along too...
Look how serious they are when they are in gamer-mode...
Then we switched things up a bit and Dad played the guitar!
And then PJ sung too...
And Dad even tried out the drums!
And here's the whole family band, minus Mom who was our photographer. It was an AWESOME Thanksgiving!

congratulations chris!

WOO HOO!!

Chris got into Elon! :-D

He actually found out the day before Thanksgiving, and we were SO excited!!!!!!!

Since he applied to Elon on an early decision application, it means that he has to forfeit the rest of his applications to other schools now that he's been accepted. So, even though we don't know what the other decisions may be, Chris has decided that ELON is the place for him!

We are so excited to be staying in NC and are already talking about our move out of Raleigh!
Chris is beyond thrilled. He doesn't like to show his emotions much or get overly excited over anything, but he really is happy about this! It is such a relief to know he got in!

On Friday, since we were in Winston, Mom and I set up a little surprise party for Chris to congratulate him. He truly was surprised!!

Congratulations Chris! I am so proud of you!