Christmas!

I don't even know where to start here. We did a lot for Christmas that I should have blogged about when it happened. I'm terrible at keeping up with this blog sometimes. Oh well. Well to start it off, Eric and I went to Virginia to visit with Eric's family. We got there on 12/23.

On Christmas Eve we went to a Christmas concert at the Kennedy Center. There was a choir there and a youth group who played bells. They were amazing. The audience also got to sing along to bring the Christmas spirit. After that we went back to their house and Eric's Aunt and Uncle came over for dinner and then to play games. It was fun. I sure did miss my family but was glad to be there seeing how the Zeugschmidts celebrate Christmas. We woke up the next morning pretty late and then opened presents. Both Eric and I got some pretty nice things. Thank you so much everyone!! The most exciting thing was the Wii that we got. We are playing it a lot. We got the Mario Kart game that we played pretty much every night with his family. We are going to be experts! We had a delicious steak dinner for Christmas dinner. It was a great day!

The day after Christmas we went down to DC to see the Terra Cotta warriors at the National Geographic Museum. It was a lot of fun to see all of these statues that were created to protect the emperor. They were pretty amazing. No cameras were allowed inside the exhibit. However, when you walked out, there was one you could take pictures of. As I was getting out my camera, the statue moved! It scared me. Turns out it was a real person who looked like a statue. The guy was amazing. After that we went and ate at Potbelly's (YUM) and then went to the national mall to go to the American History Museum. This museum has been closed every time I had been to DC, so I really wanted to see it. I was most excited about seeing the ruby red slippers from the Wizard of Oz. There was a lot of fun stuff to see there and we didn't even see it all. The Star Spangled Banner is also there, but you can't take pictures of it because it is so old and fragile. The flag is really big though and a lot of it is missing because people cut pieces from it a long time ago. After we left there we went to Eric's favorite restaurant, Carlos O'Kelly's. It is pretty good.

Sunday we went to Church with his parents and Eric got to see a lot of his old friends. We spent the rest of the day relaxing, visiting with the missionaries and playing games.

Monday we relaxed a little. Patty, Carly and I all painted our fingernails. I hadn't done that in such a long time. Eric and I went to visit Carly at work and exchange some things at the mall. We also couldn't resist buying some cheesecake at the cheesecake factory. It was a nice family treat!

Tuesday we went to the Kennedy Center again to see the musical Young Frankenstein. It was really funny. We all liked it, but wouldn't recommend it for little kids. It has some risque parts! That was great fun!

Wednesday we went and visited with Eric's former Young Men's President and friend Vit Miska. He really helped Eric out a lot. They invited us over for dinner, which was delicious. We played with their three cute kids and then caught up with them a little bit. It was great to see them. I'm glad Eric keeps in touch with them.

Thursday was New Year's Eve. We relaxed most of the night, then went to Chevy's for dinner. It was very good! We spent the night playing Mexican Train and eating Root Beer floats. Eric won the game of course, which really made me mad! Haha, I like to win! It was a fun night.

Friday we went and played laser tag with Eric's cousins. We played two games and I am happy to say that I didn't lose. I did alright. Eric won one of the games. It was fun to run around and get people. I hadn't done that in such a long time! After the game we went home, ate dinner, and then went to see Sherlock Holmes. It was a great movie that I would definitely recommend.

Saturday we went to a George Mason basketball game. Eric's parents have season tickets. They are big fans. It was a pretty good game which they won. After the game Carly and I made sugar cookies while everyone else took Christmas decoration down. Carly had never made them before so I taught her how to do it. The cookies turned out great! Later that night Eric and I went over to see my friend Tasia. We were best friends when we were young. We would spend all day everyday together during the summers. I hadn't seen her since they had gotten married a few years ago. It was great to see her and catch up. After visiting with Tasia and Doug, we met up with Eric's family to eat at Sweet Water. It's this delicious restaurant that Eric loves! Eric' parents took Eric there to celebrate him passing Calculus! We are all pretty proud of him. Calculus is not Eric' forte, so it was great that he did well in the class! When we got home we had to pack because we were leaving the next morning. Neither of us wanted to get back to Utah and go back to school or work. However, we had to, and are thankful that we were able to spend so much time with Eric's family and can't wait to see them again. We had a great Christmas! I was terrible at taking pictures, but here are a few:

The fake Terra Cotta Warrior:


The ruby red slippers:


Lincoln's top hat: