bryan, karyn, hannie and i drove down to south dakota on christmas eve – despite really nasty winter weather.

my mom was thawing a ham for the family meal on christmas day. it was my brother’s ham, so it was like he was there with us. right?

but for christmas eve dinner, mom made two giant vats of soup – chicken noodle and split pea. yum!

hannie likes bread best.

as we finished eating dinner, dad got a phone call from a friend. “looks like someone hit the front side of your van…” he said. dad looked outside, and though there was no damage to the van, there was a very large package next to it. bryan and i ran outside to bring it in…

a 55″ lcd hdtv! dad was stunned and hannie was very excited.

bryan, dad and i went to wal-mart to get a new entertainment center for the tv, while karyn, mom and hannie frosted and sprinkled cookies.

hannie had an icing mustache, which was pretty funny, but she wouldn’t let me take a photo of it.

so, that was a pretty exciting night.

we also had a turducken for christmas day lunch. this was very exciting for everyone involved, i assure you.

hannie got really excited about opening presents, so she got to open her stocking right away. i also let her open a small present i got for her.

so many presents for hannie!

but there were a few presents for the rest of us, too. fun!

jason gave me a wii for christmas and now i have a new game to play on it – epic mickey! i started the other night. it’s kinda dark, but will be fun once i get into it, i think.

karyn got her very own masher! wahoo!

“hannie, are you silly?” “yeah!”

mom and dad got a new camera for their trip to taiwan next month! take lots and lots of photos, okay, guys?!

karyn disguised my last gift (which hannie helped me open) by wrapping it with a few random other things inside at least 5 different bags and boxes – it was a new ipod nano!

we went to uncle tom’s & aunt kim’s for our first christmas day meal. grampa bob brought some “mystery wine” he made at home. it was pretty tasty!

but kim opted for poinsettia cocktails instead.

newest christmas tradition: cousin micheal’s robotic santa.

tur! duck! hen!

then it was time for the always hilarious dice game.

shih tzu party central.

cousin jenny and jeremy got married this year. they still seem to like each other, so that’s good, ‘eh?

cousin jon got a pregnancy test. let’s hope it negative!

hannie got a whoopee cushion. i have a video, which i’ll upload to youtube… someday…

all tuckered out! i guess that was a pretty exhausting gift exchange for the puppies.

oh, wait! one more gift for jeremy from cousin micheal!

… it’s an… alligator?

and for another oddity, steve made a christmas poo. but it was delish!

for dinner, we joined aunt deb, gramma d, and cousin brock just down the road.

gramma d got just a few more owls for christmas.

good thing hannie was around to help gramma open all of her presents!

we went home around 9pm. sioux falls was a-glow as we left it.

we had to get on the road back to minneapolis by noon, but i was glad that kelsey and aurora could come over before we started packing up.

can you imagine what life would be like to be that adorable? those eyes! she’s such a sweet little babe.

hannie was a little unsure about not being the center of attention, but she hung around anyway.

thanks for the visit, ladies!

when we got back to minneapolis, jason picked me up and whisked me away to st. paul for that night’s wild game. i won the tickets through email bingo at work! so even though the wild lost (unfortunately), we still had a pretty good time.

the final score was 1-4.

when i finally got home after the game, santa had brought jason another, special gift to give to me. santa sure is a sweet, generous guy!

i’m feeling very blessed this holiday season – lots of great family, a wonderful boyfriend, and really super friends. i’m currently in indianola, iowa, with jason’s family – waiting for 2011 at midnight and a few more christmas festivities tomorrow. i hope you’re having an equally fantastic holiday season, too.

happy new year!

yawn. this month-long meme is getting boring. but since it’s about 9:30, i’m thinking about heading to bed… i probably won’t actually go to bed ’til about 11:30 because i’ll get a second (or third?) wind and i’m easily distracted. since i’m not working tomorrow (for which i’d be waking up around 6 a.m. – yuck), i’ll sleep in ’til about 10. i’ll want to sleep later because i’ll be surrounded by warm, purring kitties, but i’m heading down to iowa with jason for more thanksgiving so we’ll need to be getting on the road.

did you have a good thanksgiving? i sure hope so.

i went out for a thanksgiving buffet at spasso in minnetonka with my sister, bro-in-law, and ever adorable niece. it was so delicious! mashed potatoes, roasted squash, turkey, stuffing with big chunks of veggies, and pumpkin pie with homemade whipped cream. none of us had to cook anything and when we got back to their house afterwards, there were no dishes to wash!

hannie and i played with karyn’s ipad for a while. we “read” through a couple santa clause stories a few million times because hannie is obsessed. then we watched some elmo videos on youtube. that ipad thing is pretty neat.

i also sort of half-assedly helped bryan put their christmas tree up. that was fun. i brought my dslr and my new 50mm f1.8 lens and played with bokeh. i also experimented a little with bryan’s lensbaby 2.0. i’m such a nerd, but i enjoy it.

cheers to three more days of holiday!

i am not feeling very nostalgic right now, but i turned 29 last weekend so i’ll tell you about that.

i took some friends roller skating.

that’s what i look like when i’m skating away! i think i need to work on my form.

afterwards i got a drink named after me, “tropical storm amy.” that was pretty neat. considering it was a blizzard outside. i took the opportunity to pretend i was on a beach.

i can’t stop taking photos of this pug. his name is sid.

the next morning, i woke up early and braved the snowy, slick streets to eat some brunch with my gal, kristi. i had pancakes and bacon and they were dee-lish-us! delicious.

then i cleaned cleaned cleaned my house and baked baked baked a cake and mixed mixed mixed up a cheeseball and pinwheels. because i was expecting company, you see. buddies to help me celebrate my birthday.

chris arrived first and, being a girl and all, i wasn’t quite ready for company yet. so i made him frost the cake. he did a very lovely job.

my niece started saying my name this weekend! that was a very nice birthday gift. she’s too cute, i think i’ll keep her around.

i love this photo. ann and hannie look like they’re giggling at the same girly gossip!

then dan brought the most giganticest bottle of bubbly he could find at the liquor store a block away.

and my friends played yahtzee.

all of the fun really tuckered poor ellipses right out, i guess.

my neighbors from across the street, sarah and rich, brought me a couple bottles from their store, vinaigrette. 50th and xerxes in minneapolis! go peruse their wares.

my peace lily bloomed! how nice.

and i have some wines that aren’t three buck chuck because my friends are so generous and nice. (note that bottle of apothic red! somebody has been reading these little updates – hooray!)

Please have a seat. I have about 50 million new photos to show you, some of which are from (what seems like) forever ago. There is just too much life happening lately!

Jason took me to see Dan Navarro play with Michael McDermott at the Fine Line Music Cafe. It was a really good show and it’s entirely possible that I was more than a little happy to be out on the town with such a good man. A good date night will cure what ails you!

I went on a date with Hannie (and Karyn) to Underwater Adventures. We unfortunately didn’t see any barracuda (my favorite) but there were plenty of scary sharks! When is it not crowded? That would be a good time to go again with Hannie so she can spend less time being distracted by other humans.

Random: I’m surrounded by cute pets!

I caught an amazing Minneapolis sky a few weeks ago:

My brother, Ryan, finally married Jane.

The following day was the ceremony.

…and the celebration of Hannie’s first birthday!

…and — YUM! — dinner at Skitch and Chae’s house!

I also had the privilege of meeting a very new Miss Aurora Collier-Wise.

That was a very busy day. The following day I made Jason do some Vermillion sight-seeing, which I will continue in a new post.

Just a couple more photos, while I’m on an updating kick today:

Susan and I sat with Hannie last night so Karyn and Bryan could go have a quiet dinner and buy socks.

She’s so close to taking her first, unsupported step! I can’t believe she’s almost 11 months old already.