What We Did on Christmas Vacation

As promised, here is the post about all the fun we had on our Christmas vacation to Salt Lake City. I'm pretty sure this could end up being a long one, so you might have to read it in chunks. But I'll do my best to break it up into smaller paragraphs so you're tricked into thinking it's not so long.

We had a great trip to Salt Lake. It was so much fun to spend time with family. For the most part, that is all we did: hang out with the family. But, like I said, it was a great trip.*

*That short paragraph is for everyone who is like me and just wants to get to the point. From here on it will be all the intricate details.

The flight there was a bit of a pain. We thought that we had a non-stop flight, but our Kansas City to Salt Lake flight stopped in Denver--we just didn't de-plane. It should have made for a shorter layover, but the night we flew was the night that a plane ran off the runway in Denver, so the west runway was closed. We were stuck there waiting for our turn to take off for over an hour. The Las Vegas Bowl updates that were coming in via text messages (thanks Thomas and Paul) didn't really make the wait any better.

By the time we got in to Salt Lake we were two and a half hours late. It wasn't a big deal. It just meant that we couldn't stop in to Cafe Rio for a late dinner. Mom and Dad picked us up and took us back to their place, and we went to bed.

Sunday was church. We lived in my parents ward for about eight months before moving to Kansas City, so it's always fun to see everyone. And it's nice that they all know Brookie too.

Weston, Missy, and little Ellie came over for dinner that night: a wonderful assortment of soups. It took some time for Ellie (now about 7 months old) to warm up to Brooke and me. I guess she just wasn't seeing a clean-shaven Reynolds Man.

Monday's highlights were a family picture (the first in ten years) and Family Home Evening with Grandma Jones. There was supposed to be a big storm coming in, so we went to see Grandma and our Aunt Carolyn at about 2:00pm so that we wouldn't be out in the snow later that night. Brookie and I also ran some errands in the morning, which included our bi-annual pilgrimage to IKEA to pay our dues in exchange for some cool stuff.

The family picture was interesting. Or maybe I should say that the photographer was interesting? Or maybe just annoying? It was probably just that her personality didn't mesh well with ours. We weren't there to have a good time. We were there for a family portrait. So here's an idea: just tell us when to smile. The pictures were supposed to be ready before we left, but her Photoshop must be slower than mine. I hear they turned out well though.

Tuesday we went north to visit with Grammie and Rollo. While we were up in that area, we were able to visit Utah's only Frank Lloyd Wright building in Bountiful. The pictures aren't too great because we couldn't see how to get up to the house because of all the snow.



We were also able to go to Marc's basketball game at the high school. He played for a few minutes, scored a few points, and made a few of the best should-have-been-assists-passes of the game. Oh, and Tuesday was the day that Marc, Brookie, and I all wore our Alabama t-shirts. Quite a few people commented about them throughout the day.



Christmas Eve Weston and Missy came over before dinner to open the homemade pajama bottoms from Mom. I loved them. So comfortable. We usually have a big Christmas Eve dinner, but Weston and Missy couldn't stay, so we moved it to Christmas Night, which was just as good. After dinner we watched some movies and went to bed.

Christmas morning started as soon as Weston and Missy could make it back to my parents' house. As usual, we all took turns opening our gifts. Ellie took the prize for the most presents. So we were opening presents and eating my mom's Christmas Crown (MMmmmmm) until everything was unwrapped and it was time to go to Grandma Jones' house for the traditional Christmas morning festivities of breakfast, gifts, and chimes.

For the rest of the day, Mom prepared Christmas Dinner and the rest of us played Mouse Trap, Guitar Hero: World Tour, and Apples to Apples. We had a big ham, funeral potatoes, and home-made rolls for dinner. Yum.

Friday and Saturday was when I painted the mural. Our friends the Bucks asked me to paint a mural under their stairs in their kids' play area. They wanted a jungle theme, so I came up with a few ideas. They have twin boys, so I decided to paint all of the animals in pairs: two elephants, two giraffes, two snakes, two tigers, and two monkeys. We could only work eight hours Friday before we had to leave for a party at Grandma Reynolds'.

Saturday I painted for about eighteen hours, because I really, really wanted to finish so I didn't need to worry about it Sunday and Monday. We left at 2:15am. Actually, we were in the car at 1:55am, but high-centered the car on a huge snow drift that spanned the entire width of the driveway. I went back into their garage to get a shovel but that didn't help much. Eventually, instead of pushing, I tried to lift the front end of the car. Each time I did, it moved a little. After four or five tries, it was finally out of the driveway and we were on our way home. Anyhow, here are some pictures:















We didn't make it to church until the third hour because we had gotten to bed so late. Later that day we went to see Grandma and Grandpa Pyrah, and Aunt Jennie and Reva. We had dinner and talked for a few hours. It's always so nice to spend a little time with family.

Monday we made some returns of supplies we didn't need for the mural, returned our rental car, and went to lunch at the Training Table with Weston, Missy, Ellie, Marc, Mom, and Dad. Before we knew it, it was time to go to the airport.



And that's what we did on our Christmas Vacation.