The holiday break is almost over and in a couple days it will be back to the grindstone. Here's a recap of what I did this break.

My brother, sister and I drove out to meet my family in Iowa at my grandparent's (on my mom's side). It was a bit cramped, but we managed and I had a great time. In Iowa we spent lots of time playing games and having fun. The night we all arrived the snow started falling and by morning nearly half a foot had accumulated on what was left from their last storm. We went sledding on Christmas Eve and had a blast, though it's worth mentioning that the temperature never got above 28 degrees while I was there, and hovered generally in the teens. I had lots of fun with my favorite sister Angela (aka Pootie Tang) and her dog, going on lots of walks and sticking together a lot when we went places. We had our German Christmas, which entails a delicious sausage, gravy and bread meal and doing all gifts the night before Christmas. Christmas morning we all slept in, then played games throughout the day. Monday the weather was looking like we would have to come home early, so we shuffled our plans around and went to Nauvoo. I've been before, but never in the winter. It was really nice to go see the different things again, especially with hardly anyone there. I made a rope with my sisters and Angela and I went and got bricks from the brick mason. It was in Nauvoo where the funniest moment in recent memory occurred. We walked down the Trail of Hope to the river. Angela and I walked ahead and got there first. The river was frozen so we wanted to walk a few feet out on it. We were looking for a big rock to throw to see how far we could safely go. Angela walked towards some rocks by some logs and, startled by her approach, a full grown, ginormous Canadian Goose jumped out of nowhere and started flapping it's wings running the other way. This scared the heck out of Angela and the only way you can ever understand how funny it was is if I give you a re-enactment of her reaction. It was PRICELESS! We laughed about it for the rest of the trip and I still crack up thinking about it. After walking out on the river a couple feet we went and saw an eagle's nest with a majestic American Eagle perched on it. Apparently there are lots of eagles around that area in the winter. During the trip, I saw about 6 or 7 American Eagles, some sitting in trees, some soaring through the skies. All of them were amazing and inspiring to see. After Nauvoo we went to Carthage, which is just about a half hour down the road. We had a great experience there and it was really nice to go there again. 

Monday ended with us going out to dinner with my grandparents. We had a nice meal at a local family restaurant. Tuesday we knew we had to leave around noon or get stuck in some bad snowstorms on the way back. We packed up and all headed to the Amana Colonies. The Amana Colonies is an area settled by the Germans a long time ago...they are not the Amish, which is what a lot of us who haven't been before thought. In the present day Amana Colonies are many different shops. A wool shop, a furniture shop, a kitchen shop, candle shop, toy shop, general store, wineries, breweries, restaurants and more. We picked the shops we wanted to go to and had a great time. I, of course, spent a lot of time in the kitchen shop, which was called The Kitchen Sink. There were so many things I wanted, but I had my dad hold me back so I only walked away with a knife sharpener, a pastry blender, a mug for a present for Phillip, and some candy sticks. At the general store I picked up some white kernel popcorn and some peach drink mix, both of which have provided me with delicious snacks since getting home. The last hurrah for us was lunch at a restaurant. We shared our final meal, then stopped at the general store, then said our tearful *cough* *cough* goodbyes. I tried smuggling Angela with me, but could not. After what is probably the longest hug I've ever had, she finally accepted that I had to go. We loaded into our separate vehicles and departed, us headed west for Utah, ironically following a similar path that the pioneers took from the point where we had stood just a day before, and the rest of the family back to the grandparents for a couple days. It was the right decision to leave early as we beat the snowstorm in Wyoming, which would close the freeway two days later when we would have been leaving originally. At the border though, having already endured some blowing snow for an hour, we had the scariest 2 hours of our lives. It was only about 80 miles from the border to the Salt Lake Valley, but it was an absolute blizzard. We immediately kicked the vehicle into 4 wheel drive, which I am absolutely certain, along with the at least 200 prayers we each said to ourselves, saved our lives. The roads through the pass were covered with several inches of snow, and the snow was blowing in high winds, making it nearly impossible to see ahead more than a few feet. We could basically see far enough to know which direction the road might turn, and sometimes we didn't even know that. We would watch the lights of semis and more daring travelers who passed us to see where the road went. Though tired from a day of driving, our fear kept us completely alert. Two hours later, we finally began our descent from Park City to Salt Lake. Even that was treacherous. We saw two accidents along the way, one a t-boned suburban, the other a flipped car. By some miracle, the only real "oh no" moment we had was when we had to pump the breaks for a second to get the car to slow down rapidly to get around another vehicle that was stopping quickly. Once we got down to the entrance to the canyon, the snow turned to rain very rapidly and our hearts resumed normal paces. From there we only encountered wet roads, rain and Utah drivers until Utah Valley, which had slush on the roads. Provo received several inches of snow overnight, so we put it back in 4 wheel drive in town. We dropped Mike off, then headed to my place, effectively ending the journey.

This New Years was the least interesting one I've had in my life. No one was really in town that I was aware of, Mike was sick, and the roads were sheer ice from the storms meaning Annie couldn't come down, so Phillip and I partied. We watched a couple movies, then turned on a countdown. I set up some fireworks to light off and put the speakers outside. At midnight, we blared music, lit off a bunch of fireworks and had a mini dance party for ourselves on the patio. It was about 8 or 9 degrees out, so after 25 minutes, when our hands started stinging with a fierce pain, we went back inside. Phillip talked to his mom, I played a prank on Evan, who is home in New York, then we went to bed.

Today I made Hoppin' John, which turned out DELICIOUS! Hoppin' John is a dish made with black-eyed peas and rice. You cook a ham hock or, in my case, a ham bone, an onion, garlic, and black-eyed peas together for an hour and a half. Then you cut the meat off the bone and add it to the pot and chuck the bone. You add the rice and when the rice is done, so are you. I had a really good ham bone with lots of meat left, so mine tastes amazing. The smoked ham flavor really makes it good. Anyway, if you eat Hoppin' John on New Years Day, you have a prosperous year of good luck.

So, there's my vacation in a nutshell. It was my first real break in a couple years, so it was really nice to kick back and have no obligations. Next week school starts and life gets stressful again. But, I still have a couple days. HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!