Our First Christmas

Our first Christmas together was definitely an enjoyable one :) Although some family and friends were definitely missed--we found the days to be quite merry. Christmas Eve started it off. Ryan had to be up early at 4:30 for Guard, and I was up that early as well baking bread for Christmas Eve dinner, and chocolate pie for Xmas day :) We had Ryan's Christmas party that afternoon at his shop for guard, and it was great for me to see where he works (one weekend a month, anyways), and I finally got to see what an F16 looks like.
It was a warm sunny day that day, so after the party we went to a park and enjoyed the beautiful day accompanied by some fresh air. We then went to Chris and Lora's house (his dad and step-mom) and enjoyed some hor'd oeuvres, and went to Christmas Eve mass. The meal was amazing. We did a tradition which is an Italian one where we enjoy 7 different fish on Christmas eve. The fish we savored on were: a wonderful crab dip, shrimp cocktail, broiled shimp, fried calamari, pickled herring (one of my favorites), grilled lobster tails, and salmon teriyaki. By the end of the night...we were all definitely stuffed!
Christmas morning we woke up in Tucson to a rainy, cool day. Well, cool for Arizona. (In the 50's) The neat thing is; snow was falling in the mountains--so we did get a white christmas afterall! We opened our presents that morning, baked his mom's great recipe of monkey bread, and got hopped up on coffee. The morning was wonderful as we felt truly grateful for the generous family we are blessed with. We didn't remember to get photos of everything, but Here are a few pictures we took: (Warning-- bed head and CHEESY pictures to follow)....

I have constantly been looking for a banana hanger, and Ryan succeeded in finding it :)






A "mystery gift" came in the mail about a week ago. There was no visible return address...so it just left us wondering. ........Turns out it was just the some checks Ryan had ordered.

My "winter coat" from Ryan :) (Man, I love this weather..)

As my love for baking grows, Ryan got me a bundt cake pan (which made some amazing monkey bread that morning)

Ryan's new robe & slippers :)

Because Ryan is the master of the grill, I figured it was time for a meat thermometer!

I was in dire need of some hangers :)

Thanks, Mom and Dad! Now, we are ready to go camping!!

After we finished up with all our presents and stockings.....we get dressed and ready for the day (I put on my new perfume I got from Ryan, which I have sought after for a while)! We then headed to Ryan's Dad's house. We unfortunately didn't take any pictures of the day, but had a great time! We got there, opened presents (which, once again, we are so grateful for such wonderful family!), and played Apples to Apples (one of our favorite games). We finished off the day a savory, delicious ham dinner with scallopped pototoes, and my mom's chocolate pie recipe for desert!

The next blog to come is to explain the rest of our fun, adventurous weekend!....