Week 14: Have Yourself a Black and Blue Christmas

Wednesday night was our Christmas dinner! Everyone was dressed up way fancy, some girls with hours of work put into their outfits, hair, and make-up. We took pictures before dinner, with everyone looking really great. We were all seated at tables with nice linens, ceramic plates, goblets, cloth napkins, pretty center pieces, and our main course of the evening? Pizza. Yes, pizza. Hours of work put into this “fancy” dinner and we ate pizza. Lest to say, I was a tad bit disappointed, but however, I still looked great! After dinner, we all went and changed into our sweaters for our Ugly Christmas Sweater Contest. Our Pause families came over as we also had a Gingerbread House contest against the other families. We were given a gingerbread house kit, which we had to use all of, and use whatever else we wanted. While three families made a LOTR Shire and two families made the house from UP, our pause family made a Star Wars AT-AT complete with Luke Skywalker and a flying (yes flying!) Speeder! We won first place, $30 to the OK Chalet! That could buy a  lot of Pizzookies! After cleaning up a bit, we had our Ugly Sweater contest, hosted by Chad in a jean kitten shirt I got him (He HATES cats!). Lanie and Fletcher won! We sang Christmas carols and listened to Becky read a Christmas story about candy canes. It was such a great night! Christmas Party Photos!!!!

#TeamPizzookie!

Little Luke fighting the AT-AT

Pause family photo!

I started work on Thursday for the Victory Outreach conference. First time working activities! I ran got to run the skate shop for the ice rink the first night. Saturday I ran the tube run all day. The first part of the day, I was down at the bottom handing out tubes and keeping the line. There were four of us working with two at the top pushing the tubes down and one at the bottom making sure they don’t run into the street. That night we only had two people available to work the tube run, me and Shiloh. I was at the top and she was at the bottom. I have some gnarly bruises on my knees from it now! But it was a ton of fun to do. 

Sunday, I went over to the Saunders house to hang out and help Dayton with his homework. Tim and Michelle showed up after work and we all had dinner together. We really feel like a family. I made cookies while Dylan and Tim played in the snow. Michelle kept trying to steal cookie dough. It’s really funny how much we act like a (dysfunctional) family. After dinner, we all went ice skating for a bit and then to church. After church was staff broom hockey. It was so much fun! Surprisingly, I got the puck a lot. I also got taken out a lot! But it was super fun. We played until 10:30. After about the 6^th round, I was feeling a bit sick but I shook it off, saying “one more game, then I’m done.” That never happened so by the very last game, I was feeling very nauseous. I went and sat down but couldn’t shake it. Allie got me water and helped me out but for some reason I freaked out and had a panic attack. Not fun. Everyone was super awesome about it though, calming me down & giving me jackets to rest my head on. I was feeling a lot better by the time I got back to the building. Heather gave us a ride up. When I got up the next morning, I felt a lot better but my body ached all over from broom hockey. I made my bruises a lot worse too!

Monday and Tuesday, I volunteered to help out with activities. I knew it would be a bit easier to do everything with an extra person. I leave today (Wednesday) for home with Morgan and Daniel! I’m so excited to go home! I miss my family a lot and am ready for a break from the cold up here! Santa Maria, here I come!