This is going to be a long post. Lots of pictures to share, and lots of things happening with the cousins and family up north. We jam packed stuff into our Christmas vacation.

As is tradition, we headed up north for Christmas again this year! This year we were able to get there the night before Christmas Eve. My parents, Sarah, Ellen, and I loaded up the car with some difficulty and headed out in the evening after I got off work. I brought the cat and we had a packed car due to the size of everyone’s gifts this year. My mom joked that we needed to put size restrictions next year, and my dad said any gifts over that limitation would have to be photo’d and the photo presented at the gift exchange to be picked up later like a claim ticket. 😀

The day after arriving, Sarah, Ellen, and I suited up for some skiing adventures. We only got to ski for about 4-5 hours, but after all that time in the cold we had our fun. We got home, prepared dinner, and waited for the arrival of Katrina and her family. As is customary to our family traditions we prepared our Christmas Eve hotpot! After we were well and full, Sarah and Ellen started setting up the tree. After relaxing a bit we all went to bed.

Christmas morning is always exciting as we all exchanged gifts and took pictures. There’s not much to say about the gift exchange other than to look at the pictures!

Afterwards we prepared to go skiing for free with Santa at Schuss Mountain. We traveled everywhere, and I kept yelling at Sarah and Katrina hoping to help them improve. Mostly to overcome their fear of speed.

After our return, Katrina’s dad led the group in making hundreds of dumplings. I usually try to eat my age in dumplings. I succeeded this year! 28! I don’t think I can keep this up. After dinner, Sarah shoveled snow off the porch in an effort to lose some calories so she had room for dessert. She never did get her dessert, but instead we all got distracted by Despicable Me 2.

The next morning, we made use of the crepe machine I got my mother for Christmas. She made some sort of egg frittata concoction with Sarah. It was delicious. The girls decided to build snow Gru, snow Agnes, and some snow minions from Despicable Me.

Unfortunately all good things must come to an end, and I headed home with Katrina and her parents. Until next Christmas.

-Evilmanta