Pictures, Holiday Party and Nicole's Birthday

I spent the night at Ben's house the night before.  His parents wanted me to come over to have a mini Christmas get-together.  So I left after a long day at work and got there around dinner time.  We ate dinner and then opened presents in the living room.  His dad gave me a 2001 Husky calendar as a gag gift.  He took it back after seeing my reaction.  My real present was a 2014 Cougar calendar.  Ben got me two stuffed animals, a cougar and a husky to put trackables on and send them around the world with a story.  It was a nice relaxing evening.  We watched movies and fell asleep knowing we had to get up at seven to head to Yelm for family pictures with Jenna.

Link to Jenna's Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/jennaleephotofun

The alarm went off and it was way too early.  Ben took a shower and I didn't really want wet hair so I just decided to do without one. I did my hair the best I could, put some make-up on and got my jeans and pea coat on.  I made sure I had all of my Sounders stuff ready to go as well.  We packed up the car and headed back towards home.  Mom called asking where I was, I told her we just left Bonney Lake and we would be there around 9.  She said it was a zoo at the house with everyone getting ready at the same time.  We got to the park and talked to Jenna for a while.  I thought they would beat us here.  I guess mom locked her keys in the car, haha.

Jenna had us walk to an area with a pond in the background.  She had us take pictures as a family, couples, singles, females, males, kids, immediate family, etc.  It was chilly.  She took us to the dock with the fountain in the background and took several pictures.  Mom got poop on her coat and we made fun of her.  There was lots of laughing and carrying on.

Now it was time for the Sounders pictures.  Ben and I ran over to our vehicles and grabbed our stuff and put it on.  Apparently we weren't done taking nice pictures so we had to change again quickly.  We got them all done and now it was our turn with our sports gear on.  We had a blast taking pictures.  Jenna said we were fun to photograph.

Erika, Doug, Malachi and Dad all left for coffee.  Mom, Ben and I stayed behind and helped Jenna take the props back to her car while we chatted a bit.

Ben wanted coffee so we headed over to Starbucks and then we went home.  We had a egg sandwich to get us by until we went over to Grandma's house at one for another Christmas party and food.  We shot each other with the guns and darts mom bought us for Christmas until it was time to go over to Grandma's.  We loaded up the car with a few boxes, food and people.  I went through the back door and started helping Grandma get the food ready in the kitchen.  It was officially dinner time and we all found our spots at the table.  Of course the conversation lead to poop again.  After dinner we played a few rounds of bingo.

There were many prizes won, banter back and forth and many eaten desserts between bingo games.  We all left the dining room and headed into the living room for presents.  I got a black vest from Grandma.  It is less poofy and isn't made out of duck down.  It was fantastic.  We stayed a bit watching a Christmas movie on TV and I got several texts from Megan, Lindsay and Nicole about tonight's festivities.  It was Nicole's birthday and she and Megan decided to combine them for an extravaganza party.  We went home, I grabbed my present and looked at where we needed to go.

The first stop was Uncork and Unwind.  Several people ordered wine and Ben and I ordered beer.  He got the Quilter's Irish Death-Iron Horse Brewery (Ellensburg) and I got the Ballz Deep Double IPA-7 Seas Brewery (Gig Harbor).  Mine was tasty and we made fun of the name most of the night.  Quite a few people joined us later on.  Nicole opened presents and we just hung out until it was time to go grab some food.  Nicole wanted sushi so we found a place in Westside Oly.  Aya Sushi would the the place we found ourselves at.  This would be the first time I tried sushi in a restaurant.  I ordered sticky rice and egg rolls and tried everyone else's sushi.  My thoughts, "it tastes like ocean."

From there, some decided to go home for the night and a few of us headed over to the Viking in Lacey for some karaoke and drinks.  Ben, Nicole, Celeste, Charlie, Barlow and I hung out at the Viking for a few hours.  We sang a few songs, laughed at people who sucked at singing, had a few beers and drew dirty pictures on the backside of the song request slips of paper.

To top the night off, all of us sang Barbie Girl by Aqua.  We destroyed it.  One of the mics didn't work all that great so we just went with it.  Afterwards, we all decided to go home.  It was late and I was exhausted.  Today was a long busy day.

Happy birthday Nicole and Megan!