Home for Christmas (by Jeremy)

We had the chance to go to California for Christmas this year and we had a great time; don't worry, we are working on the pictures. We left early on the 20th for the long drive. To avoid the snow as much as possible we decided to go down through Las Vegas. It was about a 13 hour drive but we got there without any real problems. I say “real” problems because we did have one little mishap. Ss we entered the Bakersfield area the horn on the car shorted and would not stop honking. We eventually got the fuse pulled out to make it stop, but now we don’t have a horn.
We arrived that night and had homemade Mac and Cheese which I love. Luckily my parent's church wasn’t until 1:30 so we were able to sleep in a little after the long day on Saturday.

Monday we decided to head up to San Francisco to go to the Academy of Sciences. It is a new museum/aquarium/cool place. But by the time we got there, only 1½ hours after it opened, the line to get in was huge and we decided to go to the botanical gardens in Golden Gate Park instead. Good thing we did because it was announced just after we left the line that they would not sell any more tickets for the day. We met Kerri, Adam and Aidan at the gardens and walked around a little. We then decided to to eat at the Cheesecake Factory on the 8th floor (yes, 8 floors) of the Macys building. After an hour and a half wait we finally got to eat and had a good time and good food.

Tuesday I went and played some Volleyball with my dad and people from the ward for a few hours and we then hung out and played some games and frosted some sugar cookies. Later that night we drove to San Jose to meet Kerri and Adam to go to the Sharks game (Hockey). Adam got great seats for us 3rd row right on the blue line (thanks Adam’s beer supplier!) It was a lot of fun and the Sharks won 5 – 0. Thanks Kerri and Adam, we had a great time.

Wednesday, Christmas Eve, we went up to Benicia to hang out with Kerri and Aidan. We played some games and went to Pizza Pirate for lunch where Adam works. It was good and we had fun watching Aidan make a mess of a whole plate of grated cheese. Later that night we went to my Uncle’s house for the Christmas Eve festivities. We played some spoons (I won [This is Cameo: He cheated]), ate some food, acted out the Nativity story (I was the inn keeper and Cameo was the assistant angel), the kids did a piñata and we played Do You Love Your Neighbor. After we got home Cameo and I opened PJs , it is something that Cameo has always done and I think it is a good tradition to keep.

Christmas Day was a good day. We got up and opened presents and had a good time watching Aidan enjoy his new toys. We then had Sour Cream Twists which are so good and one of my favorite Christmas morning traditions. We spent the day hanging out and played some Wii and played Heroscape which Cameo and I won.

Friday we hung out and went to lunch at Togos, which unfortunately is no longer in Utah, and then went to the movie "Valkyrie" which we both liked. It is amazing how close they came to killing Hitler. We then played Rook later that night and Adam and I as a team won in 4 turns; yes that is right, we had 500 points after only 4 rounds.

Saturday we got up and spent the day driving back to Utah; our only “problem” this time was a little scare about not having enough gas, but we made it. We stopped at In and Out for lunch and got home around 9. I sure did not miss the cold weather here.

Sunday was Josephine's blessing and we were able to go to that. Then we spent the afternoon at the Lombardi's. We ate food, played some games and played a little bit of Rock Band before we left. I want to let everyone know that I got a 99% singing on one of the songs. Oh yeah. American Idol here I come.

We had a great trip and we are glad that we got to spend time in California with my family. Thanks to everyone for the great things you gave us, the great time, and I am sorry this was so long.