Christmas in NC

This year for Christmas, we were very fortunate to be able to take a week long vacation to North Carolina to visit my family! We arrived Christmas afternoon and ate some hearty soup and opened gifts with my parents and brother. The next day my mom and I went shopping in her new VW Beetle!! :) While we were gone, my mom's two sisters and their families arrived for more festivities! This is all of us eating our traditional christmas brunch the next morning. Mmm! Cheese grits, sausage and egg casserole, and fruit! I look forward to this all year!This next picture we took right before opening gifts after brunch! We took it to send to my mom's brother and his family who are currenly living in Norway and couldn't make it to the U.S. for Christmas! :( We were being completely goofy and thought it would be funny to mix up the signs. This picture epitomizes my family--fun and crazy. Poor Trevor had to escape with a book a couple times to get a break from all the noise. :)
Just a picture of us waiting to open our gifts. Lovely that I'm still in PJs...

After my mom's side of the family left, we went to Albemarle, NC (about a 2 1/2 hour drive) to see my dad's side of the family. On the way we stopped and got hot dogs and fries at the BEST place in the entire world. It's called Chuck Wagon and it's only 80 cents per hot dog - fantastic! :) In response to seeing these fantastic prices, Trevor said "Why doesn't someone tell them about inflation?" Haha. So typical of my "financial nut". :)

This next picture is one of those fun three-generational pictures... Granddaddy, Dad, and Mike! Three generations of Hopkins in one room. How special! :)
When all the aunts, uncles, and cousins had arrived, we did our gift exchange (let's count -- my FOURTH one this Christmas!) and I received this lovely gift card from Victoria's Secret! Trev got a Banana Republic gift card so he could buy some new shirts for his new job!
Just a picture of us opening our joint gift from Nana... she gave us a small Fiestaware serving bowl and salt and pepper shakers. We LOVE our Fiestaware! They are so colorful and bright!Needless to say, Christmas was a fantastic time full of gifts, good food, sweets, and lots of game-playing. I taught Trevor how to play Nertz and, well, I spanked him! :) But he did make some good improvements!

We flew back to Utah on New Year's Eve and landed in Salt Lake at literally 11:57 pm. So... it turned 2009 while we were in the plane! A couple of us gave a little cheer and Trevor and I shared a quick New Year's kiss :) Other than that, New Year's has been pretty uneventful. But it has been great the last couple of days as Trevor and I have had a lot of time to spend together and we completely cleaned and revamped our little apartment. Everything is organized and ready to go for a new year and new semester!

As a final thought, I just want to express how grateful I am for Jesus Christ - the true reason we have Christmas! I am so grateful for His Atonement that provides a way that I can repent of the sins I commit. I'm so grateful that He can overcome the natural tendencies that humans tend to have. He has blessed me with everything that I have- a wonderful home, family, and a fantastic husband. It truly was wonderful to take a break and remember those things that are most important. We really are very lucky.