A California Christmas

This post is visual heaven. Actually, more like a visual hoarder's heaven (aka, me).

There's just so much to look at!!

Let's get started, shall we?

Me and Corbie flew out to California last Tuesday

We had dinner with Tanner, his family, my family, and Brie! It was so fun. Kind of a weird experience to have them with me in a life aside from BYU.

Wednesday, Kaden and Kennedy had a Christmas concert at their school. They rocked it! Such cuties, I love 'em to death.

After that, I headed to Pari's house for a girl's night. It was a blast, and got to be with a lot of lovely ladies that I haven't seen since I was 14!

Pari makes the best hot chocolate...side note.

It's a zoo around here.

Got to meet our new puppy Charlie, and I am completely and utterly obsessed with her!! She is the cutest thing.

Took a lot of 'sister pictures' with miss Kennedy Lynn.

She's a doll.

Remember how I said I loved this dog? I wasn't kidding.

Look at her little face!! Kills me.

Here I am, just playing and talking to Charlie all by myself. This was a daily occurrence. I could post about ten more videos of her, but I don't want to look too crazy.

Corb FINALLY got his mane cut. Here are some 'during' pictures...

Looked like an animal on the ground.

Ta-dah! He's a new man. I'm in love with this cut, he looks so handsome!

I got a cut too, and Pari got her eyebrows done.

After we were all trimmed and proper, we went out for sushi.

That night, Kendra had a work party at our place for The Bishop Real estate group. Santa came!!!

The whole fam, including my favorite little fur ball.

I really enjoy my symmetry photo app.

The next afternoon, we went to Bayside church for a Christmas service. They always put on quite the production! They had 'America's Got Talent' winners, the Silouhettes, perform, as well as Cirque du soleil (yes, I did have to google how to spell both of those...). 

On top of that, they had their usual rock band performing all sorts of Christmas arrangements.

Here's the Silouhettes, who are a group of kids all under 18 who dance behind a sheet and are just awesome.

Here is Cirque du soleil, but it's a really shaky video and didn't capture any of the cool stuff...but it'll give you a little taste of it.

After the performances, they light one candle (which they gave out at the door) and slowly everyone's candles are lit from passing it along. It's really neat.

That night, we went to Mofa's birthday dinner at a yummy Thai place

followed by Parker working out...

And some late night snuggles.

One more picture of Charlie because I can. (The late night caused some puffy sleep eyes, so excuse those).

And here is where the real visual heaven starts! Me, Pari, Deyna, Andrea, and Kyndel all had a photo shoot Saturday morning, courtesy of Pari's mom, Michelle. She is entering a competition for a scholarship and needed some models, that's where we come in. (:

We did our hair and make up...

Put on some funky headresses and such (which are cut out of this picture...oops.)

And drove to this gorgeous grassy wooded area by a river.

First we had to cross the street and stand in the middle of the road in our funky outfits. (Only I would stop to take a picture in the middle of the road...I'm a little photo happy).

 

Then we arrived here!! Gorgeous right?? Couldn't get over it. We don't have random little areas like this in Utah...everything's just dead and brown haha.

Gorgeous Pari.

Deyna working it for the camera

Like my crazy gettup? Complete with feather boa, giant safety pin (clearly visible here), and all.

All of the above are just ones from my phone. Here are some of the actual ones Michelle took:

 

Two different versions of this one...I'm kind of fond of it. (:

I'm leaning towards liking ^^this one^^ more, maybe I've just got a dark side that's coming out.

And that's it for now! More pictures from the shoot will come as soon as Michelle gets them to me (:

It was a really fun day.

Modeling can be tiring, so Pari made us more Cocoa and we watched (more like slept through) The Grinch.

We headed over to a party at Connor's house with a bunch of people and a giant Pazookie. Me and Pari ended up staying hours past everyone else singing and playing guitar & piano with Connor. It was so fun, even though I'm not as musically gifted as them. (:

On Sunday I went to church with the gang (Pari, Connor, Andrea, Kyndel...the list goes on), which was great. That night we had our family's annual 'White Trash' Christmas party. It's always so fun!

Random shot of a bunch of people gathered around the food...

The best part of the night is our gift exchange, where people bring the most ridiculous gifts! One year Corbin got a hamster. This year I didn't have time to snag a gift, so I didn't participate, but it was still fun.

Monday has just been family time. Lovely Christmas Eve! (:

Grandma Caroline's homemade vanilla ice-cream recipe mixed in with some homemade cookie dough...delicious.

THERE.

I always feel the need to take a deep breath after writing a post, they take a lot more work than you think! And I'm sure reading this ginormous one took a lot of effort too, so we can both breath a sigh of relief that it's over now.

iiiiiiiinnn.....and

oooouuuuuttttt.

That was nice.

I've stayed up way too late writing this post in hopes that I'll be so dead tired tomorrow that I'll be able to sleep through both of my flights home. Christmas wouldn't be Christmas without spending hours at the airport/on a plane! (That was a little sad huh? It's just the truth).

Have a very Merry Christmas, and may Santa treat you well. (:

Stay tuned for a Utah Christmas post coming your way soon.

"And to all a good night!"