Oh Christmas tree...

Home for Christmas... the wrapping, the shopping, the absolute chaos. There's nothing like it. We all have our own traditions. For some of us it's arguing over who gets to open the next present. For my sister it's hiding as many of yours behind your back so that people are forced to sit there for the last half hour with all their attention on you, unwrapping the gifts. If you're me, it's to veto any suggested trip to the mall for any reason possible.

One of our family traditions is to go look at awesomely decorated houses on Christmas Eve. I believe this stems from the both the desire to enjoy the beauty as well as the laziness that keeps us from putting up our own display. This year we went to a street that works together to decorate. Each house has their theme. Perfect photo op, right?

 

These first ones are at my Aunt Emma's/our family's house. This is the extent of our outside festivities!

 

At this house they were giving out hot chocolate too. Love that these girls were roasting marshmallows :)

 

I have a thing for VW bugs.

 

This was a display built in their garage! Seriously!

 

Think warm thoughts... think warm thoughts....

 

Classic Vegas with my brother and my new sister-in-law.

 

At the end of the cul-de-sac they have Santa's Village. Let's be honest, Vegas is probably where Santa comes to chillax after his big all night run.

 

Just for the Nelsons :)

 

The reason for the season.

 

This was my favorite. I got the Lucy at her stand for my mom (she definitely needs the help), but you have to love the real life Charlie Brown Christmas tree.

 

Can anyone guess this theme?

 

"Painting the roses red... we're painting the roses red"

I just love Peter Pan.

And in wishing you all a Merry Christmas, one more picture! While we have a shortage of lions and lambs here, we do have some dogs lying down with the cat. Merry Christmas all! And to all a safe holiday.

5 K for Cancer... finally

My semester sucked all other life out of me, but now that it's break time I'm able to finally do some editing on batches of pictures that didn't have deadlines. These are from the 5K for Cancer that was held on behalf of my cousin Leo, who is battling skin cancer for the second time. Too many for captions but here's some fun photographs:

 

Okay, so this one is out of order, but this is a friend of my roommates who lost her mother to cancer this last summer. She's a dear and I thought it was amazing that she would come out to support another family who's going through some of the same things. Plus, someone didn't believe she was in this race, so sorry this took so long, but you can shove the pictures under their noses now!

 

There was a craft fair happening at the same time as the race. Just a couple tables but some friends donated some dang cute things to sell! 

 

Several of these are my family members.

 

I want socks like these!

 

And they're off!

 

And the winner is...

 

The guy giving the high five was the second one in and spent the rest of the time cheering everyone else on that was running. Seriously cool points.

 

This is a man who's on chemo treatments. AMAZING! Way to go Leo!

 

See??? Still cheering on!

 

I don't know who this kid is, but I love her enthusiasm... and her skirt :)

 

Timp students rocked my world!

 

I think it was appropriate that we had adults and kids of all ages running/walking this race. The proceeds are for the family to help get Leo through treatments so they will have more time together. I loved seeing people pushing strollers through the race and all the support in general. Admittedly I signed up to run but decided to take photographs instead. (I don't do running).

Here's to hoping the treatments continue to work and praying that we have Leo with us for a long long time to come!