The black lung.

I took a nap after church on Sunday and woke up with the start of a sore throat. A sore throat that has progressively worsened over the past two days to the point that I have become Kermit D. Frog and am pretty sure I will have no voice tomorrow. My daily perusal of the local newspapers this morning led me to this horrifying picture (thanks, Deseret News), which I'm pretty sure is the culprit behind said sore throat:

Either Dementors are invading the valley or we are right smack in the middle of "Inversion Season." Bleh. But on the bright side, we had a small storm that cleared the air and has delivered us with the blessing of frigid temperatures, which should keep us all happy until the gunk returns. Aren't winters in Utah just the best?

Feliz cumpleanos.

A day where people are super nice to me and call and text and email and post things on my Facebook page and give me presents just because it's the day I was born? Yes, please!

Yep. My birthday was on Tuesday. John and I both took the day off of work and spent a lovely day together, which consisted of:

• Sleeping in. A gift in itself.
• John making me breakfast--blueberry pancakes and bacon. Mmm mmm good. (He also let me watch Say Yes to the Dress while we ate. See? He loves me.)
• Going to Ikea to walk around and eat lunch. I forgot how ridonculously big that place is. We bought some decorations for our bedroom (which is our next "house" project) and stumbled across perhaps the most comfortable leather sectional OF ALL TIME. So, you know, if you're looking to get me a present...Also, Ikea always makes me think of this movie. Love it.
• Going to a couple of furniture stores across the street from Ikea to look around for fun. The first one was heavenly. No salespeople bothered us whatsoever. The second one? Holy cow. VULTURES! A saleslady literally followed us around the store the entire time we were there, which led to John playing games with here by traversing from one end to the next multiple times to see how persistent she was.
• My parents taking us out to dinner. And me getting "serenaded" by the waiters/waitresses and receiving free dessert. Score one for the birthday girl.
• John getting me the most perfect gifts. The one I was most excited about? My new Paul Millsap shirt! Yeehaw.

100,000

My little car reached a milestone last week. And don't you worry that I pulled onto a side street to take a picture.

(Not quite as impressive as the roughly 270,000 miles that John's car has on it, but how do you even begin to compete with such a mighty beast?)

It's taken me to so many places...Vegas two or three times, Logan a zillion times, family and friends' houses, to the job I've been lucky to have for the past five years, and to the bishopric member's house where I met my Johnny for the first time. Thanks for six great years and 100,000-freaking miles, Lancer!

We are less nurturing than a desert.

It's a sad day when your rubber plant, which is supposedly impossible to not keep alive, has lost all of its leaves and is left barren and naked. This is the tragic sight that greeted us after work tonight:

According to my research via the all-knowing Google, "Rubber plants are fairly easy to grow and with some care and a minimum of attention can last a lifetime." Or, in our case, around 10 months.

Wow. We are amazing at plants. Let's hope that the garden we planted in the fall fares better than our sad rubber-leafed friend. Sure am looking forward to seeing those little crocuses and tulips come out in a couple of months.

The quest for domesticity

Once upon a time I was dating a boy. And during the tenure of our courtship, the holidays approached and I first heard the legend of the magical Christmas Bread. Time went on, and I married the boy and that very same Christmas, I myself got to taste this fabled bread. And all was right with the world.

Translation: John's mom makes special bread at Christmas that is TO DIE FOR. It has creme filling, and almond filling on top of that, and a crumble mixture on top of that, and icing on top of everything, and as a bonus it is fat and calorie free! (Because everybody knows that at Christmas, all of the calories and fat don't count, sillies.) It's all I heard about when I was dating John and it was getting to be Christmastime. And then when we spent Christmas with his family the first year we were married, I got to taste it myself...and oh. my. goodness. Luckily there were a few slices left when we got up to Logan this year or we would not have been happy campers.

Anyway, I decided that if I ever truly want to be a Morrey and keep John from being forced to leave me on account of my inability to make delicious Christmas Bread, I needed to learn how to do it. So on New Year's Eve I woke up early so the dough could get to rising, and a whole lot of sugar and butter and a few phone calls to John's mom and about a half a day later, we had three loaves of glory.

Phew. My marriage is safe.

Christmas

Our Christmas was fantabulous this year. We were able to spend time with both of our families and got really spoiled. Ridiculously, ridiculously spoiled. (Thanks, parents.) We spent Christmas Eve delivering neighbor gifts in the morning, watching A Christmas Story (LOVE that movie) in the afternoon, and going to dinner with my parents, Jason and my Aunt Lorraine that night. We had our own little Christmas the next morning, then headed over to my parent's for more food and presents, then headed on up to Logan to see John's family. It was a good day and it was so fun to spend time with everyone.

Some holiday highlights:

• Me getting sentimental while opening a gift from John, only to see what it really was and say (out loud, of all things!), "Oh, I thought this was something else!" Ha. How's that for a buzz kill? But I still love it anyway, promise.

• Stuffed cream cheese French toast and bacon for breakfast Christmas morning. Even better? John made it while I sat on the couch with my feet up. Happy Christmas to me!

• Finding the perfect gift for my mom and making her cry. (Just to clarify, tears of joy. Because of the perfectness of the gift. I am quite good at giving good presents, if I do say so myself.)
  

• The rousing game of Quibbler we played with John's family Christmas night. I lost (which I am NOT happy about) but John tied for first, so either way I count it as a win for us.
  

• The best nap of ALL TIME that we took on Sunday afternoon. There is literally nothing better than snuggling up under the covers with my Johnny and sleeping for hours on end.
  

• Pretty sure John was most excited about getting this set up:
  

This was our main gift to each other this year, and because I am a mean old witch I wouldn't let John take it out of the box until Christmas. Also, we are heathens because this is for our bedroom. We just so happen to thoroughly enjoy a good dose of 30 Rock or Arrested Development before drifting off to sleep. So sue us.

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas, from our little family to yours.