Christmas is officially over. =(

Okay so, this year I didn't even have to put up a tree. Not even a single seasonal decoration. (Not in my own home anyway.) What was the point when Allen and I haven't been home since the first week of December (until the day before yesterday anyway)? But I helped my mom turn their huge house into a gorgeous winter wonderland! Which was fun and a good way to get me into the Christmas spirit. I spent the first half of December sitting around, waiting for Allen to get to Washington to spend the holidays with us. Again, like I've mentioned before, he was on a ship somewhere off the coast of California...occasionally, he'd take a helicopter to somewhere in the middle of Arizona and then back to ship again. While he was busy doing his marine thing, I was busy preparing for an AWESOME Christmas. I wanted it to be perfect. And of course, I should have known better. Because when I really get my hopes up about something, it always turns into a horrible nightmare. Yeah. That was my Christmas. And every Valentine's Day since we've been married. Okay....maybe it wasn't HORRIBLE, but it wasn't the best Christmas I've had. With no Dad around, the rest of the family was feeling pretty blue, the weather was nothing but WET...24/7...nothing but clouds, rain, rain, and more clouds. And I got sick. Really sick. It was my luck. It's always my luck. There's one thing Allen knows pretty well about me (and he's the same way so we can empathize with one another)...when I get sick, I get ugly. Mean ugly. So, Allen, who was perfectly happy to be actually sleeping in a real bed again and just happy to be with his wife and daughter again, just in time for the holidays, was stuck keeping an impatient, complaining, constantly irritated Bekah as content as possible under the circumstances. A lot of other things came into play that contributed to my bad mood, but here I was crying because we forgot to buy the yams for Christmas dinner. Wow, now that I think about it, I realize how ridiculous that is. Haha! But on the plus side, Hannah seemed to really have a good Christmas. She got more gifts than I could count! She officially has enough toys for the next year. Allen was really excited to be Santa this year. He went and got all Hannah's and my stocking stuffers and got up in the middle of the night to display them in the living room. It was really sweet of him and really cute how excited he was about it. Talking to him, it seems he's come to the conclusion that Santa gets so much milk to go with his cookies from kids all over the world on Christmas night that the Heiner family is going to throw him a bone each Christmas and set out a Monster energy drink...you know, it's a stressful job and he might need the pick-me-up. So, we made sure we had Monsters this year. Silly man.

Well, Allen and I left my mom's up in Western Washington the morning after Christmas. It's about a 20 hour drive or so. The first day, we made it to the Oregon/California border when we stopped to get a room. That whole day was slow because the fog was so thick that everyone was going at least 10 mph under the speed limit. The second day I thought would be a lot better and that we could really make up for some lost time. I was wrong. The I-5 has only two lanes each north and south bound and I guess it was because many people were traveling home after Christmas but here we are in the middle of absolutely nowhere, going 20 mph under the speed limit, in bumper-to-bumper traffic. This was the case all the way from just south of Sacramento to north Los Angeles. Yeah. FYI, that's about 300 miles. UGH. Allen and I are both very impatient people. We were going crazy. But we'd take turns...while the other does damage control. Allen would be freaking out, so I'd calm him down, telling him "We aren't in a big rush. It's okay. Let's just relax." Then 5 seconds later, I'm screaming at the car in front of us, while he's trying to calm me. It was actually humorous now that I think of it. Needless to say, we got in late. But at least we're home. And I'm finally somewhat recovering from my flu/cold/whatever I have. Hannah's happy. Allen's happy. And I'm getting there. =)

Well, that was our monthly update. Hope everyone had a great Christmas. Love, the Heiners