Crashing California

Christmas Day has come and gone yet again for us. To be honest, it was pretty uneventful in this Huzil home. The party that we threw 2 weeks ago apparently had a gift of it's own to give, as Jay and I are still battling colds (though beginning to get better) so are quite a few of our friends who attended!! I feel a bit bad about that, and the running joke now is trying to figure out who came and infected us all! The Christmas Eve service went over pretty well, though it was one of those moments I admit, I didn't really enjoy till it was too late. Too much self inflicted stress for me, it's so easy for me to let my head play games. I was just glad to call it over and finished without any major hiccups. We spent Christmas Day in our PJ's ... Jay got me a new set of hand weights (3,5 and 8 lb) and I got him a book and a new T-Shirt. And that was pretty much it. We had a huge breakfast, with bacon and eggs and bagels, talked with our family then jammed for the rest of ...

Twas three nights before Christmas -- here is a quick update from our end. Our First Annual Christmas party was a wonderful success, except that I do wish that we could have spent more time one-on-one with our friends ... mostly we had to be host and hostess, but a good time was had by all, we crammed 40 people (not including 3 kids and us) into our one bedroom, and had NO noise complaints! I would love to make it a tradition. Preparation for Christmas Eve @ church has been alright, well, actually it's been stressful! ... we had a practice yesterday night and two people (including one of the soloists) didn't show ... I was pretty unhappy to be brutally honest ... to top it off, both Jay and I have gotten head colds, now in full swing ... so please, please if you do, pray for us and Christmas Eve at our church ... first that Jay and I would NOT be sick (or so sick that we can't play) and just for the church and the people who will be coming. That this service will be meani...

(This was my Christmas Present from my supervisor @ work) Christmas!!! I can't believe how this holiday has snuck up on me ... I realized last night when we were rehearsing for Worship on Sunday, we've been doing one Christmas Carol per week leading into our Christmas Eve service and I thought I had things all planned out, till I realized yesterday that we had covered 3 carols, had 3 more to go and Christmas Eve is literally NEXT WEEK! Jay and I will be throwing our First EVER Holiday Huzil bash at our home. We hope to fill our little beach bungalow with 20 or so of our closest friends and just hang out ;) I don't think anything will be unruly ... I'll prob. just cherish the times and think of those who we WISH could be here with us, but are separated by distance and borders. Work @ JC has been a FLURRY of deadlines and this week has been trying. I am struggling with my feelings (still) with my supervisor. Still hurt and sometimes bewildered at her and other times f...

I'm not sure what the history of the Christmas Tree is ... I'm thinking it prob. started as a pagen ritual that the Catholic-Christian church turned into something that has to do w/ Christ's birth and has so evolved to become one of the traditions of our Christmas times. Whatever the case, there is a weird warm Christmassy vibe that comes with a tree. We decorated ours this last weekend. My mom had brought our Christmas tree down from Canada this Fall (along with everything else). So, I excitedly unpacked it on Saturday night (mist lots of sneezing from dust). After careful examination and about 10 mins of trying to figure out how to place the bottom of the tree in the "bottom of the tree holder", I prevailed, attached the bottom boughs to the top and fluffed all the branches... only to realize after I had my little 4ft. evergreen masterpiece splayed in my living room, that I had NO decorations. As you can tell from the pictures, we did get decorations. Jay dro...

(Our "Corporate Christmas Tree" in the JC front foyer) I cannot believe that it's pretty much almost one week into December! Christmas definitely feels like it's holiday toes are beginning to nudge themselves into my shoes. It's funny that for a corporate office, that usually seems pretty sterile and conformist, even here the sweet red tinges of Holiday cheer are seeping their way in. The reception area is playing elevator-style Christmas music in the foyer ... cubes are getting decorated with lights, Santa Hats and little trees ... Poinsettia plants line our stairs and a pretty giant Christmas Tree looms in the front, declaring with it's ever-green-corporate-might that the Holidays are here. I've been thinking of this time of year in a different sense -- since Jay and I are leading at North Oceanside Church now, and Christmas Eve services (aside from Easter) tend to be the most well attended. It is up to us (me) to plan our Christmas Eve service. I fe...

Today was "Black Friday" here (which is basically the US version of boxing day, before Christmas) Stores open @ midnight, there's shopping pandemonium, and traffic is horrendous. But here is how I spent my day: I spent the whole afternoon making Turkey Noodle Soup (thanks to my mother-in-laws prompting) which turned out Reeeeely well =) But I did not stay home ALL day (c'mon now...) I did step out in the a.m. and walked to a little boutique in Carslbad Village called "Rags" and scored some really great deals, including a Sweater Dress, a FANTASTIC scarf and two pairs of shoes, one of which is pictured here -- a cool $5.99 plus tax =) Tomorrow I hope to spend the morning playing guitar and worship tunes ... and an afternoon coffee with a girlfriend from work. I wish ALL weekends were long ones sometimes, but then, i guess they wouldn't feel so special ;) Till Next Blog ~ love, a.

(Our FIRST Turkey!!) I used to think American Thanksgiving wasn't really too big of a deal. I mean, everyone ELSE thinks it's huge (it's quite literally, the biggest holiday beside Christmas here), but since we're the "imports" Thanksgiving felt over-rated. It seemed to be the day that everyone else celebrated their families, and invited us along, since we had none here. And then would commence the feast and celebration, while I would generally feel isolated, kind of alone and I'll admit, a slight bit bitter and skeptical about the "biggy-deal-ness" of this holiday. I looked up the history of American thanksgiving the other day, since, now that we live (probably pretty much for good) I should really figure out what the hullabaloo is: ~~~ (the following taken from :http://www.scholastic.com/scholastic_thanksgiving/feast/) The English colonists we call Pilgrims celebrated days of thanksgiving as part of their religion. But these were days of praye...