a great way to end and begin

happy new year cruel world.

so life is good. it is so great to be able to go home and pick up where you left off. what a great christmas/new year break. i got to see so many people that i love and have missed. i unfortunately didn't take most of the pics--let those around take the pics. therefore i do not have a whole lot captured. m.b.

my holiday started off just right. i woke up extremely early to get to work, because my flight was in the afternoon and i had to get in some time. i was out scraping off the 2 inch ice off of my windshield at 5 am (at that time iowa was in severe cold weather) when i hear this manish nonsensical yelling. lo and behold i see this naked man running down our back alley. he scared me and i felt bad for him (i am pretty sure he was not in the right mind at the time) but it was hilarious and a great way to start off the day and my holiday. merry christmas naked man.

i flew with soba and she was a jem. way to go pup for surprising all of the peeps on the plane.

when i got into slc--i was walking out of the secure area and quickly checked out the folks entering the secure area and suddenly realized that the girl i was watching retrieve her newly scanned luggage and watching me was my friend kasi french--who i talk with on the phone but had not seen for four years. what a great surprise. we freaked out--it was funny.

miranda came to the airport and went around shopping and to get my haircut with me. every time i see her, i am amazed at what a woman she is becoming. when i am in iowa, i keep thinking she is my adorable eight year old sister that i need to watch over. boy do they grow up so quickly. we met up with sara and ate some soup at a soup kitchen. i love my sara gilmore. what a great friend and an incredibly talented hair guru--yes, that is what i shall call her--i don't know what the kids call that career these days...hair stylist, beautician, hair technician...hair guru. yes. that is it.

christmas eve began with the rigby traditional "special store" bargain hunt. this was the 2nd annual hunt and had a few twists, but hilarious. We then headed up to Logan for a mexican christmas fiesta spent with the in-laws. i love being a monson. what incredible people i get to be related to. we had the whole group there (minus little kaya), but i am really glad matt was able to come up with us. mom monson spoiled us. thank you so much. what a great time. they made sure to fulfill all my wildest dreams...singing christmas songs, putting a puzzle together, caramel was dripping from the ceiling...awesome.

christmas day we spent with my side (the whole family was there--i can't believe we have 3 babies. they are beautiful and funny and i loved spending time with them. my siblings married some incredible people and i have the best family in the world (both sides)) and did the traditional twice baked potato and honey baked ham christmas. it never gets old--i set my clock by this tradition. get the rigbys all in the same room and you know it is going to be a good time. just sayin. my mom spoiled us and never sat down--not to mention that we were given a whopper of a christmas with all the gifts they give. yep, whopper is totally back--all the kids are saying it, atleast they should. that night we went and hung out with nicks family (the capener family) at bob and tammy's. i love them. sorry for dropping the puppy. we got to hang out with kaya for a bit too.

the rest of our time was spent driving back and forth from logan to farmington trying to get in as much fun as possible:

we saw my old ward friends that are hilarious and nick got to finally meet and then we saw my high school friends who are not hilarious. jokes. i got to see all their babies--which i am still not sure we are old enough to have, but whatever.

we skiied/snowboarded

i got the flu

went to jazz games


tilley family party--so good to see the family and play games and i think i managed to weird out my cousins fiance--nothing like welcoming to the family the right way. atleast i didn't start singing the oink song.

dinner with nicks friends--i wish that we lived closer and could hang out more.

for new years eve, we headed up to midway to hang out at the parentals condo. this was awesome because we managed to get the rigby's and the monson's under the same roof. yep--best of both worlds. lots of games and food and dunking our heads in the freezing river out back. (Dear ABC: please retire Dick Clark and fire Kellie Pickler--their newscast of the new years eve party was a joke.)

our last days were spent up in logan hanging out with the monsons. this time kaya was there to hang out with and we had a good time.

good times. this vacation went by way too fast and i didn't get to see some. perhaps one day we will get to hang out brooke, chelsea, ash, natalie pervert, jami foo, rigby family...the list goes on--and those i did see, i didn't get to see long enough.

thanks for everything folks. utah treated me well.