Christmas Party at Christine's

Christine had a big Christmas party on Dec 23, which was the first chance I had to see lots of my friends, it was awesome! We had a giant gift exchange (40+ people, yipes, that's a lot of stealing!) and I ended up with a Poker set (unfortunatly, I didn't have space to bring it to Baden, so we're still stuck using ceramic washers guys). Fun times were had by all, not much more needs to be said. Here's some pics:





Me and Andrea at Christine's party
















Nobody knows how Sketchy ended up walking around with an axe, but we all feared for our lives.


















Erin looks highly interested in Mike and Mark's conversation














Ummm... ya......














Song unwraps a present, I think it was trivia deely of some sort













Duncan finally ends up with his beloved chicken hat and sais
















Love the fashion statement Rob















Nice pick Jared


















Kiran immediatly sets to work blowing up the gift that he brought to the party (and poor Caroline ended up with)











Don't you want to enjoy your gift Caroline?













And more hilarity ensues















Nice, ummm "hat" Mike












Glass enjoyment














Scott and Andrea share the bean bag chair














"I'm still bored from being in Saskatchewen"













Here's to Jordan...



















Steph and Aimee enjoy the party













Dave and his "disciples"












Somebody's gonna clean up at the bottle depot














We give this party 2 thumbs up














Mike takes a short nap













Ewwww, Hot 100...... *shudder*












"I'm watching you..."














Peer pressure at it's best (haha, that's Christine's younger brother)













Something amuses Steve










Duncan continues his bad influencs by leading the making of a brew-ha-ha (drink containing some of what everyone at the party is drinking)













Me and Mike are excited














Another pic for the shocker wall at Kehl, mwah ha ha










Let's throw things at the passed out guy!

Christmas!

Time to catch my blog up on all my Christmastime activities!!!

I came home to Calgary for Christmas, arriving on Dec 21. It was a pretty good flight, except that it was so early in the morning that there were no busses running yet and I had to walk down to the Baden train station, weighed down with various luggage. It was a nice 4:30am stroll, especially after staying up all night packing and such. Before the first flight I took some cold medication that Richard had picked up that completly messed me up, I couldn't even sleep. So after that I opted for dealing with the cold symptoms instead. The highlight of the second flight was seeing Fantastic Four, it was pretty sweet.

I was showered with hugs and kisses from my parents and brother (not so many kisses from him) and was excited to see the house all decorated for Christmas. The next few days were filled with tree decorating, seeing friends, and various parties (and a vicious cold that I managed to kick pretty quickly, yay).

Look at our beautiful tree! Though I miss the bird-of-prey angel that's on our tree at Kehl

On Dec 22 we had our annual Christmas carolling party with some family friends. My brother and dad played the piano and guitar, and I joined in a bit to show off some of my new guitar skills. As usual my dad got completely carried away with being the center of attention and singing with over-the-top enthusiasm, haha. It was a great night, always one of my favourite holiday events. Here are some pics:

Judy singing while Alex plays the piano

Rae and Elizabeth singing carols

David and my mom enjoying the carol singing

The singers that actually have talent doing some harmonizing (it sounded awesome)

Here are some pics from Christmas day:

Christmas morning in Calgary (Fish Creek Park behind my house). Gotta love those chinooks, it was warm for my whole visit

My family being goofy with their new flashlights (Alex started it of course)

My dad, with his annual Toblerone (probably the main reason he supported me going to Switzerland, lol)

Brought my mom back an assortment of dark chocolate (her favorite)

Candy, music and duct tape, what more could you ask for in a stocking!?

Alex liked the swiss card and Checkpoint Charlie shirt I got him

Finally, my own pictonary game! If only Aimee was here in Switzerland so we could rule as champions!

Alex testing out his new amp

Daddy carving the turkey with surgical precision

Now THAT'S what gravy is supposed to look like (are you taking notes Shane?)

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas again!

My dad makes a toast

On Dec 27 my grandparents (from my mom’s side) arrived from Victoria, and we had a nice secondary Christmas with them:

Yummy post-Christmas brunch!

Me with my grandparents, they loved the clock I got them from Krakow

On Dec 29 Devon had a party for all the old and current praktikants, which had a great turnout and was fun. Evan and his friend Paul brought over their music gear and played, it was kickass. I didn’t take any pics that night, but hopefully I can get some from Devon.

All in all it was a really good vacation, I won’t go into huge detail about what else I did but here are some highlights:
-Went to a Flames Game, and rocked some wicked seats (thanks Chris!). Too bad we lost that one :(
-Played music with my brother and my dad, Alex taught me how to play Float On and a bunch of other stuff
-Watched way too much TV, including a couple seasons of Arrested Development (finally!), ER, Scrubs, and a couple Buffy marathons
-Had a hardcore Mad Gab (and shuffleboard, haha) night over at Erin’s
-Went too Christine’s Christmas party (see separate post)
-Went to Vicious Circle for New Year’s (see separate post)
-Did lots of shopping
-Went skiing at Sunshine with Aimee and Alex (my brother)
-Hit up the Back Alley with Chris, Aimee and Mark
-Saw the new Harry Potter movie (again) with my family
-Finally wrote my super-late internship report #2
-Caught up on all the food I missed while being in Switzerland: steak, sushi, Thai, Viet, Mexican, slurpees, cheddar cheese, Tim Horton’s, late night Wendy’s JBC, and more importantly: my mom’s cooking

Playing some guitar with Alex