Chapter Ninety-Three: 'Twas the Day Before Christmas...

December 24, 2015

'Twas the day before Christmas, when all through the house,

Festive music was playing, fake snow on my blouse;

The tree was decorated in cold winter care,

In hopes that Texas would crank down the warm air;

Jack, the dog, was nestled all snug in his bed,

Ripping something that wasn't supposed to be shred;

And Sarah in her leggings, sitting in her chair,

Was struck with inspiration, one she couldn't bear;

Away to the laptop, she flew like The Flash,

Stroked away at the keyboard and rhymed in a dash.

But alas, she knew, this poem wouldn't last

Because poetry was never a success in the past;

It was small, but she was proud of her work,

So she ended the verse with a little smirk;

To end with a bang, she decided to say,

"Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good day!"

Feeling the Christmas spirit, courtesy of Daniel Ibanez's awesome artistic skills

Happy Christmas Eve, everyone! You better believe that poem took me more time than I'd like to admit, but I'm pretty proud of it.
It's hard to believe that Christmas is tomorrow. And then we will have to say goodbye to 2015 as we welcome the new year. It's hard to believe the year has flown by like it has.
My month-long break has not been too eventful. I have spent most of my time working as a waitress at Red Lobster. I enjoy working, for the most part, because it gives me something to do during the break, but I sometimes wish I had more time with my family and friends. I miss them dearly. Luckily, tomorrow, I have the day off, and will spend nearly the entire day surrounded by my beautiful family.

On the 16th, I celebrated with my coworkers at the official Red Lobster Christmas party! It was fun to reconnect with my coworkers ("Yes, I still work here") as well as eat some amazing home-cooked meals! There were tamales, stuffed jalapeno peppers, green bean casserole...and don't even get me started on dessert. Yum!!

Everyone in cute sweaters feat. me in my uniform

On the 18th, I finally met up with Ruth and Noemi, my favorite twins ever. We ate breakfast together and just talked about everything that had happened in the last 5 months. It was so much fun to see the two of them again. They are two beautiful ladies who I will always love spending time with.

Breakfast at Starbucks

The very next day, my laptop wouldn't turn on. It would boot up, but then freeze. I panicked because I hadn't backed up my laptop in awhile (Somewhere, Dad is saying, "I told you!") and was a little worried about my personal files. Luckily, Dad managed to work his tech magic and keep the important files on the computer, whereas everything else (games, chrome, etc.) was deleted. I didn't mind this too much, because what was truly important was recovered. This delayed my blogging for a bit (I'm actually blogging on my mom's computer right now), but hopefully I will be back in the groove soon!

Yesterday, by the grace of God, I was sent home from work because we were not busy enough. I say this is a blessing because Luke just happened to be in town, which meant I could hang out with him for awhile! We drove around, ate some mozzarella cheese sticks, got free drinks at SONIC, and just enjoyed each others' company.

Later that day, I finally reunited with my best friends. Kimberly, Victoria, and I all exchanged gifts (which involved lots of squealing, laughter, and smiles), and had a lovely tea party with the cutest butterfly glassware.

Who needs sugar when I have friends so sweet??

We then went out to I Heart Pho, a Vietnamese restaurant that is one of our favorite places to go. We tried some new spring rolls, and enjoyed some warm pho.

White Chicken Pho <3

This is what beauty looks like

After we cleared our plates and bowls, we headed back to Victoria's house to decorate the cookies baked earlier that day. Thanks to Lauren, Victoria's talented older sister, we had plenty of colors of icing to use to create whatever we wanted. Although our cookies didn't always come out as pretty as we wanted, they still tasted great, which is really what mattered.