A Semi-Successful Blogmas + Shenanigans in Cabin #90

Hello friends! I last left you on Blogmas day 12 and you'll notice that's where Blogmas has seemingly ended. T'is true. I let the ball drop after 12 days. See what happened was, on Friday the 13th I had plans to go out of town with my family and I did not have a post prepared ahead of time for Friday, or that whole weekend. And so then by the time I got home on Sunday I was like it's cool I can totally catch up it's fine, this is fine. But I didn't catch up and so here lies Blogmas, 2019, after 12 days. It was fun while it lasted.

BUT the silver lining is, 12 is a very Christmas-y number (12 days of Christmas anyone?) and perhaps I MEANT to only write 12 posts - the 12 posts of Blogmas, if you will. We all know I didn't but we can pretend it was on purpose. And I mean, 12 days is 12 days and given my hot and cold streaks of blogging the last few years, I'm counting 12 days in a row of Blogmas a win. It's a win. It's a semi-successful Blogmas. We came, we saw, we sort of almost conquered.

Now that that's out of the way. Can I tell you about said trip on the Friday that ended Blogmas? Because it was freakin fun.

My family and I unintentionally started a tradition a few years back of taking a quick little weekend trip out of town to hang out and do Christmas-y things together. We started with Sedona, and would take the long way home through Flagstaff for a pit stop to play in the snow. When that ran its course we tried out Prescott for a few years which was equally as fun. We were ready for another change of scenery this year so we decided to make the trip up to Greer for a Christmas weekend in the White Mountains.

Nate and I left on Friday and took our time mosey'ing up there. We made a pit stop at a wood working store in Heber, and also the gas station wherein, a man standing behind us in line with a very Russian-looking fur hat told me that I had really good hair for braiding. "You have really good hair for braiding," he said. "The texture, the length - your hair just looks like it would hold braids really well." This at the same time the gentleman in front of us was chatting up Nate about friends he knows who work in law enforcement. Not gonna lie, I felt really popular at the gas station in Heber, you guys.

We made it to Greer by the early afternoon and upon check-in we realized the main lobby had corn hole boards for the taking. So take them we did. And corn hole we played. A best of three between Nate and I and my parents that it kills me to say we lost. We had a really good first round and then I just got overly excited and I let the win go to my head and I got distracted with the Christmas music on the bluetooth speaker and I probably spent too much time trying to floss to "Mele Kalikimaka" by Bing Crosby. Sorry Nate.

My sister and brother-in-law didn't leave town until after work on Friday so we ate dinner the four of us, and watched a Hallmark Christmas movie while we waited for Audrey and Lionel to arrive (Bless you, Greer Lodge for carrying the Hallmark Channel). And we waited. And we waited. 

My sister shared her location with us on her phone so we were able to keep an eye on how close they were getting. Except they were getting very close to the New Mexico border instead of Greer. For those of you good at geography, that is the WRONG WAY. We kept watching their location in anticipation as if it were a sports game: "Noooo that's the wrong way!" "Ok they're back in Globe hopefully they don't miss their turn." "They're approaching their turn...Yeeeeah the took the right turn!" The joke became, "they're back in Globe" and any time anyone asked a question, the answer was always, "back in Globe." Where is my flashlight? Oh it's back in Globe. Has anyone seen my slippers? Yeah I saw them back in Globe."

It was a wild ride but at about midnight we walked up to the main road in our jams and jackets to wave them down with our flashlights (heaven help us if they missed the last turn), and they finally made it to cabin #90. Nate had thought he'd be funny earlier in the day and switch the pillows on their bed from the head to the foot so that they'd lay down the wrong way, but after their long journey and too much time spent in Globe, we quickly switched it back knowing they'd probably not be in any mood for shenanigans. Wasn't about to take that risk.

After a good night's sleep we all took our time in the morning and eventually headed out to play in some snow!

My mom and dad found a nice snow play area that was not teeming with people earlier in the week and it was so nice. In fact, after about an hour, most people had left and we were one of the only families left on the hill. I was not mad about it. 

We took turns sliding down the hills in our tubes - feet first, face first, on your stomach, doubled up, backwards - you name it, we slid it. Queue the action shots:

Our proudest maneuver however, and surely the gold medal winner if this were the Layman's-Snow-Play-for-a-Bunch-of-Desert-Dwellers-who Barely-Even-Own-a-Pair-of-Snow-Pants Olympics, was when all six of us piled onto our three tubes and slid down the hill linked together like some sort of centipede of death. Oh yeah. 

Did anyone break any bones? No. Did we cause a bit of a scene? Yes. Were small children looking at us like we were having more fun than them? Also yes. 

Once we had our fill of tubing we headed out to check a thing off our bucket lists. 

That thing: a freakin real life sleigh ride

Am I making this up? No. Is this picture photo shopped? Also no. This happened. I don't have a lot else to say about it because...like...just...UGH 😍

You can't hear it but there were even sleigh bells jingling (ring ting-ting a-ling too) around the horse's harnesses. Outside the snow had fallen and family was calling, "yoo hoo!." It was lovely weather for a sleigh ride together with you.

Sorry I'll stop. I had to.

You know that feeling you get when you have a really good day? Like, you can't stop smiling and your heart feels full and warm and you keep looking at all the pictures you took? These wonderful things are the things we remember all through our lives....ok FINE SORRY I said I'll stop. 

After our magical sleigh ride we headed back to the cabin, hung out for a bit, and then headed down the road to the Molly Butler Lodge for dinner. After we'd had our fill of steak and potatoes and bread and all the delicious things that fill you up after a long day of Christmas-ing so hard in the snow, we entered into a rousing game of Head's Up. The last time we played it we were in Sedona on a weekend Christmas trip, drunk-ish in the hotel lobby and it's a miracle we didn't get kicked out. Especially because my sister has a tendency to yell SO LOUD that you literally cannot hear anyone else. See look, she's standing up yelling louder than anyone, can't you hear her?

Of all of us, my dad is the worst at this game. Once people start shouting he gets a deer-in-the-headlight look and doesn't know who to listen to and doesn't know what to guess and so he just stares until his brain processes the six clues that have just been hurled at him. My mom finally had to be like, "GARY LOOK AT ME. GARY LOOK RIGHT HERE. GARY FOCUS HERE." It was funny. It was also funny when they were trying to get me to guess "Alamo" and my dad's hint was, "remember the...!" and I yelled "TITANS!" so sure I nailed it. It was a good movie ok, how could that not be the first thing that pops into your brain?

We went to bed late after yelling our hearts out at Head's Up, woke up Sunday and started to pack it up.

It was such a good and cozy and Christmas-y weekend and I'm not gonna lie, I felt a little bit like I was in a Hallmark movie all weekend which, I am totally ok with. Shenanigans in Cabin #90 coming to a Hallmark Channel near you 2020.