Christmas Crazies: Utah Trip

At sort of the last minute, we decided to tag along with my parents and Kenji to attend my cousin's wedding in Bountiful:

It was a beautiful occasion, and I am happy that we went.

Considering it was really just a weekend trip+two days' driving each way, I'm pretty proud of how much we were able to cram in. 

How did we survive road trips before hand-held technologies?

First of all, a sad note: We brought Pugslee with us on the trip, snuggled up in his dog bed.

This ended up being the last picture taken of him. He had a long life, and I think the long drive and super cold weather in Utah was too much for him, and he died the night of the wedding. 

You may not want to know the rest of the story, so I'm not going to include that quite yet. Maybe if I get requests.

Joel's mom got the flu right before Christmas and had to cancel her plans of coming to Oklahoma/Texas for the holiday. Sad. So she drove down to Bountiful from Boise to see us, and we had another mini Christmas!

Pretty dress for Pretty Junie

Mom always gives the greatest tea parties for her grandkids. Traveling tea parties!

We also got to spend some time with my aunt and uncle, who just adored June:

Dane, too.

June was screaming in every photo, except the one where the rest of us decided to scream.

We also spent some quality time with Evan & Holly and Cindy & Eric. It was great (and always hilarious!) to catch up with them. 

But we were especially grateful to spend time with George & Melanee, who even let us stay with them! We always have such a great time hanging out with them. We ate delicious food thanks to Melanee, and we got to hang out with Megan, too, despite her busy schedule. 

We always stay up late into the night, which is probably why we never get pictures. They would just be pictures of us sitting on the couch in our pajamas, mouths awkwardly positioned in the middle of speaking. But one of these days we need to document it.

But, since I don't have any pictures of all of us, I'll post these random pictures I happened upon:

Joel and George chatting at our wedding open house, circa 2004:

I can't even remember when this was; it must have been after a football game or something. 

Blast from the past, George! And I found a couple photos of George and Melanee and Samantha at BYU graduation. Pretty fun.

Anyway, it was a whirlwind trip, and June slept terribly. Silly goose. Don't know what we're going to do with her. But I think the trip cured of her impossibly picky eating, because she eats much better now. Weird?

Dane and June promptly reacquainted themselves with their toys upon our return:

And I finally managed to finish the very belated grandchildren quilt I made for Joel's mom. It turned out pretty well, I think.

And finally, we had fun over the holidays morphing our photos together on MorphThing.com. This is one of all five Hood siblings. Kind of creepy, huh? Especially thanks to Kenji's facial hair. Dane keeps looking at it, saying, "That's Mika. Wait, no. It's you, Mommy. Or maybe it's Kenji. Who is that?" I'm probably enjoying messing with his mind a little too much.

Christmas Crazies: PRESENTS!!

Now, we all know that Christmas isn't really about the presents. But don't you think you gain some interesting insight into people by observing what they give and get each other?

No?

Case in point:

Can you see the glint of joy and utter surprise as my dad opened up the medical grade scale that my mom got him?

Weird present, right? How many of the rest of you had a huge scale sitting in the living room when all the presents were opened? To be clear, the scale is STILL sitting in the living room. Used daily.

This is a strange present, except perhaps when you consider the fact that my dad had a heart attack over 5 years ago, after which he lost a lot of weight and has kept it off remarkably well.

Also, consider the fact that we are a nerdy type of family that likes things to be exact. 

Case in point:

I don't think that gift really needs any explanation, except that the creepy, stalker-ish tendencies of Google worked in my favor this Christmas. Somehow it knew that somewhere out there, the perfect combination of Star Trek and Cycling jersey would find a happy home in the Hood household.

Cute Mika and her cute money tree (thank you, Pinterest.)

Christmas Eve pajamas for the kids:

Mom realizing what the framed recital program meant:

Kenji wearing the hat I bought him immediately after he sent me the link and said, "I might want this." I had to jump on it. Brothers are hard to shop for. He was so happy to get it.

I think.

Dane and Uncle Brady:

June-in-the-box, wearing the adorable jacket from Jiichan & Baachan.

Rika and I playing our traditional and impossible Nutcracker Duets:

Oh, and did you notice? Our photos look suddenly way better now! We got a fancy new DSLR for Christmas! I am so happy! And I also learned that taking a semester of high school photography back in 1999 (read: before digital) doesn't make for a knowledgable photographer.

Christmas Crazies: Music

Whew. We had so much going on over the holidays that I, unsurprisingly, wasn't able to update the blog. Further, I can't possibly put it all in one post, so I'm going to have to break it all up. Hopefully I can get them all up in a timely manner.
Man, my write-ups have gotten boring.

Christmas is a musical time of year, and this year, we were musical to the MAX!

Early in the year, we found out that Craig Jessop, former director of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, was coming to Oklahoma to direct an epic choir/orchestra concert. I think it was a cosmic inevitability that the Hood family be heavily involved in such an event. For months, Rika and I (well, mostly I--Rika was a slacker) spent every Sunday evening accompanying my mom's stake's choir, dragging our husbands along to sing.

Then, the orchestra rehearsals began. They were...kind of maddening, but it was still fun to be in an orchestra again. I do love playing in an orchestra.
Then, the big, two-concerts-in-one-day extravaganza! The performances went well, despite a little mishap. Right before the second performance, I was adjusting my shoulder rest (which was kind of dumb of me to do right then, but anyway). I unscrewed the little nut that holds the feet on and promptly dropped it, then watched helplessly as it rolled off into the chasm under the stage. Luckily, the feet held okay for the rest of the concert.
Also, I cried.
Not because I was moved by the music (though it was moving) but because I was trying so hard to suppress a big coughing spell. I only sort of succeeded, but I hope I wasn't distracting.
We all got to meet Craig Jessop and impress him with our musical family (plus one friend from Japan).

Mom's Christmas Recital

For our Christmas present to my mom this year, we put on a family recital, complete with every sibling performing a special piece. Even Kenta, who couldn't travel, recorded a piano piece that we played for our larger than expected audience. 

I, for one, have not practiced regularly in years and haven't taken lessons in even longer. It was looking pretty bad until I finally decided I needed some help and took up violin lessons again. They make me happy.

I think the photos tell the rest of the story on their own.