A Good, Old-Fashioned Christmas (Somewhat Literally)

One of the things we we're most excited this Christmas season was getting a real tree. After we got married, Cary Anne's aunt was nice enough to send us a hand-me-down artificial tree. But Cary Anne's family used to go out some years and chop down their own tree and my family always had a real tree, too, so we missed that. Towards the start of December, CA, Kelly, and I walked to our local garden center to find the right tree. After winding our way through dozens and dozens of pines, we finally found one that seemed tall and full enough and reasonably priced. The half a dozen block walk there didn't seem so bad, but for some reason felt longer when we were carrying the tree.
"I should have done more push-ups before attempting to carry this thing," I said.
"Then you would've just been sore," Cary Anne replied.
"No, I mean more push-ups in life. Not just today."
When we finally got the thing up to our 3rd-floor walk up, CA and I prepared the tree stand while Kelly removed sap from our clothes using peanut butter. Over the next couple of weeks, we decked the thing out in lights and ornaments and ribbons.

After the tree was up, the rest of the holiday season was exactly what you would expect. Our church Community Group had an ugly sweater party, where we spent the night eating lots of snacks and playing games. We also made a short weekend trip down to Lexington in the middle of December since we decided to spend the week of Christmas in Virginia with Cary Anne's family. It was a ridiculously short trip: 13 hours of driving for less than 40 hours of visiting. But we did at least get see family and friends. I even stopped back in at Krispy Kreme to say hello and get some free donuts.

The Friday before Christmas, we flew into DC to meet up with Cary Anne's parents, along her brother and his wife who had flown in a few days before. The next day, we all crowded into the van and headed down to Colonial Williamsburg.

Ever since I've known Cary Anne, she has talked about how much she loves Europe and desires to move away from America. But that attitude completely changes when it comes to Colonial Williamsburg. Whenever I would make fun of it, she would vehemently defend it like she was the daughter of Uncle Sam himself. Christmas in Williamsburg is a bit of a family tradition for CA's family, but they hadn't been since 2007, so CA was excited...maybe too excited.

We spent the week exploring the rustic, old buildings and meeting all of the character actors: the wig maker, the cobbler, the butcher, the baker, the candle stick maker. Cary Anne enjoyed learning about their sewing techniques, and I enjoyed watching the men fire off the cannons. During the day we would explore the old Govenor's hedge maze, and at night we'd all head back to the resort where we would eat dinner as a family and play games. The weather was pretty nice, too. It was so warm on Christmas day that Cary Anne and I went to play mini golf, which is an activity I never thought I take part in on Christmas day.

Overall, it was great trip and fun opportunity to bond more with CA's side of the family, but it's always nice to come home again.

Winter's Arrival

Back at the end of 2011, Cary Anne started telling me she needed new rain boots. She would go to her closet, pull out her boots, and yell "Look! Look at how cracked these are! They don't even keep water out!" Soon, she came home from work talking about how she found the perfect pair of rain boots at a shop downtown for a mere $125. Of course, after our big move to Chicago, we couldn't exactly rush out and spend that kind of money, but CA insisted she wouldn't be able to survive the sleet and snow of winter without reliable boots.

"All you need is a big pair of galoshes," I insisted.
"That's all I want, but they're harder to find than you think!"
"We just need to go to Walmart."

In Lexington, Walmart was a 5 minute drive down the road. Here, we have to make a 20-minute cruise out to the suburbs. I was under the impression that all Walmarts are basically carbon copies, but when we walked through the doors, I realized the Lexington Walmart was actually a "nice" Walmart. The Walmart here is cramped and dingy, and the width of the aisles can make you feel claustrophobic. When we finally made it to the boots, we discovered that organization is apparently optional at this Walmart. The boots were basically in a large pile which you had to sift through to find your appropriate size. After about 15 minutes of digging, Cary Anne had 3 boots, and though they were all the right size, they were all also for her left foot. For every boot of the wrong size we found, we tried to place them back on the shelf in an understandable order, but I told CA she could probably throw every one as far as she could in separate directions and no one would notice. Eventually, we did find a full pair of boots for Cary Anne, and I bought myself a box of Skittles as a reward for only spending $23, rather than $125.

It was a good thing Cary Anne got new boots, because we recently received two substantial snow storms here in the Windy City. When we first started telling people we were moving to Chicago at the start of November, all people seemed to talk about was the weather. They reacted as if we were Napoleon telling them we were going to invade Russia at the start of winter. However, despite all the talk, up until last week, winter had been freakishly mild here, with most days lingering in the mid-40s. (I was not expecting to still be riding the Vespa around town at the start of January.) Then, about 10 days ago, roughly 8-inches of snow accumulated over about 18 hours of straight snowfall. Now I feel like we're getting a taste of the Chicago winter I was expecting to experience. Here are a couple photos I took of the lake during a more recent snow storm that dumped about 4-5 inches...

A few days after that first big snow, my parents returned for another short visit thanks to my dad's job. On Tuesday, I gave mom a tour of all the places Cary Anne and I go on a regular basis, since the first time she visited we had just moved to town and had yet to develop any sort of routine. The tour ended with us seeing Skygate (aka- "The Bean") and picking up CA from work. That night, after Pops finished up with training, he headed into town and helped me change the headlight in mine and Cary Anne's car (meaning he changed the light while I held the flashlight). Then, we all headed down to The Pony for dinner. The Pony is Chicago's bar of choice for UK alum, so they show all the sports games. That night, we got to enjoy the men's basketball team demolish Arkansas. During commercial breaks, there was a trivia contest. While we could answer some of the more basic questions about Kentucky on our own, I often texted my brother when it came to the more detailed sports questions. In the end, Jon led us to a 1st place victory, and a $30 gift card prize. It was a great evening all around. Now if we could only get more people than just my parents to visit.

A Bluegrass Christmas (less banjos than you might think)

Several weeks ago, Cary Anne and I began getting in the holiday spirit by decorating our place. Despite the fact that our apartment is already cramped, we decided to lose a little more square footage by putting up a tree. Last year, after Christmas, we bought a star on sale, and this year we learned that the thing is just a bit to heavy for our hand-me-down artificial tree, so it's almost constantly leaning at a 45 degree angle.

Originally, we were hoping to get to spend Christmas in Virginia this year considering we haven't been back there since our wedding last year and we haven't seen Cary Anne's parents in over 6 months. Sadly, with our limited time off and limited income, a quick weekend trip down to Lexington became a much more practical plan.

So last Friday, the 23rd, I drove downtown to pick CA up from work around 4pm. It was my first time driving the car into the heart of the city. It was rush hour, and it was not a pretty sight. I quickly learned you basically need to have zero value for your fellow human beings in order to get anywhere. You know, real holiday spirit stuff.

Chris and I aren't as great at posing for
pictures as Cary Anne and Hannah.

We arrived in Lexington shortly after midnight and immediately headed to bed since we had made plans to meet our friends Chris and Hannah for coffee at 9am the next morning. Nothing says vacation like waking up at 8am. Over lattes, Chris and Cary Anne exchanged stories about working at a law office while Hannah and I pretended to be interested. (Click their names for a link to their blog. They haven't updated in 6 months so feel free to leave them a nasty comment.)

After coffee, we headed out to Paris, Kentucky, to my "Cousin" Judy's horse farm. (She is technically my father's cousin. Not sure what that makes her in relation to me...?) We've started a bit of a tradition of sharing brunch out there around Christmas time, and it was great to see everyone since CA and I had to miss out on the annual Thanksgiving get-together last month.

Of course, the only thing better than a delicious, filling meal shared with family is the glorious nap time that follows. After dozing for a couple of hours, Cary Anne and I headed out to Southland Christian, the church we used to attend in Lexington, where we met up with our friend Al and her family for the candle light Christmas Eve service. As expected, it was a beautiful event.

The next morning we got up and went to the church I was raised in during my teenage years and the church my parents still attend, Rosemont Baptist. Like Christmas brunch, it was a time filled with hugs and "Good to see you"s and "How's Chicago?"s. It's always fun to go back there and see the things that have changed and the things that never will.

After church, we threw some logs on the fire and my uncle Bob came over for present opening time. There was a chorus of "Ooohhs" and "Yaays" and "Don't worry, I saved the receipt," and overall, everyone came away with some great presents. Cary Anne and I got new covers from basically everyone since we recently moved to an icy tundra (though at this point in winter, Lexington has accumulated more snow than Chicago.) Later, in true Hall family fashion, my dad changed the oil in our car. Apparently, that guy can't even catch a break from mechanical work on Jesus' birthday.

After that, Cary Anne and I hopped around town a bit to visit some more friends. First, we stopped in at the Kelly's, where we got to catch up with Kate as she shared stories from her first semester working for Teach for America on a Native American reservation in South Dakota. We also got to play with puppy she rescued/adopted during her time on the reservation. Then, we hopped over to Waffle House for a late night snack with our friend Sharonda, and we all stuffed ourselves on greasy breakfast food as she shared the latest antics from her job.

The next day, our small vacation came to an end as we journeyed home. However, on the way, we were fortunate enough to get to stop in Cincinnati to meet some friends from Cumberland, Laura and Allison, for lunch. For some reason, Allison decided that meeting at a restaurant attached to a mall the day after Christmas was a smart idea, but we managed to fight the crowds. Allison shared her adventures from her first semester as a teacher in Winston-Salem, and Laura filled us in on all the latest Cumberland gossip.

Overall, it was a great Christmas weekend. 

Settling Down, Settling In

Well, we've certainly been keeping busy since our last update. First, on Sunday, my parents stopped in for a visit. My dad's job sent him up for some new training, and of course my mother couldn't pass up the opportunity to stop by and see our new place. Since my parents are tourists (and Cary Anne and I are barely more than tourists), we decided to head down to Navy Pier for the evening, where my mom enjoyed souvenir shopping and Pops enjoyed looking out at the boats.

That same day, word came from Colorado that Cary Anne's brother, Marshall, had proposed to his girlfriend of a year, Mackenzie. Their first date was mine and Cary Anne's wedding, so we like to believe that we had something to do with it. We all knew the proposal was coming, so it was nice to finally see it come to fruition. Back in August, Marshall moved across the country from Virginia to be closer to Mackenzie so it's good that things worked out, because if not I can only imagine how awkward it would have been.

On Monday, my Kentucky license expired so we headed to the nearest DMV so I could get a Illinois license, and it was...crowded, to say the least. When I would renew my license at the DMV closest to us in Lexington, it wasn't uncommon for the employees to outnumber the customers, but at the Chicago location it looked like a crowd waiting outside a Best Buy on Black Friday.

Luckily, despite the sea of people, my number was called in about 20 minutes. I guess when Illinois officials envision the streets of Kentucky they see a lot of horses and tractors because they didn't trust me enough to give me a license without making me retake the written test. Before going, I had reviewed the more obscure info in the state handbook, and I kept spouting off little tid bits to Cary Anne on our way to the DMV. Know what the punishment would be if I got convicted of illegally passing this school bus, babe? A three month suspension of my license and a $150 fine. In the end, my studying paid off because I passed with a perfect score.

After our trip to the DMV, we headed out to the suburbs to see my parents one last time before they headed home. Since we were already out west, I couldn't resist stopping by the local Krispy Kreme, since there are none in the actual city. The place was roughly twice the size of the store I worked at in Lexington, with a large sitting area, two production lines, and bays for the delivery trucks to back right up to the warehouse. I sent this picture to my old boss, Clayton, with the message, "They have chocolate cake!" Our store stopped making chocolate cake back at the start of the year, and I think Clayton is still bitter about it.

On Tuesday, Cary Anne and I headed to our weekly Bible study. We've been attending the Edgewater campus of Community Christian Church since we've been here in Chicago. Community Christian is a church that started out in Naperville, and has sprouted satellite campuses all over Chicagoland. The Edgewater campus, right now, is basically 25 people meeting in a rented out art studio, a big change from the mega-church we attended back in Lexington. 

After the Bible study, our group of 7 decided to head out and do some chalking, which is basically diet graffiti with a positive message. Apparently, this is something the Edgewater campus has been doing basically since they launched a few months back, so once a week we go out and use chalk to write short, encouraging notes on the the sidewalk for people to read on their way to work the next day. At first I thought the idea was a bit silly, but as the night went on, people kept coming up to us talking about how they had seen the chalking before and how much they enjoyed it. So, my attitude quickly started to change as I realized even the smallest gestures can have meaningful impacts. All in all, it was a great evening and really made us feel like we are actually starting to settle in here.