Dedicated to the One I Love

On New Year's Eve, (behind in posting again, I know...) Jon and I reached our 10 year anniversary.  I know, I know - who would have thought we'd make it this long?  Well, I did for one, and Jon too.  We have never had any doubt that we will spend this life together and then the eternities.  Following with our tradition, which started the year we got married, we celebrated our marriage on the 1st of January, clear of all the crazy people and crowds.  This year, we got a hotel room with a jacuzzi tub and went out to sushi for dinner.  It was lovely.  We spent more time in the tub than anywhere - heavenly.  My future house will have one of those, from which I will conduct all of my business.  

And now, for your reading pleasure, a list of things that I love love love about my husband...

His sense of humor

The fact that even when I don't want to laugh at him, I can't help it

His guitar playing/singing

The way he puts me to bed when I fall asleep on the couch or on top of the covers

The way he holds me every night while we fall asleep

How he looks like Josh Groban when he grows his hair out

That he likes to cuddle

His tolerance of my endless reading

His kisses

His hugs

That he is such a wonderful daddy

His height

His appetite

The fact that he laughs at my jokes and voices

Our inside jokes

The times when he pulls thoughts out of my head and says them before I can

His willingness (and desire) to see Twilight and then talk about it ad nauseum with me

The way he calls me "Beautiful" like it is my name

That he knows about my guilty pleasures and doesn't tease me about them

That he puts up with my occassional nueroses

The way he takes care of me

His ability to remain married to me 

The fact that he is my best friend

He believes he can do anything

He believes I can do anything

His self confidence

The way he thinks more of me than I do

His constant support of me in all things

The fact that he joined his life to mine

That is not everything - there are a million little things that he does and is that I can't remember at the moment or can't post on here ;) But that gives you the jist of it.

It's The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Or at least it was...

I have a disease assosciated with blogging.  It is something akin to bulemia.  I go for weeks at a time, binging with my camera, taking dozens and dozens of pictures, hoarding them to myself, until finally I feel so guilty for my gluttony that I purge, vomiting everything all over you at once in the form of five new blog posts in one day.  Well, no more.  I am breaking the cycle of bad behavior. Becoming healthier, as it were.  Call it a resolution.  And the cycle of healing will begin with this one post - that is right - ONE post, highlightinging the things that I have not been sharing with you over the last several weeks.  And if this one post turns out to be just as long as those five separate posts would have been, just remember, sickness isn't cured in just one day.

December was a busy month, as it is for so many of you out there.  I had planned to post lists of my favorite and not-so-favorite Christmas songs for your enjoyment, but as that time has clearly passed you will have to wait until next year.  In a second-annual Joyner tradition, we traveled to Sacramento to watch the Santa parade, which came later in the year this time around due to financial difficulties.  We were joined this year by the Sartains, minus Tim, and rather than drive the whole way we thought we would try our luck on the Light Rail, Sacramento's regional transit system.  

While we waited in the parking lot, we were joined by a festive group of prisoners who came by to wish us a Merry Christmas (or clean the parking lot, but who knows?)  We boarded the train, waved goodbye to our new friends, and were off on our way to the parade.  Once there, we chose our spot and sat down to wait in the toasty 35 degree weather.  Afterwards, we walked the seven children cattle-drive style back to the Light Rail, where we enjoyed a nearly standing-room-only ride back to our car.  Sadly, the inmates were gone.

We attended Anna's choir concert.

We also attended a Christmas concert in which Hailey took part.

We decorated for the holiday...

We had our traditional Christmas Eve breakfast with our friends the Hunts...

and our traditional Joyner-Alston Christmas Eve dinner, complete with nativity scene.

No children were accidentally thrown away with the wrapping paper in the chaos of opening presents on Christmas morning...

and we evaded road closures and survived being shuttled through the snow to get to my Dad's for Christmas dinner.

For New Year's Eve, the Joyners and Sartains were treated to dinner at the Eastern Max Chinese buffet by the Aby, of which the only picture is the aftermath...

Somewhere in the middle of all that December fun we also made a trip to Utah to attend a funeral.  It was a very busy month, and by the end, we were pretty much ready to say goodbye to 2008 and hello to a new year.  So there you are - I feel much better now, not quite so full and ashamed of myself ;)