December started off with Hannah's birthday. It also started off with Alex and me traveling to Brookings to visit my mother.
While there, I had my 60th birthday (Hannah threw me a "black" party for me on December 31st). Back in Fallon, Glen had arranged for the marquee at the old Fallon Theatres to broadcast it:
 |
| some misread that as my goth birthday and not my 60th--hence the black party for me |
 |
| Alex made us shrimp scampi for my birthday dinner! |
While in Brookings, Alex and I also were able to visit the annual Christmas light display at Azalea Park. I had gone once years ago when Hannah and I were visiting Brookings after Christmas. It's totally amazing!
 |
| Alex taking photos... |
Everyone was able to come home for Christmas! Eric even took the week off so we could spend lots of time together. We stayed up late, ate too much, enjoyed a little bit of snow, and played tons of games. COVID changed some of our gaming plans with the extended family, though. :(
Another really fun thing we did was something Hannah and Kaellen set up. They organized us into 2 groups, gave us different challenges, filmed us performing the tasks, and later showed us what everyone had done, and scored our challenges. It's from a show on YouTube (
https://www.youtube.com/c/Taskmaster).
The 2 groups had different challenges. Andrew won in his group (which included Alex, Glen, and Angeles). Eric won in my group (which also included Ryan and Heather). SO much fun! We laughed so hard.
Tasks included things like make your funniest noise (I did a Tarzan yell, which sadly was not good enough for me to win that challenge), eat 345 calories from an array of food in front of you (that was a task done in Glen's group), and do something that would look impressive when it is played backwards (another task from Glen's group).
The backwards challenge had 2 amazing entries: Andrew (who won the challenge) was filmed scrambling up 3 solved Rubik's cubes while blindfolded, which turned into the amazing feat of him blindly solving 3 cubes very quickly. Alex set up a complicated game with lots of pieces and then pushed all the pieces to the floor which then looked like he set up the complicated game in a few seconds.
 |
| Grandpa, Joy, and Henry making cookies for caroling |
 |
| these were for us |
 |
| Andrew, Henry, Joy, and Heather with their little snowman |
 |
| All ready for Santa to come |
 |
| Henry and Joy left out treats that Santa ate |
 |
Hannah is the pickle finder this year!
|
 |
| Joy |
 |
| Angeles, Andrew, Heather, Ryan (and Henry) |
 |
| Joy, (Eric), Hannah, Kaellen, (Alex), and Glen |
 |
| Let the show begin! |
 |
| Alex, Glen, Angeles, Andrew, and Henry watching their clips |
 |
| the clip of Glen trying to eat 345 calories from the food choices given |
 |
| We kept track of all the games, gamers, and winners |
Hannah had been planning on throwing me a birthday party inviting friends and family to come, but because of COVID, in the end there were just 8 of us (Andrew and his family had already left). Black clothes, black decorations, black fingernail polish, dark cake...
 |
| turning 60 is such a serious occasion |
 |
| we had Gary take a few photos of us...brrr |
