"Ohhhh, I'm the happiest Christmas tree!"

Ho-ho-ho, hee-hee-hee!

Another Christmas has come and gone. This year was a special one, to be sure. It's not often that our entire family is gathered in one place and especially rare (particularly in the near to distant future) for us all to be home in Colorado at the same time. As an added bonus, everyone (for the most part) remained healthy! That was quite a victory, let me tell you.

So let's see if I can be succinct, I'll make my best attempt but can't guarantee success.

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As you can see by my fancy symbolic representation of the passage of time, I got distracted. AND, I keep wanting to write about the new year but feel obligated to catch up by covering Christmas first. Ergo, I'm going to resort to a pictorial (totally thought it was pictoral, but Google tells me it has an i) recap. If I'm feeling ambitious you may get a few more words for clarity's sake, but don't hold your breath (not sure why you would in this instance, but it seemed the thing to say). I know, I'll do some headings.

We'll start with "Reenactment of 1999 Family Photo Shoot, in which the famous dogpile pose was replicated"

Eating Cereal

(Don't worry, they get better)

With my Oregon niece and nephew

(See?)

And all we had to say to entice James to turn around was "Katie is doing it!"

"The Guys"

Supermom. Seriously.

Some Christopher-directed love

(Can you see it? Cause I totally can)

The Blizzard

Baking

Cuteness.

Three words: "Just keep [scrolling]."

Watching Meet Me in St. Louis

(Natalie caught me)

Our Cute Tree.
The Perfect Petersons

(Sorry, it's either that or perennial, for some reason that's all I got right now)

The Wonderful Whitmers

The Book

A Michael Ciaglo Original

The superheroes.

Natalie's awesome DVD grab bag present

(My finger was supposed to be aimed at the DVD, not myself...my bad)

Our oh so indescribably delicious Christmas feast.

A stocking stuffer mastered.

(Those five tops are spinning in a tower!)

The man of our Christmas Eve pajama hour

"Peak the Strategy!" (i.e., the name of Michael's band)

Random

(Wearing all my scarves at the same time before packing them up)

First things first: I apologize, Thanksgiving.

I'm ashamed. I missed a holiday (in the blogging sense). Me, missing a holiday? I love holidays! I'm a Hansen! I'm the daughter of a holiday fairy! I've neglected Thanksgiving! That poor holiday that is already so overshadowed and I inadvertently contributed to its minimization...well better late than never. Let's start with a picture (I kind of took a short hiatus from taking pictures, so this is about all I have and it's thanks to my dutiful younger sister):

And it's a good thing Natalie caught this one when she did, because this is what followed!

Oh Daddy, you make me laugh. We had a nice Thanksgiving holiday with my mom's side of the family in Syracuse, UT. We ate some yummy food, enjoyed the break from school/work, and took advantage of some Black Friday deals...many of you are aware that my participation as a consumer didn't stop there and I happily continued my shopping trends on Cyber Monday as well. It's true, I (the very same Jamie, I assure you) have found a way I enjoy shopping: online (gotta say, I'm kind of huge fan of Amazon now) and/or with Natalie (seriously, she makes any excursion way fun, but particularly shopping adventures; I wouldn't have wanted to brave Target at midnight on Black Friday with anyone else!).

Anywhich (ooh, that's a new one!), my new-found materialism aside, we also had the opportunity to attend little Christopher's blessing--for some reason I smile at the pairing of "little" with Christopher, oh that's right, maybe this is why:

Love those cheeks little man! It was a lovely, delightful, pleasant, enjoyable holiday. Gratitude abounded. Much and many thanks were expressed. No pilgrims, but family and plenty of food.

And so ends this official blog-style commemoration of Thanksgiving, 2011. Apologies for my tardiness.