Home.

Thank you Kyle for all you do. For being stuck on a ship, spending thanksgiving and Christmas on the flight deck for a steel beach picnic. For working long hours for endless days with not much free time. Sacrifices.

I knew I'd be alone this year for some major holidays, so I had planned a while back to head home over Christmas. Luckily I drew Christmas Eve as a bonus PTO day at work so vacation wasn't totally blown before the upcoming Panama trip in February.

I flew to Phoenix late on the 23rd and stayed with my sister and brother in law. Saturday I flew to Duluth, MN on a cheap charter flight with 1/3rd of passenger being below the age of 6. Birth control. Sat next to a super nice girl from Wisconsin who bought a 2nd beer for me after I'd been kicked non stop since takeoff.

I got the white Christmas I paid for as it had snowed right before I came. [although it has already melted]

Christmas was spent at my parents house. My mom had 26 relatives over for dinner on Christmas day. Craziness for sure. White elephant was the hit of the day. Silly Smith sisters.

Monday we went to Duluth for some shopping, food, and a Christmas light display called Bentleville [after the founder's name]. Pretty, but it's a pretty big use of energy. The biggest steel Christmas tree in North America. Monday was the last night so they had a fireworks show.

The best part was it was free!! Something like this in CA would cost 20 bucks to get into and charge ridiculous amounts for hot chocolate coffee and cookies. Yeah those were free too!! Half way around they had fire pits and gave out roasting sticks with marshmallows!! Did I mention it was free?! Seriously, sharp metal sticks and open flame fire pits and no waivers or restrictions? This cannot be 2011.

Tuesday was spent running, which I'll save for a different post. My parents made a delicious dinner and I got to see my old friend Kelly, who also has a husband is deployed. [to a much scarier place with the Army] I finished off the night spending some quality time with the dog on the couch watching The Cutting Edge.

Writing this from the blogger app on my phone. Excuse the typos. On our way to MSP for errands, friends and I'm flying out tonight. Back to the warmness of San Diego.

Thanks to my dad and mom for everything. I hadn't been home for 2 years and that was too much.