I haven't had a Christmas with my family since 2008, so it was a big deal when Tyler and I were able to drive to South Dakota and spend it with my family.
The drive. Was. Awful. It was our plan to drive 6.5 hours to Laramie and stay with my cousin and her husband, Mary and Kevin, then drive the rest of the way to Rapid City the next morning.
We finally got on the road around 2pm, and it was dark by 4pm. Visibility was TERRIBLE! I'm not sure I'll ever have anxiety about driving in a snow storm again, because I don't think I will experience a storm worse than the one we drove through on I-80 that day. I can honestly say that there were multiple times where all I could do was say a prayer and trust that we were going to stay on the road.
So FINALLY, after 8.5 horrific hours, we made it to Laramie! We all (Tyler and I, Mary, Kevin, Alissa, Seth, Blake, and Robin) sat around and chatted for a bit before going to bed.
In the morning, I woke up and heard Tyler talking with Seth about how there were multiple highways closed due to snow, and immediately my anxiety sky-rocketed. (For those of you that don't know this about me, I have anxiety, though lucky for me, it's not something that affects my day-to-day life, only when stressful things are coming up. But when I do have anxiety, it tends to make me feel sick...like...about-to-throw-up sick.) After much vomiting, I received a blessing from Tyler and Kevin, which helped A LOT, and then we planned for the next drive. We finally hit the road again only after stopping at McDonald's for breakfast and by this time I was feeling much better about this leg of the trip with the sun up and shining bright. It took us probably about 7 hours to get to Rapid City, but it felt like 2 hours compared to the hellish drive from the night before.
Throughout the Christmas weekend, we played games, went shopping, watched home videos, cuddled and snuggled (mostly Maisy and I), teased Abby, ate some awesome meals that our mom made, laughed and goofed off. It was way fun!!
The morning we left for the long drive, we stopped at Tyler's parents to have Christmas with them before we left, and I LEFT my CAMERA there!! I was so mad, I cried when I realized it. We were already an hour and a half away, so we couldn't turn around.
With that being said- you'll understand why there are hardly any pictures from Christmas. (My mom let me use her camera, but it was huge and didn't have "auto" so I didn't take very many pictures.)
So, Christmas this past year was pretty awesome. We had such a great time and I can't wait for when the entire family can be together again for a holiday.
Love you guys!!