ITS ALIVE

I dedicate this blog post to Mallory, who has emailed me twice to make sure I'm okay due to the fact I haven't written in a couple of months. Mallory, rest assured all is well, and thank you for your avid reading and concern, you da best!

Where to start, where to start...

Christmas Family Reunion:
Christmas this year was extra awesome. I have TEN siblings, ya'll. So its fairly easy to get everyone together with their different job and school schedules and their children. The previous sentence is the biggest lie I've ever written in my blog.

We haven't had a reunion with everyone present in a decade, and we were still an in-law and two nieces and one nephew short, but we got close, and all of my immediate siblings were all under the same roof again, and it felt like old times.

There come to be some problems when you have ten kids, their spouses and their children under one roof. First of all, space. So apparently its my mom's motto that if you're not married you're bottom of the chain, so my younger sister and brothers and I had to sleep in the van in the garage for a couple of weeks.

Totally kidding.

But that is true about being lowest rank, which makes sense, I don't need much privacy and I don't have a husband or kids to sleep next to me, so its fine. I rotated from air mattress to couch to recliner chair every couple of nights, kept me on my toes.

Side note: I hate living out of a duffel bag, it never fails that when I get home and open my bag all the clothes I'm in the mood to wear are nowhere close to me, and all the clothes I packed are not appealing. Cut to me wearing my pajamas for half of vacation. Don't worry, we're in Minnesota, its 100% acceptable, I kid you not. My older brother Marcus has lived overseas and just recently moved to California with his family. He jumped up to go to Best Buy one night wearing sweatpants, mentioned he should go change before he left and then looked at me and said, "wait, this is Minnesota, i'm fine in this." I wasn't even fazed, and must have had a confused look on my face when he mentioned needing to change, I didn't think twice about his outfit. I once overheard girls saying people from Minnesota are "plain Jane, granola, homely" I was deeply insulted and thought it to be untrue, moved away from a  year and came back to visit and said, "whoa...we are" If I saw one more camo hoodie and sweatpants combo I would have lost it. God bless you, Minnesota, and God bless your sweatpants. In our defense, when you walk outside and instantly feel your hair and snot freeze, wearing anything besides a sweatsuit almost just kind of makes you look like an idiot.

Back to our giant reunion...it was awesome. I spent much time in the basement watching "Grey's Anatomy" I own the series on DVD and decided I wanted to watch the pilot episode because re-watching the first episode of series is always fun to me, ended up being a mistake, because I pretty much hibernated down there.

I got to snuggle and play with many nieces and nephews, get to know some sisters-in-law a lot better, laugh a bunch, wax my brothers back, you know, the usual ;) I also went back and worked a few shifts at Starbucks. Being home isn't the same if I don't work at least a couple times, I love our regulars and my co-workers like family, but being in a Starbucks in Target is dangerous. I along with half the American population have a Target addiction, where you walk up and down aisles finding stuff I think I "need" get to the check-out, walk back to my car, sit down and buckle my seat belt and say, "Whoa, I just spent 75 dollars, what did I even buy?" I definitely have about five of the same v-neck shirts, all in different colors, not to mention a disgusting amount of Burt's Bees Chapsticks which aren't sold on this island, and more nail polish colors than any girl will ever need. I need help.

Petri Dish
So you know when a kid goes to Daycare and ends up getting sick all of the time because of all the fellow children with germs? Okay, my house turned into a cesspool, not literally, as far as I know there was no underground disposal of human waste, but EVERYONE GOT SO SICK. Coming from all parts of the country with so many people and so many germs, it was just madness. I don't know who started this fiasco, but slowly each person came down with the same flu-like illness like a domino effect. Christmas Day half of my family were in the dark basement dying and throwing up simultaneously, yeah, that can happen. Cari and Piper got it the worst I think, they were both feeling pretty crappy most of the break which was really sad, Cari finally got her energy back once everyone had already gone home and break was almost over, isn't life funny...

All in all, break was awesome, enjoy these pictures, especially you, Mallory.

Some friends I met while I was in school at the Aveda Institute met me for dinner

The negative effects of a bright flash, also probably the cutest picture of me. Ever. 

A couple of my brothers, Amy, Andi and I went to the Mall of America to see Jared Allen (my favorite NFL player/dream husband) who was supposed to be on this radio interview that they were recording live from a restaurant, when we got there we learned Jared was a no show and had been replaced with our teams kicker, thats my face upon learning this, disgust and misery.

Cari and Grandma while we were at her house baking cookies, an annual tradition. This was our first Christmas without Grandpa and it was really weird to be in his house without him there. We miss him :(

The fruits of our labors

My nephews Quentin and Jackson, my niece Paige and my nephew Vince 

Getting Dairy Queen after dinner at Big Bowl in the mall. From left to right: My brother Dillon, his wife Amy, my sister Carina, my brother Tyler and myself. 

At the Mall of America waiting for people to get off of their rides

My sisters in law Katie and Amy, baby Vince and my little brother Tommy

Dippin' dots are THE best

Statues made entirely out of Legos, they're at least two stories high

My sister in law Katie, my brother Ben and myself

Me & Mum :)

Dillon, Hannah and me

My younger sister Hannah and me

Piper after being put under to get her cavities filled, she's crazy

I went on a date with my dad to a couple of my favorite places in Minnesota, both of which were in the city of course. I hope I can live right in the city someday, pretty spendy, though, I may have to live under a bridge like some sort of troll. This is one of my favorite views, taken from the Guthrie Theatre. 

My dad sippin' on his banana chocolate malt from Annie's Parlour

Fun date night with my Pops, one of my favorite nights from the break

Taking mom to get her first ever pedicure, can't believe that.

Helping my nephew sled, matching orange jackets and Vikings hats, what's up.

Vikings snuggie, best Christmas present ever. I guess I really like our team...

My parents, younger siblings Hannah and Tommy and Baby Vince all sporting their new St. Martin threads, and in Tommy's case, dreads. I love that even while we were taking a picture his eyes are kept on his Minecraft computer game.

One of my best Christmas presents ever, my best friend Christine flew to Minnesota from Florida, I hadn't seen her in over a year. 

The family showing off their white elephant gifts

I put in this nasty cheetah swimsuit cover up thing and my mom ended up with it and actually really loved it, so we
find that hilarious.

Back to the Island:

Our travel back to the island was fairly uneventful which is always good news when you're traveling with an unpredictable toddler. Our flight was a redeye so Piper was pretty stinkin' exhausted but she did really well, she loves airplanes and traveling. She begs us to pack our suitcases months before we're flying next, and every time she sees an airplane she makes sure I acknowledge it, whether its on TV or in real life. Funny girl. 

She started to get a little restless on the second flight, boredom was getting to her, I feel bad for those sitting on the row in front of her, because she was all over the place.

The first week back felt like a million years, getting back into our routines and dealing with a jet-lagged and messed up sleep schedule toddler was tiring, but things are picking up now thankfully and we're getting the hang of our busy lives again!

It's high season on the island now which means tourism here has picked up a lot during the winter months. The weather is also MUCH more bearable now than it was when we left. The summers here get TOO hot and when we got off the plane last weekend it was like a breath of fresh air with the breezes and cooler temperatures and less humidity. Hallelujah! Although I am still used to there not being many people on the island, so now that so many tourists are here the roads are jam packed, parking is even crazier, and tourist attractions look like this instead of the normal one or two people stopped at a tourist site.

Karma:
My boyfriend Pierre is a security guard at my apartment, he works overnights mostly every shift, so he's downstairs from 11pm to 7am. A couple of nights ago I was laying in bed restless, still trying to get back on a sleep schedule and I hear this super annoying sound. I was trying to brainstorm what it could possibly be, our neighbors wash machine is uneven and its shaking like crazy? Someone's doing construction at two in the morning? What. The. Deuce! Finally I message Pierre and tell him there's some super obnoxious noise and its driving me bananas and completely keeping me from sleep. Not to mention it was one of those noises that makes you feel like you're literally losing your mind because it would go for about 30 seconds and then the noise stops and you swear it won't come back again, but then it does. I could just visualize myself bald while someone drips water on my head until I lose my mind. Was the noise at all the equivalent to Chinese water torture? No. But I was really annoyed!

Pierre says he'll come check it out and doesn't hear anything from outside of the apartment and I told him that's because its happening in the wall that I share with our neighbors so he knocks on their door and they answer and they're very clearly cranky from being woken up, and he apologizes and says there's a noise complaint. He can't find any source of noise from their apartment so he comes into our apartment to listen, walks over to my box fan and unplugs it. No noise. I could have died. I felt like SUCH an idiot. He says "goodnight" and walks out. Hahaha. Apparently the remote for the fan was loose and rattling on the back of it so each time it rotated it would rattle. Whoopsie Daisies.

I love to play pranks on Pierre, because I think its so much fun, and also because he's such a good sport about it, he'll usually laugh and then doesn't get mad at all. So we were hanging out on Saturday night and grabbed some McChickens from McDonalds which is the equivalent of Pierre's life support, he LOVES McChickens. I feel like if you talk to him while he's eating one, he could hit you.

He goes to the bathroom and I unwrap his sandwich and take a bite of it, wrap it back up and put it in the bag. He comes back out and opens his sandwich, "Michelle, we have to take this back! Someone ate a bite of it! I think they gave me the wrong burger!" I totally go along with it and say wow that's so gross, I can't believe that. So as he's putting on his shoes to go I tell him I did it and he doesn't believe me, he just thinks I'm not interested in going back to McDonalds and makes me switch sandwiches with him. Germ freak.

Then we go to a beach and look at stars, they're so much prettier here than they are at home because there's far less light disruption and you can see them so much more clearly. When we get back to his house we discover there's a cockroach IN MY HAIR and I really thought I was going to die. Cockroaches are like the logo of the island, because they're everywhere and its so gross.

After I calm down and am getting ready to go home I grab my keys and am running down the stairs of his house to my car and completely biff it going down the stairs, I tumble down like fifteen stairs. The next morning I had these awful shooting pains on the front of my body and Cari was freaking me out with her med school knowledge thinking it was Appendicitis or something. I was almost certain that its just from falling and I was bruised and sore, thankfully after a couple days its feeling better and just more stiff than shooting pains and I'm glad I don't have appendicitis ha. Basically while I was laying at the base of the stairs I decided to stop playing tricks on my poor boyfriend because bugs and falling down stairs aren't worth it in the end. Booooooo.

I made a New Years Resolution to update the blog every two weeks. So I will keep striving for that, and also to take more pictures, so I put one of my cameras in my purse and am going to bring it with me everywhere now, get excited.

Come visit me if you start to develop seasonal depression from all the cold winter weather! I'd love to host and show friends and family around this little island thats becomes a second home.

Until next time!

Enjoy this sunset

Enjoy this extremely awkwardly posed photo

Piper says "hi, blog readers!"