Internet, meet John

Thanks to the Christmas gift Smeegs got Butch this year, a corner of our basement now looks like this:
My husband is currently debating over whether a Karl Malone or D-Will fathead would best complete his shrine. Heaven help me.

I'm guessing this present was a large factor in Butch declaring this year's Christmas the best one of the four we have spent together. I would have to agree with his assesment, but not so much because of John as the fact that we got to spend lots of time hanging out with family, hitting the slopes, and, in my case, eating about ten pounds of baked brie. Hope your holidays were equally magical.

Christmas came early this year

When we bought our house the upstairs bathroom looked like this:

Pretty disgusting, eh? So Megan and I ripped everything out:
And Butch and his awesome Dad and brother rebuilt it to look like this:

Most of you are probably thinking "is that a shower cap hanging on the shelf?" Yes, yes it is. Don't judge me.

You're also probably thinking "Dang, that's some bright freaking paint." Exactly. When we were choosing paint for the bathroom the color I settled on was demurely named "English Apple" and appeared to be a lovely true green. Then we applied the paint to the walls and the result was quite different. To be honest I actually don't mind the way it looks in these photos all that much, but if you've been over to our house at night you probably remember that the bathroom walls gave off an eerie glow that resembled a nuclear plant or something. Not really the look I was going for.

I've been wanting to repaint the bathroom for some time now, but with all the other house projects we've had going on it was kind of low on the priority list. Plus I was not looking forward to taping off all the nooks and crannies and whatnot. I had mentioned to Mike that I wanted to repaint the bathroom as a Christmas project and even went so far as to pick out a swatch and sample can at Home Depot but didn't think we could really manage it during the Holiday break.

But then I came home from an annual "girls weekend" in Park City with Mike's mom and sisters on Saturday morning to find this sign posted on the bathroom door:

If you don't watch Arrested Development you're not going to get that particular joke, but the point is that I walked into the bathroom to see a Merry Christmas banner and the walls transformed into a lovely shade of robin's egg blue ("Zen" by Behr):

Turns out Butch and his friend Hansol had stayed up until 5 in the morning on Friday creating this Christmas miracle. As cliched as this sounds, I truly think this is the most thoughtful and unexpected gift I've ever received. My husband is awesome.

We continued our early Christmas celebration by heading up to Alta to test out the new ski gear we bought this season. Mike's parents were kind enough to give us money for new ski boots (me) and new skis (Butch) for Christmas and we wanted to try them out before our full ski day at Snowbird next week. So up to Alta we went, accompanied by Smash, Matt, and Smeaglett.

If anything could have made me love Butch more that day, it would be watching him ski. This is only his second season on skis after boarding for most of his life, but homeboy is already dropping cliffs and taking crazy tree runs with the rest of us. I hope our kids inherit his athleticism cause they sure aren't going to get it from me.

Of course we had to make a run to Molca Salsa afterward. Nothing tastes better after skiing than greasy Mexican food.
It's funny how, back in my high school and college days when I had a season pass and a schedule that allowed me to ski at my leisure, I totally took the experience for granted and only got truly thrilled about skiing on the most powderlicious of days. Now something as simple as an hour and a half of skiing (for free!) makes me feel positively giddy. I guess absence does make the heart grow fonder.

Hope all of you are having a wonderful holiday season!

Apparently all I want to write about is sports

Last night I was talking to Smash and she reminded me that the Patriots were playing the Jets on Monday Night Football. Of course I was out running errands all night so I couldn’t watch the game, and when Butch got home I told him that I really need to renew my former Patriots enthusiasm. To which he responded (in a lovely sarcastic tone) “oh, cause they’re 9 and 2 now?” And right then and there I was reminded of why I kind of hate being a Patriots fan in the first place.

See, my family lived in Boston when I was a kid and we more or less maintained loyalty to that region’s sports teams (or, more accurately, we cheered for whatever teams my jock older brother rooted for, and he remained loyal so the rest of us did too). I can’t stand watching baseball but I hate the Yankees on principle, cheer for the Celtics as soon as the Jazz make their exit from the NBA playoffs, and, when it comes to the NFL, the Pats are my team.

However, as mentioned above, I haven’t really been too invested in them for the past couple of years. This is mostly because I married someone whose loyalties lie more with the NBA than the NFL, and, with the Jazz schedule being as packed as it is, my weekly sports-watching quota is usually met long before the Sunday football games air. But it’s also because being a Patriots fan has kind of sucked ever since they beat the Rams in the Superbowl and went on to dominate the NFL for the next couple of years. During that era I dreaded telling anyone I was a Patriots fan, as I could see the word “bandwagon” forming on their lips before I could even finish a sentence. Superbowl parties also became bittersweet, as my siblings and I were usually the only ones cheering for New England while everyone else was pulling for the underdog. It was indeed lonely at the top.

Then came the Patriots’ inevitable fall from grace, with the whole Belichick cheating scandal, the disastrous Superbowl of ’07 (even my Benedict Arnold of a husband cheered for the Giants), and the tabloid spectacle created by Tom Brady ditching his Baby Mama for Giselle “my body is ridiculously hot” Bundchen. Hoo boy. Rough times indeed.

But the Pats have pulled through it and, after owning the Jets’ trash last night, are 10-2 and looking like the football team that I know and love. So by returning from my NFL-watching hiatus it looks like I might once again find myself cheering for the “bandwagon” team that everybody wants to see lose; the team that has nowhere to go but downhill. As much as I hate to make this comparison, it kind of makes me feel like a Lakers fan (except not really, cause the Lakers suck). But hey, it could be worse. I could be a Cincinnati Bengals fan. Am I right, Phil?

One thing’s for sure. I would have an easier time cheering for my beloved Patriots if the quarterback didn’t resemble a mulleted, post-pubescent Justin Beiber. Tom Brady, please cut your freaking hair. I don’t care if you’re balding, you look like an idiot.