All I Want For Christmas

Oh Christmas. Our Christmas seemed to start right after Thanksgiving when we went to Elf with Ana and Matt. I failed to put these pictures in my previous post, so here they are.

December was a very full month, but mainly full of fun things so I'm not complaining! It started off with us going to a Christmas party thrown by some friends in the ward. Overall the night was really fun, but it did start out some what stressful. I had worked that morning and because we hadn't been able to get to the temple in November (and the temple was closed in October) Ben came with me to work so we could head to the temple together once I was off. By the time we got home it was about an hour before the party. We check the mail because our white elephant gift was supposed to arrive by then. As I was walking to the mail I see a man in a white mail van go to the office door, see that it's closed, and drive away. When we check the status of the package on amazon it now says that delivery was attempted and the person wasn't home. WHAT?! First off, amazon always drops off packages in front of your door. Secondly, that man did NOT try and see we were home at all. (We have learned since this incidence that some of our amazon delivery people are the worst and never even try to drop it off at your apartment. They just dump them all at the office. The other day we had three packages at our door from amazon and only the top one was actually addressed to us.) So by this time I'm fuming. All my middle school insecurities are rushing back to me as I contemplate us being the only people without a real white elephant gift. I will not be the kid that brings the unwanted present! I'm not reliving 7th grade math class! Also, around this same time I have this horrible feeling that we were supposed to bring a treat with us to this party. I reread the invitation and it definitely says bring a dessert or favorite dish to share. I was so focused on thinking of a cool white elephant gift that I totally spaced it! So now we've got 40 minutes to whip something up. Ben goes racing to Walmart as I start preparations on some peanut butter kiss cookies. By the time we arrive at the actual party I'm grumpy, stressed, and dreading the moment we tell everyone our present is actually empty. After mingling for a bit and eating some of the treats people brought our moods lifted a bit. Then we played some group games which were a lot of fun! At the white elephant gift exchange people seemed to be okay with the fact our present would need to be delivered a little later and let us play along. It was pretty fun even though the gift we ended up with was pretty useless. It is a water fountain thing. Something you'd have at an office or something. Apparently it was a gift from last years party and when the lady went home with it she immediately stuck it in her closet to be her gift for the next year. So I guess we will keep it just in case we get invited to this same party this December. Also, there was this terrifying moment when I thought we were going to go home with a real fish. Luckily, the host of the party took pity on me because she saw my face as I opened it. Pets are bad enough if they are cute! I'm not taking care of no fish! Also, I have no clue where we would have put it. Maybe on the back of the toilet? And then one day if I accidentally tip the bowl over and the fish happens to fall into the toilet.... Anyways, it was a good thing we didn't go home with that fish.

The next weekend we had two Christmas parties. The ward party on Friday and a doctor party on Saturday. I could not WAIT to get the ward party over with. We were in charge of the service project. Recently, some experiences with different callings has made me realize that problems arise when you are put "in charge" of something, but you really aren't in charge. When something is delegated to you it is best if it is all put into your hands instead of you being the face of it, but someone else is still telling you want needs to happen. Basically, things did not go as smoothly with this service project as we would have hoped. It was just having the members make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, but somehow it ended up being way too complicated. Add to that the fact that the choir was performing during the program and you'll understand why I was happy to be done with the ward party. But the ward members seemed to enjoy it so we will go ahead and place it in the win pile.

They went all out with the decorations...this is the candy cane forest.

Then on Saturday we went to a party being thrown by the clinic that Ben will occasionally volunteer at by translating for the doctors. The clinic is for low income families and is completely run by volunteers. It was a little awkward at first because we didn't really know hardly anyone there, but Ben wanted to go because apparently only one med student went last year and that's all they've been hearing about for the last year. It was a rough start. Conversation around dinner all had to do with doctor things which gets boring reaalll quick for me. (I know, life's gonna be fun.) Luckily things picked up after dinner when we started the white elephant gift exchange! (Which I believe was called a Chinese gift exchange on our invitation to the party...ahhh Texas.) This was the best kind of gift exchange because we didn't actually have to provide any gifts! The board for the clinic provided them as a thank you to their volunteers. At first it didn't look like I was going to participate because there were only enough gifts for a few spouses to get one, but the cutest old man (who had taken a liking to Ben and I when he heard us speaking Spanish) came up behind me and gave me his ticket. At first, people were a little hesitant to steal, but then I picked these really cute bowls and people stopped being shy. After someone stole my bowls I picked a cute fruit bowl and then a candle...basically Ben and I unwrapped more presents than anyone else because we kept picking the good stuff! We ended up stealing back the fruit bowl and some towels. The best part of the whole thing was one of the doctors totally loved me. He kept talking about how I had the magic touch and would only let me pick the gifts that he opened. Haha it was fantastic! Then after the gift exchange I found out that him and his wife always wanted a daughter and they would have named her Emily. So I've basically been adopted. Just thought y'all should know. It was seriously hilarious.

The next Christmas party was the most highly anticipated. The Nayar & McIntyre Christmas party!! (Yes that's right....4 Christmas parties. When we saw a 5th invite we couldn't bring ourselves to go.) We went to this fancy Moroccan restaurant. The food was fine, but I was most excited about Ben meeting my coworkers. I wanted him to see how fun they are and for them to see how awesome he is. He fit in perfectly, as I knew he would. My coworkers really liked him. The girls have told me on multiple occasions that Ben and I are the only people who give them hope that love exists. The other day I was telling them that Ben and I spent New Years Eve watching movies and doing a puzzle together and she said, "You two really found each other." I couldn't agree more. :) The craziest part of the N&M party was when Lakshmi and Maria gave us our Christmas presents which were APPLE WATCHES. When I saw the shape of the box I guessed it was a watch, but never in a million years would I have guess it would be the new apple watch. There are perks to working in big and small companies, but I really prefer the small company. We are such a close group it makes work parties fun and not awkward (I'm looking at you ZRT Christmas party of 2015).

The week before Christmas we dressed up at work...I found this sweater at Goodwill in June and had the foresight to buy it. It will be my Ugly Sweater for the next 20 years. (see Mel's blog if you doubt the need for a good ugly sweater)

Not wanting to have to spend money on Christmas pajamas I'm wearing Ben's school shirt that has some evergreen trees and snow on it. 

After the N&M party it was just a few days until we headed to Idaho! I'm really lucky in that I really do enjoy being with my in-laws. I especially love watching Ben with them. He gets a few more laughs with them than he would get from me with his cheesy jokes. They all love him...it's so cute! We decided that in order to save money we were going to fly to SLC and then take the bus to Rexburg. That wouldn't have been quite so bad if we didn't also have a layover in Denver. Basically it was a 13 hr day of travelling. Probably never doing that again, but it honestly wasn't as bad as I thought it'd be. It helps that I never get to be with Ben that long...it made the travelling not seem so bad as got to be with him.

Our week in Idaho was full of fun and zero responsibilities...it was amazing! We played lots of games, watched a bunch of movies, did some puzzles, and just had a great time!

This is a Sound of Music puzzle which was super fun. Whenever we were working on it at least someone would be humming some of the music.

Painting mice! I think this tradition is so fun, but I always wish I was better at it. I'm telling you it's got to be in the Jack genes. I don't know how they get such perfect lines! Ben graciously fixed parts of my mouse that I couldn't get to cooperate.

The second we picked out the kissing mice I knew I was gonna make Ben take a picture like this. I personally think it's adorable. 

So, last year we made a cute gingerbread house, but we were totally upstaged by Sterling and Dan's giant gingerbread rocket. This year I suggested we could create an American Ninja Warrior course and Ben liked the idea so we went with it. Little did we know in a few short hours it would tear our marriage apart......haha okay not really, but there was a point where Ben basically forced me to let him work on what I was doing cause I was losing my mind. In the end it all worked out and we were happy with our finished product.

See those Candy Canes with Life Savers hanging off of them...that's what almost robbed me of my sanity. 

Not pictured: all the hot chocolate we drank, tim-tam's we ate, handbells we rang, songs we sang, racquetball we played, and laughs we shared. One note on the racquetball- I played Ben's mom as he played with two of his brothers. None of us had played since last year, but man Ben's mom was killing me. We played three games and by the third game she was trying to give me points. I would get to serve as many times as I needed, but she'd never let herself get a second try. I've never felt so much pressure to win.  

One kind of unique thing we did was play a family history memory game. Ben's dad reminds me of our dad in a lot of ways. He wanted to include a little more worthwhile activity in our to do list so he suggested we all find an ancestor and play a game of memory with their name and a story from their life. Ben's family is a little different from ours in that they allow him to suggest these activities and don't mock him for his efforts. For real, in the end it was really fun, but at first all I could think was Dad would have had a LOT more resistance in our house haha poor Dad. The Jacks are a little less sassy than the Messerlys. I looked up one of our ancestors and we all went around and shared a story from an ancestor. It was fun listening to the stories, but I mainly enjoyed looking through our ancestors and reading different stories that are in the family search website. I believe the ancestor I found was Grandma Miller's father...I think. His Dad was killed by a tree falling on him when he was just a few feet away. It was a traumatic experience for him and he kept asking why it wasn't him that died. His father had kids to take care of, but he wouldn't have been missed. After struggling for a while he finally heard the voice of the Lord tell him that he didn't take him because he wouldn't have been of any use to him. He said his father was in the spirit world teaching the gospel and is of great use, but he would have been useless to him. I'm paraphrasing, but that's basically what it said. A pretty humbling experience! He later had a heath scare and almost died. When he saw his father calling for him to come join him he asked to stay on earth a little longer. Yall should look up his memories in family search because it's a good story, but I'm not gonna write it all out here. 

Anyways...we had an awesome Christmas. We missed our Messerly family, but I was so glad we got to Facetime together on Christmas Eve. Family time is the best time! Love you all!!

Happy New Year from the Jack/Messerlys!

One (or multiple) Fine Day(s)

Since I last posted here we've celebrated Halloween and Thanksgiving (and now Christmas and New Year...oops), Ben and I both received new callings, and I choreographed a dance for my coworkers that we performed for my boss on her birthday. So lets get started.

First off, Halloween. Recently I was going through some of my client's pictures (we have them send pictures as part of the proof of a legitimate marriage) and decided Ben and I needed to take more pictures together. I had taken it easy on Ben the first year of marriage cause I know he isn't a fan of pictures, but I decided things needed to change. So...that inspired me to start looking for fun things we could do that would have cute picture opportunities. I'm a huge fan of corn mazes, but most of them are kind of lame around our area. Most are designed with kids in mind so they are like 3 ft tall. I found an awesome corn maze about an hour and a half away that became a haunted maze after dark. Ben has always wanted to take me to a haunted house because he loves scaring me so I figured I could convince him to make the drive if I played up the haunted aspect. Being the giving and amazing man he is he gave me half of his Saturday so we could go. It did not disappoint! There were some fun little carnival rides, amazing kettle corn, creepy mazes, and fireworks. There were also nasty farm animals to pet, but we didn't really take advantage of that part.

We also got in the Halloween mood when we went to a Halloween party thrown by a couple in our ward. We didn't really want to spend any money on costumes so we came up with something that didn't require us to buy anything. We are big fans of America Ninja Warrior. I don't know what it is, but that show is so addicting! Ben has dreams to be on it one day and if he wasn't a medical student I would totally be down for that. (Although in order to get on it we are going to have to pray someone in our family gets some life altering disease. They always need an sob story to get coverage.) Maybe 10 years down the road...for those of you who aren't familiar with the show there are a bunch of obstacles that people try to get through so they can hit the buzzer at the end of the course. There are a bunch of levels and if you make it to the end you are named an American Ninja Warrior and you win a million dollars. The only lame part is that there has only been one season that someone has actually completed it. (Well technically two people finished that year, but they gave the million to the one that did it fastest. They obviously made things a lot harder since that year because no one has won since.) So by the end of the season you're super into it and then it's just disappointing when your favorites inevitably fail. I digress....so we grabbed some work out clothes and ironed on some letters and become "Beast Ninjas" for Halloween. (Every contestant comes up with some ninja name for themselves when they go on the show)

This is a picture of me throwing cheese onto Ben's face. We totally won. Although I will say it wasn't because of my excellent aim. Ben was diving for those slices! Commitment people. 

We may have had a slightly lame costume compared to every one else at the party, but we were fine with that. Although I will say we had the best dessert at the party. I saw these adorable "Melting Witch" brownies on pinterest and knew I had to try them. They were basically the reason I convinced Ben we should go to that party...I needed an excuse to make them. So yeah, our treat put everyone to shame.

As you know, actual Halloween day fell on a week day. One of the first things I learned about my job when I started is that they don't mess around with Halloween. Maria and Lakshmi started a contest between some of the other immigration offices and the Dallas Chief Council and his office are the judges. They won last year and needed to defend their crown. There was a ridiculous amount of work time going into coming up with our costume idea and story line. To help demonstrate home important this is to you let me tell you that at my performance review a few weeks later one of the biggest praises they gave me had to do with me coming up with the story line for our costumes. We basically shut down the office that morning and had our photo shoot. Then the attorneys spent the rest of the day in Photoshop putting together the final product. This was our entry:

Hopefully you can read all of it because we were pretty proud of it.

I'm a method actor as you can see

As you may have guessed by looking at the previous photos it's A LOT of fun working in my office. I really lucked out. I'm not just doing work I enjoy, but I'm working with people I really enjoy being around. Because our bosses are so awesome we always want to do something great for their birthdays, but the fact that they can buy anything they want for themselves makes it tricky. Especially Maria, she has expensive taste. So, as we were discussing what to her for her this year Karina brought up a suggestion Lakshmi gave them last year which was to make a dance for her. The minute she said it I insisted we do that. I immediately started listening to some classic 70's and 80's music and the inspiration was flowing. I spent a Saturday choreographing the dance and then a week teaching it to the girls. Then the day of the performance came. Lakshmi ushered Maria into the room that had been decked out to have an 80's disco feel. From the minute she walked in the room throughout the whole dance she was cracking up. It was so. much. fun. The whole video can me found on the Nayar & McIntyre facebook page, but I've put a clip of the ending below for those who don't want to spend 4 minutes of there life watching me dance around like a fool.

After Maria's birthday the big holiday was Thanksgiving! I had seen some pretty cheap tickets to Utah a few months back and decided since it wasn't going to be possible to spend time with both families this Christmas we'd fly to Utah for Thanksgiving instead. The catch was that we had to come home Saturday morning because coming home Sunday wasn't so cheap. We only had about 48 hrs in Utah, but we had all sorts of fun! Wednesday night Matt graciously picked us up even though the airport was a mad house! Luckily, we timed it perfectly and Matt didn't have to try and circle around again. On the way home we were supposed to stop at Ben's favorite wing place in Salt Lake, but unfortunately they were closed (and they didn't update their hours online!). That was a little heartbreaking because that was basically the one thing Ben wanted out of this trip. I felt so bad, but he said it was okay and we settled with Buffalo Wild Wings. If anyone is planning to come from Utah to visit us stop by Wing Coop and grab a few tenders for Ben on your way. When we finally arrived home Ana came over and the four of us had fun chatting.

Thursday morning I went to the gym with Ana because they were letting guests in free. I did my first cardio based gym class in months. Maybe even years. My calves were killing me the next day from all that hoping around. While it was fun, I missed my BodyPump. That afternoon Danny brought over a van full of food he had been cooking all morning. Dane joined us at the house and we had a yummy lunch/dinner. After dinner was over video games were played by Ben and Matt and Ana and I took the opportunity to play around on the piano for a bit. It was an exhausting day! By the end of it Ben and Ana literally woke me up with a bag of tootsie rolls so I would play 5 Crowns with them. I was so tired. We were staying up later than normal and it was even worse than it seemed because Texas is an hour later than Utah so our body's clocks were all out of wack. The next day I opted for not going to the gym with Ana so we could sleep in a little. Friday was pretty chill in the morning. Matt and I played some Super Mario. He was Mario, I was Mario's hat. I'm not usually a big fan of video games, but I'll admit when we were heading home I was already telling Ben I wanted to play that game again. Friday evening was a blast! We had dinner at Zupas! Oh Zupas...how I've missed you! There is nothing in Texas that even compares! Then we headed up to Salt Lake to see Elf: The Musical. It was super cute! We all had a good time. On our way home we discovered that Loren was heading our way so Ben and I got to say hi to Loren, Luke, and Charlie before we left bright and early Saturday morning. Such a quick trip, but definitely worth it.

Now we are back to normal life. I'm getting used to being in the YW presidency and Ben is about to be called as Elders Quorum President. I also still direct the choir...but I try not to think about that much. 😇 I'll post a separate post about all the fun we during Christmas time. Life is fun over here in Texas, but also pretty busy. We sure do me yall! Come visit!!