The anxiously awaited Christmas letter...

Well, as you can tell, I did not post my annual Christmas letter on the blog on December 15th. Why, do you ask? It seems that other pressing events have prohibited me from sitting down to write the annual run-down of what I've been doing all year (read: these activities involve black light mini-golfing with friends for my birthday, shoveling snow, going out to a movie...) I apologize for that, even if I did have a bit more fun with those!

So, I'm going to try to write this all really quick...

I'm still living in Meridian in the same house, though I did embark on some small home improvement projects this year and have more planned for next year. In August, I decided that the golden oak cabinets in the house were just not going along with my color scheme. Much to my father's dismay, I thought that painting was a great option. After a trip to Home Depot for sandpaper, primer and Behr Kitchen & Bath sateen paint (and a DIY lesson from a 'weekend home makeovers' book), I tackled the master bath cabinets to change them from golden oak to dark espresso brown. They turned out great! I'm plotting to paint all of the kitchen cabinets next, but I think that will wait until spring. And next on the agenda is tiling the master and guest bathrooms.

As for work, I'm still at the Ada County Sheriff's Office, though I did get a bit of a promotion/transfer in May. I was offered a position in the Finance Office as an Account Clerk II. Basically, I pay all of the bills for the jail, medical unit, records and civil departments, and about 15 other departments. I audit a lot of reports, prepare bank deposits and more. So far, it's been a pretty good move.

Sayde is still doing well, and has assumed the position of snow removal supervisor. (Boise has been experiencing snow storms for the past week and a half, and Sayde helps with the shoveling of snow.) She wasn't thrilled when I went on a few vacations this year, but she did get to stay with my parents each time.

And I did go on several vacations! I went to Phoenix in the early spring to visit some family and friends, and then went back again in June to visit my best friend Angie before she moved to Blanding, UT. A few days after I returned from that trip, I went to Pocatello, ID for my grandma's 80th birthday party. (And yes, we did put 80 candles on her cake!) I was able to spend some time with a whole bunch of relatives, which was a lot of fun. In July, I helped my parents run a TNT Fireworks tent and sold a whole bunch of fireworks for 10 days, but was I glad when it was over! Angie and I took a trip to San Francisco in mid-October for a girl's weekend, and toured the whole area. (We definitely took advantage of our free trolley rides using our CityPasses...up and down the hills, day and night!) Then, my grand finale trip this year was to New York City as a little birthday trip for myself. My aunt Sue went with me, and we were able to see the Empire State Building, Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, Museum of Modern Art, the Guggenheim Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the American Museum of Natural History, Times Square, Chinatown, the World Trade Center site, Wall Street, Fraunces Tavern, Federal Hall, the Broadway show "Wicked", watched Gossip Girl being filmed, and I was even seen on the Today Show! It was a lot of fun but I was a bit glad to get home to my family and Sayde.

Well, I think that covers the major highlights of the year. If I think of more, I'll add another post on here!

Wishing you a Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year,

Sheena and Sayde

P.S. Please come visit us anytime!

Back from New York City!

So I've kept my biggest trip a secret until now, but I just got back from 6 days and 5 nights in New York City. I decided earlier this year (mid-July) that I wanted to take a big trip somewhere that I had always wanted to visit as a birthday present to myself, since I turn 25 yrs old this year. After consideration of my vacation wishlist (which is pretty long!), I thought that New York sounded perfect. The catch: no one really wanted to go with me. (My best friend Angie would have gladly gone, but she's limited when it comes to vacation time since she's a teacher.) However, my Aunt Sue agreed to go, and we thought that sometime after Thanksgiving but before New Year's would be perfect.

I randomly selected a week in December, and boarded my Delta flight at 6:40am on Sunday, December 7th. I met up with Aunt Sue at the Salt Lake City airport, and we flew together from SLC to the JFK airport in New York. Our flight arrived in New York around 4pm, and we took a SuperShuttle van from the airport....and got to the hotel over 2 hours later. I had found a good deal on the Travelzoo, so we stayed at the brand new Hampton Inn on 35th St. and 5th Ave in the city. We were right down the street from the Empire State Building, Macy's, and within walking distance to Broadway and Times Square.

(Our room at the Hampton Inn)

We went to the Empire State Building on Monday, all the way to the 86th floor and saw some great views.

(Standing on the 86th floor of the Empire State Building)

I had lunch at one of my AZ favorite restaurants, Chipotle, before we headed down through Times Square to check out the Museum of Modern Art. It is a FANTASTIC museum, and the Van Gogh exhibit was phenomenal. Seeing my favorite painting, Starry Night, in person was a bit overwhelming but it was a great museum. After that, we decided to check out Rockefeller Center to see the gigantic Christmas tree and skating rink. (No skating for me though, since I'm a bit clumsy!) We left from there and went back to the hotel to crash, since I had a bit of jet lag.

(A Kandinsky painting at the Museum of Modern Art)

(The Christmas tree at Rockefeller Center)

On Tuesday morning, we took the subway down to the Upper East Side to watch Gossip Girl being filmed. (There's a great website, http://www.onlocationvacations.com/, that posts daily TV and movie filming locations.) And we found Gossip Girl on the steps of the Museum of the City of New York at 104th St. and 5th Ave. I stood among about 10 papparazzi trying to snap some pictures of the actors, and was able to see Penn Badgley, Leighton Meester and Blake Lively, as well as some of the other characters. (No Ed Westwick or Chace Crawford though...) So, I'll be keeping my eyes open for that show to air and be able to say that I was less than 20 feet from the action! I couldn't get any of the major actors or actresses to take a picture, since there wasn't a break in the filming.

(Penn Badgley and Blake Lively on the set of Gossip Girl)

From there, we walked along Central Park and went to the Guggenheim Museum. The building is awesome, but there was a Catherine Opie photo exhibit that had pretty much taken over the galleries, and well, I'm just not a fan of explicit gay photography and other blah photos. So that was a bit disappointing. We wandered down further to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and were able to spend a few hours there. I went through the Egyptian and Greek artifacts, European sculpture and painting, American painting, the Temple of Dendur and the Curator's collection exhibit. I was amazed by some of items that they have been able to acquire, although it was a bit creepy to walk in rooms with 20+ sarcophaguses. We took the subway back to Grand Central Station, and walked back to the hotel from there.



(View of the outside of the Guggenheim)

(The Temple of Dendur at the Met)

On Wednesday, we got up early and went down to Battery Park to board a ferry to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. It was a bit of a rough boat ride, but it was definitely worth it to see the Statue of Liberty so close. It was our luck that the elevator to the observation deck was broken, so I braved the 156 stairs (roughly 15 stories) to check it out while Aunt Sue stayed in the museum. It was a great view, but the rain made it a bit cold! We got back on the ferry and rode over to Ellis Island, but decided not to go in since the lines were extremely long. (I don't think I had any ancestors come through Ellis Island anyway.) After we got back to shore, we walked down to see Fraunces Tavern, the NY Stock Exchange, Federal Hall, the World Trade Center site and some of the other buildings near Wall Street. (The Century 21 store had some cool designer stuff too!) We took a subway down to Chinatown from there, and went scouting out some good knockoff purses. I bought a very good Coach purse from a little shop, but it takes some stealth to find these designer purses now...apparently the mayor has cracked down on vendors. But, it's the best fake Coach that I've ever seen, and it was only $35! I got some good Dolce & Gabbana sunglasses for $6 too. From there, we changed clothes at the hotel and went to see Wicked on Broadway. It was a stellar show, and we loved it. I stood outside the stage door after the show with a few other fans and was able to meet all of the major characters, which was awesome. We walked back through Times Square to see the lights at night, and crashed once we got back to the hotel


(View of The Statue of Liberty from our ferry boat)

(Meeting Marcie Dodd, who stars as Elphaba in Wicked!)

(Times Square at night)

On Thursday morning, we decided to go stand outside of the Today show. I had made a poster at home to hold up, and after all, it seemed like we had to check it out. Unfortunately, I picked the morning that it was raining and sleeting to make my TV debut. So, I joined about 40 other crazy people down at 30 Rockefeller Center, and after about 40 minutes, I was shown in the crowd on national TV! (And the sign looked better than anyone else's, ha!) We went from there to the American Museum of Natural History, and I'll admit that I had flashbacks to "Night at the Museum"! The dioramas and dinosaurs were awesome, and the gallery on Human Origins was actually pretty interesting. After that, we walked down to FAO Schwartz to see the Big Piano, like Tom Hanks played on in the movie "Big". There are two girls at FAO that put on a music show on the Big Piano, and it's amazing! (I'll try to figure out how to link the video of it on here.) We went back to the hotel for a while, then went back to Macy's, where I bought a real Coach purse for a fantastic price and then ran back to the hotel in the rain.

Our NYC trip ended on Friday morning, when we flew home on the 7am Delta flight. I slept all of the way, and then managed to fly standby on an earlier flight home from Salt Lake to avoid a 3 hour layover at the airport. It was an awesome trip, all in all! Major thanks to Aunt Sue for being a trouper on all of my museum trips, Gossip Girl searching and walking a million miles in the cold!