It's Not Christmas Without You.

i love this artist's voice. i'll never forget the first time my friend kelsey showed her to me {kelsey showed me a lot of my favorite artists now that i think about it...} it was incredible. and i love this song. it's actually my favorite christmas love song. absolutely beautiful. and i see it being very applicable this year...and next year too. oh goodness.

but i am so happy. christmas is wonderful {thanksgiving is still my favorite but oh well}. they are both wonderful.

and i love this snow we're getting. i don't mind the driving part.

this snow reminds me of wonderful snowy walks, learning more about another person than i ever have and loving them all the more for it. i guess it's okay to tell you that i started to really notice that one guy during thanksgiving and fell in love with him by christmas.

i've still to kiss under a mistletoe though. {can you hear me smiling?}

anyway - so there's my winter schpeel. listen to the song, and i hope you enjoy it like i do.

christmas eve.

every year it comes around...it's a day for best friends.

can i tell you about this christmas eve?

would that be strange, seeing as it's already the 26th? i hope it's not strange for you because i'm still so happy. and although old memories assaulted me occasionally, some tender and some...painful; i have made new ones. and they are lovely.

the day began with aaron and megan opening our gifts to them and their gifts to us. because my family is strange and we celebrate everything early this year; thanksgiving and now christmas. it's all good. we're whites. {refrain from racist comments please.} haha

i was...stressed and uneasy to say the least. seth's christmas present was a unique one and i was worried that i would mess it all up.

because i wrote him a song.

maybe someday you will hear it but i find that unlikely. it's his and his alone and even though i will be recording it for him to keep...that's just it. it'll be for him to keep.

so i drove illegally to pick him up and played it for him at the stake center, on their beautiful grand with the yellowed keys. he didn't seem to mind the illegal part. if anything i truly think he was relieved at my driving. if my memory serves correctly, he had just been out driving with his younger brother. despite what you all may recall, i am actually a pretty decent driver.

i messed up. but i played it for him twice through, and...it was the right christmas present. fitting.

later that day he gave his present{s} to me. if it weren't a public blog i might say i'm in love. oopsy! haha. I now have my very own treasure box, pre-filled with treasures and hopefully...soon...one of them will permanently hang on my wall. a picture of Our North Star.

the rest of the day was beautiful. imagine having a baby in the home, to hold and comfort whenever you please. it made me want to be a mother...so badly.

but those years are a ways away. and i can contain my baby hunger. even if it must be five years away {which to me...seems...very far away right now. but maybe that's just it. the Lord is always thinking up new ways to help me be more patient.} i can make it.

and then a very timely phone call. and soon thereafter we had some delightful plans to go caroling with the mason family! oh i was so excited.

and for good reason.

it was a beautiful. singing, the harmonies, the christmas lights. being with seth, laughter. my attempts to escape being whitewashed {which i fear once the next snow falls may be inevitable...eeps!}, watching the small children run around excitedly to every door that they saw, the awkwardness of choosing the next song, difficult and accidental key changes, exciting icy driveways, seeing floating lanterns. seeing how the singing seemed to brighten the smiles of others. oh and i got to meet seth's older brother at last.

it's strange, i don't think i could ever explain the happiness i felt that night. it was one of the closest times i have felt to celestial happiness in my entire lifetime. something about even just being near seth...his family, singing, snow and loveliness...

how could life have ever been any better?

a goodnight hug and the night was concluded, sweetly.

i never forgot though, whose birthday it was. i hope that wherever he is, he finds happiness. but yes, i wish never to see him again. and although some would say that is...a betrayal. but it was different. one person can help a friend while only harming another. although i won't say which was done to me...maybe both, i feel that it would be best...if no contact were ever to be made.

i'm sorry if that hurts him. or her. but i refuse to be manipulated. i refuse to change for another.

and instead of playing his song that day, the one he taught her, but only i remembered...

i played a new one. one of hope. one of peace. one of purity and love.

a song of happiness.

tis the season!

if you live in my house you know this: i listen to christmas music starting the week before halloween. go ahead, hate me. i still love you. and no, this is no excuse for my family's christmas tree to be up until my birthday {march...yah, i know right?}

so maybe i've started my christmas selection a little earlier this year; a whole half a week before the week before all hallows eve....

but that's okay. because we had fall break and even if it didn't snow, it's getting into heavy coats and cute scarves season. which reminds me, i need to find mine.

the colors this year were beautiful. down here in elk ridge the mountains are covered mostly with foliage so instead of ugly brown interspersed by the blessings of a few colors, mostly reds up north, we have splashes of color all across our mountains. at the base you have the brightest oranges and reds you have ever seen then going further up you have the yellows of birches in the valleys and the dark green evergreens at the tops of those valleys and then at the tippy-top of the mountain you have that beautiful fresh snow we got about a week and a half ago. it's beautiful to say the least. excuse my blatant bragging...i'm pretty proud of my mountains. i took this picture.

and then there are the smells. oh, the smell of rotting dead leaves is really...well, sounds horrible but it's smell is divine. go ahead and call me weird but i love it.

christmas is just around the corner. i'm already thinking about what presents to give my friends this year. i've got some great ideas. so many memories waiting to be made. oh and we have plans to go up to Temple Square too, to see the lights. i'm really excited for that one, because that is my favorite place on earth, without a doubt and without even a pause to think. i know. (:

so excuse me if my song list is mostly comprised of christmas songs, but how can i help it? i'm in love with the season. i mean, who doesn't love gingerbread and candy canes? who doesn't love a cold evening with friends singing carols and then ending up at someone's house for hot chocolate and some folk songs on the guitar {one of my favorite christmas memories as a child...}

and then...then there's the real meaning of christmas too. Christ. the celebration of His birth. it's so beautiful, that it almost takes my breath away.

maybe life is just too wonderful and good to be true right now for me, so the happiness of everything else is spilling over into my writing about the small things. anyway, i love you. i hope i've gotten you excited at least a little bit. i hope that as soon as you are done reading this you jump out of your chair {or onto youtube...whichever you prefer} and begin getting those christmas CD's out, blowing last year's dust off of them, and begin the ritual once again of christmas love and joy.

here's to the season, my dear dear friends.

PS! this halloween i'm going to be elphaba from the show wicked. or however you spell it. yes, that's right...i'm going to be green. i'm super excited. pictures will be posted.