I am so behind on blogging my life so here we go. The weekend of the 15-16th I was on holiday budget lockdown. Shopping for gifts and beer for myself had wiped me out. Luckily I had a moment of inspiration and realized I needed to research all the west coast beers I need to drink in CA the next weekend. I pulled out my West Coast Beer Guide, my new Beer Atlas (written by Tim Webb who got me through Belgium), and Beer Advocate. I put on Pandora and spent the next four hours snacking and researching beer. It was a lovely Saturday.
Then I checked my mail and got my Christmas card from Albert.
Monday at work I got a my Christmas gifts from one of my bosses. She seems to know what I like.
Thursday Albert and I went to Great Divide Brewery Night at Barcade. I had a Colette Farmhouse Ale, I give it a 3 out of 5 on untappd. My favorite beer by the brewery was the Wild Raspberry Ale. We stopped after two each because Albert was being kind enough to drive me out to JFK since the PATH still doesn't run 24 hours a day.
Then it was California time! I flew into SFO and was picked up by Uncle Dennis. We had an awesome lunch at a pizza place under his building and I started my CA beer with Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, boring maybe but really good with pizza. Then the most important moment of my whole trip happened. I met Miss Paige Emma Stradford. I immediately gave her the Christmas gift from me and then we were kind of matching and it was awesome.
We posed together. Then I got yelled at for giving her adult food at dinner. Then we danced together.
The next day was friends day on my trip. I met up with all my awesome high school friends and their spouses. We then proceeded to not take a single picture of us adults. After a nice brunch Colleen went to pick up her child, Matt went to work, Zerlina went to Michaels, Chris, Pat and I went to the beer store. Look what I found!! It is really good, lived up to the hype, and was awesome. Special thanks to Capitol Beer and Tap Room for pulling it out of the back room for me.
While we took no pictures of adults I have plenty of pictures of the cutest little boy ever, Vincenzo.
That would be him wearing his Vincenzosaurus Rex shirt while riding a Vincenzosaurus Rex. Then we hung out in the box it came in, a lot.
Then I got my Christmas present from Vincenzo and his parents.
After he went to bed we filled the box with garbage. This is what he did when he found it in the morning.
The next day I went home to see my cousin Jessica, her husband Erik, and their little girl Abbie. Here is a nice video of Abbie opening one of her gifts from Aunt Peggy and Uncle Dale.
Abbie and Paige wore matching outfits for a photo for their Great Grandma.
After another awesome dinner Abbie tried putting on Paige's new pink shoes, then put them on my toes, and then tried to steal them.
My niece's shoe fits my big toe. Then we were heading into Christmas Eve. Paige and I hung out again on Christmas Eve.
We went to mass, came home, opened gifts, and put on our Christmas pajamas.
My mom made another awesome meal totaling four awesome dinners in a five day span, Colleen made awesome dinner number five. Then on the 26th I was headed back to east coast. First there was a flight delay so I got in another delicious CA beer. Total on untappd I checked in 22 beers in CA. It was a good six days. Then it was time to prep for New Years in NY. The PATH decided it would run for the whole night which was super exciting. We saw Zero Dark Thirty. I got carded going into the movie theater. I think I look young but I'm pretty sure I look at least 17. We got out of the movie at 10:00. We took the train up to Rattle n Hum and had a nice two beers to ring in the New Year. We forgot to take any pictures. Now its a New Year and I am ready for whatever adventures come my way.
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