I'm not really sure what I have to do today, so I might as well blog.

Time to recap the happenings of winter break :)

We set out from TX to CA on the 20th of December, and arrived in Berkeley on the evening of the 22nd. My conclusions from that drive are:
-Arizona is the state that will never end. You'd think it would be Texas, but no. It's Arizona.
-It is necessary for my next car to have cruise control. My Matrix, while it is my baby, is rather lacking in that area, and since my car is the one to go on road trips... it's kind of painful.
-Taking the 5 freeway up to NorCal sucks.

After arriving in Berkeley, we spent time with George's family, and I finally got to meet them all. Christmas was lovely, and I love his family. They're a great bunch :) It was funny because his cousins were all very curious to meet me, and vice versa.

I got to do some internal comparisons between his and my family and how they did Christmas. At first I was a bit frustrated because I'm used to the kids getting up at 6 in the morning (which we were working our way into getting our bodies adjusted to the time zone, but more on that later...) to go through our stockings, and once everyone is awake and downstairs, someone sifts through the mountain of gifts to give each person their own pile of presents. Everyone then proceeds to rip through their individual piles (now I'm just thinking of one sibling in particular, but we did all take part in this), and then we have breakfast while figuring out the newest toy.

George's family is quite different. And once I got past the initial frustration (which was in part due to my not knowing what to expect), it was actually kind of nice. We got up, ate a yummy french toast breakfast with eggs and tea and coffee, talked a bit and took pictures, and THEN we mozied over to the living room to open presents. George was wearing the Santa hat, so he distributed presents and stockings. Each person took turns opening one present at a time, which was something I had never experienced before.

Now, while I love the gifts I got from George, perhaps the most amazing gift I've ever received came from his parents. Through the World Wildlife Fund, they adopted a Mekong Dolphin for me. I have pictures of it and a stuffed animal of it, but I HAVE A FREAKING DOLPHIN. HOW COOL IS THAT???

Ahem. Very cool.

The rest of our time in the Bay Area was devoted to spending some more time with family, eating good food, and searching for a wedding venue. Tia was a good sport, she drove us to Half Moon Bay, where we had originally wanted to get married, but it was too expensive. We then thought, why not just get married on a state beach? We discovered that A) it's cold, B) it's windy and you can't really hear anyone that's more than 5 feet away from you, and C) not really wheelchair accessible. So beach was out.

Tia then suggested San Francisco City Hall, which looks like this:

So we decided to check it out. The interior is gorgeous:

We thought, hey, we could probably get married HERE and then walk down a block to a nice restaurant for the reception easy peasy! And probably a lot less expensive than most places! So we put a hold on City Hall and set out to look for a restaurant that would accommodate our guest list and the type of food we wanted for a reasonable price. Not as easy as it looks. We found a place, but I didn't really like the food. So we were sort of back to square one.

After talking it over, we decided that one of the things that we do want for our reception is to be able to dance. So the hunt continued. We found a place that is seemingly affordable, and everything we want (without beachfront location), but I don't want to jinx it, so more on it later :)

While we were in L.A., I did happen to find the dress *squeeeeeeee!!!* I haven't bought it yet because fittings will be easier in Texas than in California. Alicia's coming with me to buy it in Houston next weekend so WOO HOO!!!

ANYWAYS. The whole time we were in California I could not adjust to the time zone. I couldn't wake up any later than 7:30 each morning, regardless of what time I went to bed. A bit frustrating.

It's late in the morning. I should probably get up and shower and stuff. I'll continue on later.