Ben, ‘11

January 7, 2009

I’m back!!! Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and other seasonal greetings to you. Now that break has effectively disappeared, I must come to terms with the fact that papers, assignments, and readings are right around the corner. Sure, I’ll see all of my friends again, but I’m still not direly missing campus life like other people. My break was quite enjoyable for the most part. I reconnected with good friends, former teachers, and close adults. Whether it was watching a movie with friends, going out to dinner with a close mentor, or sharing stories with high school teachers, it was nice to see everyone. Sure, I battled absolutely frigid Wisconsin weather with temperatures often in the single digits and wind chills well below that, but I didn’t mind it as much as I thought I would. That might have been because I’m pretty sure that I went outside only two or three times all break, including trips to the car.

So, what have I done with four weeks of free time? Well, I arrived home to attend our family’s annual Christmas party a short two hours after I landed in Minneapolis. I also had my grandma’s funeral as I mentioned. Besides that, it was a lot of Christmas celebrating and shopping, hanging out with friends, researching and planning, and movie watching. I got through the entire Band of Brothers series and so many others. Even though I had absolutely no reason to stay awake past midnight, my body and mind couldn’t handle the change, so I still stayed up until 2:00 AM, this time watching movies. I also went tubing with friends and hosted another party for decorating Christmas cookies and watching Home Alones. In addition, I stayed active in 4-H by helping my little sister to sew an advent calendar for this year’s county fair. It’s really cool. There is a button for each day in December leading up to Christmas and each day you hang a little ornament or trinket from each button. A picture’s below.

However, I still found my fair share of school work to do over break. I used a lot of the time off to plan my summer study abroad travels in Spain and western Europe, finalize the InterVarsity social calendar, plan the Alternative Spring Break, and so much more. I now know that the start of school is close because my e-mail inbox is beginning to explode with e-mails from all of my organizations.

So, since I’m beginning to fall back on this more and more and also because I simply take so many pictures, I’ll save any further words that I have and let the following pictures explain the past four weeks:

I was eagerly welcomed back to Wisconsin by the family goats, Gretel and Rapunzel…

as well as our dog, Misty, and my brother, John.

Our family did our annual shopping trip at the Mall of America, the largest
mall in America complete with 4.2 million square feet, over fifty restaurants,
a 14-screen theater, 13,000 employees, and an amusement
park in the center of it all.

Everything at the Mall of America seems big.

Our entire family at Kokomo’s for our Christmas shopping trip

Christmas Eve was spent playing games with the family

Christmas morning!!!

My siblings, brother-in-law, and Misty on Christmas morning

We saw some deer in our back yard while opening presents

Tubing with the siblings in the back yard on Christmas afternoon

One of the few times I ventured outside

I thoroughly enjoyed the contrast of my younger brother’s
Dale Earnhardt Jr. NASCAR hat and the nice Christmas dinner dishes

Celebrating a late Christmas at my Grandma’s with fondue

Enjoying New Year’s Eve ATVing with friends on the river in frigid temperatures.
The wind chill that morning was -20 degrees

Don’t worry. The ice was 17 inches thick.

Decorating Christmas cookies with friends!!!

Reuniting with high school friends for a Home Alone party

The advent calendar I helped my sister to sew

Quote of the Week: “Christmas waves a magic wand over this world, and behold, everything is softer and more beautiful.” ~Norman Vincent Peale
Thought to Ponder: How is it that a flea can jump 350 times its own body length?
Shout Outs: Ken for the great dinner
YouTube Video of the Week: