Last Adventures of 2019

Right now, it’s the end of June and the end of the fourth month of Armageddon. I can’t believe it’s only been 4 months; it feels like an eternity that I’ve been stuck in this house. It also feels like eons ago that I got to do all the cool stuff I’m going to tell you about from December.

First, I made my third trip of 2019 to Rochester, NY, to hang out with family the second week of December. I got to visit with my sister, brother-in-law and nephews and participate in the annual Polish Christmas cookie frosting tradition. I love that something that Erica and I used to do as kids we can now do with her kids. The boys love getting creative decorating the cookies after Erica and I frost them.

Southwest Airlines gets creative around the holidays!

A friendly game of Mario Bros Monopoly. Leo was trying to cheat!

I got to watch Leo at his karate class! He’s the kid on the far right with the white belt with black stripes.

They were clearly into it and I had a blast doing it with them.

The cookie factory line! Erica and I frosted cookies on both ends and slid them down to Gino, Leo and Domenico to decorate.

The visit went by quickly and it is always great to visit around the holidays.

The week after that, I had the pleasure of attending one of the most weird holiday events ever with my dear friend Heather: Camp Christmas. It is really hard to describe this. It was a massive art installation in a warehouse consisting of the history of Christmas throughout the ages combined with a ton of lights, fascinating stories and lots of…pink. You could walk right through it all as it wound around, and there were a lot of interactive bits, including a paper passport you got at the start that you needed to stamp throughout the exhibit. Let’s just have the photos do the talking!

A very well-lit tree. Every possible type of light you can image was on there, including emergency responder lights and lava lamps!

A tree consisting of massive candy suckers. It was slowly built over the course of the months the exhibit was happening so that by New Year’s, it was full. Out of frame to the right was the spot in the corner behind glass where the professional candy-maker worked during the day.

This unicorn did not look like this. It was white. But the sign said to turn on the flash on your camera, and POW! Illuminated!

And one of the last rooms of the place was mid-century Pepto Bismol pink complete with pink glittered horse. Like you do!

So….yeeaaaahhhh….I think you have to be on acid to fully experience it but I will ABSOLUTELY go again!

Anyhoo, then it was Christmas. This year, we expanded the Polanycia clan to SIX with the additions of both nephews: Colton who is going to a local university here and staying with my in-laws and Michael who is living with us since returning from Japan. That of course meant there were more antics than usual!

But of course, the obligatory family photo at the dinner table.

Then someone always has to be the present distributor and wear the redneck reindeer antler hat. It sings. That’s all you need to know.

I got a metric shit-ton of Stroopwafels. They are the shiz.

JC’s tuckered out from opening so many presents.

So, Christmas was chill as always with food, gifts, a traditional non-Christmas movie (can’t remember that far back to what it was) and generally hanging out.

And, last but not least, it’s always a good time when you can close out a very fun and eventful year with a HOCKEY GAME. JC and I attended the Avalanche game on New Year’s Eve that always ends with some great indoor fireworks!

2019, how I miss thee!