Since our last post we have done a lot of stuff. On Sunday November 20th we headed off to Lambeau Field to see the Packers beat the Tampa Bay Buccaneers with Amber's Brother Adam and his girlfriend Becky along with Amber's cousin Emily and her husband Harry. It was a bright and sunny day with temperatures in the middle 30's so it wasn't too cold but just cold enough for awesome autumn football weather. A great time was had by all!
Becky, Adam, Harry, Emily, Amber and John outside of Lambeau Field after the game.
After a short two day work week we headed back north, this time to Stevens Point, for Thanksgiving. We had a wonderful time out with friends on Wednesday and Friday nights. We had an amazing Thanksgiving dinner prepared for us by Mary Okray (John's mom). We got to see the Packers win against the rival Detroit Lions. Amber and Michelle (John's sister) were up at 11:30pm on Thursday to hit up the after Thanksgiving Day sales and scored some wonderful gifts and John headed to Rusty's Backwater Saloon for a night of drinking with friends. A typical and wonderful Thanksgiving weekend it was!
The next weekend Adam (Amber's Brother) and his girlfriend Becky came out to Janesville for some Christmas movie watching. During the course of the weekend we watched Home Alone, Home Alone 2: Lost in New York and National Lampoons Christmas Vacation. Home Alone and Home Alone 2 are movies that Amber, Adam and Kyle (Amber's late brother) watched growing up and it's been tradition to watch them every December since. National Lampoons Christmas Vacation has been added to the mix because it is John's favorite Christmas movie and very funny as well. During that weekend we also finished our Christmas shopping!
The next week Amber had her 5th Grade Concert at Cunningham School on December 8th; which went very well. That weekend Adam, Becky and their friends Sean and P-Ham came to visit and to celebrate Becky's 21st Birthday which also took place on December 8th. Now Becky can come out drinking with us! We showed her some fun places in Janesville on Friday night and then they went on to party it up in Madison on Saturday. On Saturday December 10th Amber headed to Wauwatosa to spend a girls night with Amie and Megan and discuss Amie and Brian's upcoming wedding.
On December 15th Amber had her 1st Grade and 3rd Grade Concerts; which went really well! The next day was the Todd School Staff Party where we had a little too much fun :) and then we headed up to Appleton for December 17th and 18th to have Amber's family Christmas. It was fun to be with family, but also sad to know that one very important member is no longer physically here to celebrate with us. Holidays are some of the toughest times one has to face after losing a loved one and after losing Kyle (Amber's brother) early this year it makes celebrating harder. But we all tried to be as light hearted as possible because that's how Kyle was and how he would want it to be. We even wrapped up a baking potato and had Riley (Amber's 3-Year-Old Cousin) open it up as a Christmas gift. He laughed about how that wasn't a REAL present, but then had to take it home so that his mom could make him some french fries later with it! Crazy kid!
This brings us to Christmas Vacation. This year was an Okray Christmas year so we headed up to Stevens Point to celebrate Festivus on Friday December 23rd. In case you don't know what Festivus is here is the definition:
Festivus is a secular holiday celebrated on December 23 as a way to commemorate the holiday season without participating in its pressures and commercialism.[1] Festivus became part of worldwide[2] popular culture after being featured on an episode of the American TV showSeinfeld in 1997.[1][3]
Every year since 1999 John and his high school friends, now many of them members on his Trivia Team, have celebrated Festivus with cocktails (non-alcoholic before they were of age), dinner and then more drinks out in Stevens Point (this was also not part of the beginning years). Good thing we've all moved on and are of legal drinking age! This year we headed to Gratzies! Restaurant and had some wonderful cocktails along with yummy Italian food followed by some tunes at The Cabin Bar. It was as it always is a great time!
John and Amber heading out for Festivus.
Christmas Eve and Christmas Day was spent in Stevens Point as well. We went to Woodlands Church (John's dad's Church) for Christmas Eve service. It was a very different service for us because with Amber growing up and raised Lutheran and John growing up and raised Catholic we have had very structured church experiences all out lives. Woodlands Church is a non-denominational church with a much more liberal take on religion. It was a very large space where the service took place and they had a large band and many vocalists playing and singing upbeat versions of traditional Christmas songs. They also had all the words on large projector screens. It was a very unique experience. We also took family photos at the church before the service started.
The original Okray Family: Melissa, Michelle, Mary, Mike, Mikey and John on Christmas Eve.
The Long Family: Andy, Melissa, Jared, Justin and A.J. on Christmas Eve.
The Extended Okray Family: Andy, Melissa, Mary, Mike, Mikey, Michelle, John, Amber
Justin, Jared and A.J.
After church we had a wonderful steak dinner and a few drinks, watched the nephews open a few gifts, played cards and settled in for the night. Christmas Day was also very nice with everyone opening gifts, eating leftovers and loafing around for most of the day. Christmas night we got to watch the Packers win against the Bears and all was good :)
The next day we headed to Appleton to meet up with Adam and Becky and then head to Crivitz, WI to visit Amber's paternal grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins for the afternoon. Grandma Georgene made some wonderful homemade pizzas (which she is known for) and we had a great time catching up with everyone.
We finally headed home to Janesville the next day and while home we deep cleaned the whole house, watched a lot of DVR'd TV and headed to the gym multiple times a day trying to undo the icky eating that had taken place during the past few weeks.
We headed to De Pere for New Years Eve. We meet our friend E and her Grandfather, who works for the Packers, at Lambeau Field for lunch at Curly's Pub and to celebrate our Engagaversary (the day we got engaged) where we got engaged. We then headed over to Megan and Avery's house for some cocktails, dinner at A Bravo Restaurant and ringing in 2012 at the Keweenaw Bar with good friends and many drinks! On New Years Day we headed back to Appleton for Brunch and to watch the Packer game. We had to go home because the next day Amber had to go back to work :(
Celebrating our Engagaversary at Lambeau Field.
The same spot John asked Amber to marry him on December 31st, 2007.
Ringing in 2012 with a kiss at the Keweenaw Bar in De Pere.
On January 2nd we headed to our friends Amy and Drew's house to watch the Rose Bowl and although the Badgers lost it was still a nice end to Christmas vacation (even though Amber had to work that day) Boo!
That takes us to about right now where when I read through all of the awesome things that we have done these two months I realize that our life is pretty great and although I'd love to be saying that the Packers won today too; I can't and that's okay.
Until next time!
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