Celebrating a White Christmas!by Amaru & Suzanne, December 25th 2008

We were hoping for it and we did get to celebrate a white christmas!

But first we had to get there. We flew for around 14 hours, disembarked in LA, passed immigration, collected our luggage, walked through customs just to hand our luggage back in and get back on the same plane and same seats.... Anyway, another 5 hours later we landed in New York and were able to see that everything was white and covered in snow!

Of couse we had to go for a walk in the snow, this was Suz's first white christmas and we wanted to take full advantage of the situation. So just after we reached my parents new house we bundled up with a thick jacket, gloves, scarves and hats and we felt like little kids again =)

The new house was great as well, such a difference from the small apartment they used to have, we can all now get our own room...

The next few days were spent catching up with family, celebrating Denis' 18th birthday and then we made a trip into New York.

We've been into NYC a couple of times together but Suz had never seen it during winter. On this day we had around -7C so we rugged up before leaving for the city. And it's not just the temperature thats the problem, it's the wind that cuts straight through you.

We took the train to Penn Station and started our walking tour from there. We walked past the Empire State Building up to Times Square and were on our way to Rockefeller Center when Suz spotted a certain shop..... The Magnolia Bakery!

Those of you that follow the blog know that Suz loves going to the one located in the West Village, this time we found one here and just had to go in and get Suz a cupcake =)

We made our way to Rockefeller Centre and saw the big Christmas Tree and all the people iceskating (we also saw the huge line of people waiting to skate). Since we didn't plan to skate anyway we just made our way north along 5th avenue until we reached Central Park.

Central Park in winter is amazing, it's such a winter wonderland! And it was actually warmer here than in the rest of the city since the wind couldn't make it through as easily.

Lunch was a given, of course we would have Joe's Pizza, top that of with a nice cup of coffee from Mud coffee and that's our day!

The very next day we were back in the city, but this time we were going to the Madison Square Garden to watch an NHL game between the Washington Capitals and the New York Rangers.

Due to a mixup when the tickets were bought online, we had a lot of extra tickets - those of us that ended up going were Zilia, Pär, Denis, Andrew, Rene, Amanda, Suz and I. We sat in two different sections but were not far from each other.

Our seats were in the so called "nose-bleed" section, all the way to the top, but we enjoyed them.... the view over the game was perfect and you could see everything that was happening. The game started and the Rangers were aggresive and by the second period were up by 4-0, it looked like an easy win and the fans were loving it!

Well, in the end the Capitals managed to get a draw and then later in overtime they won... it was a bit of a shame for the Rangers to lose at home, but it was still an awesome experience to be able to see a game in the famous Madison Square Garden.

The next few days were all about the family. On Christmas Eve we were at my parents place where they had a big party with family and friends.... and we even got to see Santa arrive through the door to start handing out presents to everybody =)

Later on that evening we sang birthday songs for my sister and dad, my sisters birthday is on the 24th and my dad had his 60th on the 25th of December. Christmas has always been about big birthdays at our house.

Pär, Freddy and I decided to have a "Guys night" and went to Freddy's place where he cooked for us, we had some beers and wine and then Freddy managed to cut his finger while slicing some frozen bread... it didn't look that bad but we decided to go to the hospital to have it checked anyway. Four stiches later we went back home and resumed our party =)

On Boxing day, Suz and I decided to go to the Mall to see if we could pick up a few things now that the sales started. We took the bus (nobody does public transport here) just because we knew parking was going to be a hassle. And it was, at least outside, once we made it inside it actually wasn't that bad (we've seen worse in Sydney during sales).

The last day we just spent at home together with the family, the last week was great celebrating a white christmas with family, but now the time has come for Suz and I to finally start out Honeymoon!!

Belize here we come!!

 

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