The Twelve Days of Christmas - Celebrate the Merriment!

As many of you know, moving to Jackson Hole was a bit out of my "comfort zone." Yes, in my "Grand Plan," if I was going to move it was going to be to a big city - New York, Boston, or Chicago! Funny how life can be so contradictory. But, this move has actually turned out to be a blessing in disguise - a beautiful and exciting place to call home for the past four months. We have seen and done things that I never would have imagined, and still have so much more exploring to do. The people are friendly and extremely worldly. This may be a small town, but the folks here are truly city folks.

I must admit that as the holidays approached I feared that it would be hard to find traditional holiday things to do - but JH once again did not let us down! Here are some of our Holiday endeavors - some unique to the area, many unique to being a Nelson!

1. Rocky Mountain Bank Christmas Party - This was one of the first nights that Derek was in town. Although it was a scaled-down party this year, we enjoyed meeting all of Barry's colleagues - they are a fun group. And we walked away with two of the ten gift drawings....unfortunately I was the only loser in the family!
2. Tile painting @ Snake River Brewery - The local brewery invited Jacksonites to make their mark on the pub, painting tiles to line the walls of the newly added dining area. We went to the Center for the Arts, not knowing how well -attended this event would be - but JH residents proved that they LOVE their brewery, the place was standing room only! We each painted a tile (and I also did one for Ashley, since she was not in town yet). It was a really fun evening - and of course they had brought 3 kegs of freshly brewed beer to the Arts Center for the event. We followed our painting session with a trip to the brewery for dinner and some more good brew!



Standing room only at the Ceramics studio!



Rudy Borrego - brewer and Ceramics teacher! If you want some good brew, try the Snake River Brewery beers - sold nationwide.My favorite is their Pale Ale or the OB-1.



Our soon to be famous tiles - artistic ability does not run in the family necessarily! Derek seems to have "won" this competition!

3. Danish Dinner - To celebrate our Danish heritage, and allow Derek to enjoy some of his favorite foods from his trip abroad, he looked up some recipes and I went to work! We had a fabulous meal of Frikadellar and Rodkal and a dessert of Aeblekage. It was all delicious, thankfully, since I didn't pay attention to the servings in the recipes and prepared enough for 12! Barry & I will be enjoying a few more Danish dinners in the weeks to come.
4. Holiday Mixology @ The Wort Hotel (Historic hotel in downtown JH) - We thought that this would be a fun event to attend with Derek. The class offered tips and recipes for making holiday drinks including how to prep the glasses (lots of fun ideas from dangling candy canes to putting chocolate kisses in the bottom of a martini glass), measuring the the alcohol, and mixing ideas and the best part - tasting the creations! My favorite was The Evergreen - 1 oz. Tequila, 1 oz. heavy whipping cream, 1/2 oz. creme de menthe, 1 oz. creme de cocoa. Shake in an ice-filled martini shaker. Pour into martini glass rimmed with chocolate sprinkles. Delightful!

5. Hanukkah Dinner - We decided that it was more important to celebrate Hanukkah as a family, rather than during the 8 nights that it fell on, since Ashley was not yet home. We had our traditional dinner and lit the candles and enjoyed an evening of celebrating all being "home" in JH!

6. Elk Refuge Sleigh Ride - okay call us "tourists," but it was on my bucket list and my kids obliged and went with me. Yes, we were the only locals on our sleigh, but I would say that it was enjoyed by all! Something that I would definitely do again when you visit us this winter! The sleigh actually takes you out into the refuge, where thousands of elk migrate to winter, and we were face to face with these beautiful creatures.
 
 

7. Walks on the Snake River Levee (I've already shown you all those pics)

8. Movies - We saw "The Fighter" - awesome, true story and "True Grit" - probably my favorite move of the year! Both worth seeing this holiday season.

9. Celebrating the Winter Solstice by attending the Gallery Event for Tom Mangelson. He resides in JH and is a world-renowned wildlife photographer. His works are amazing. After a fun evening in the Gallery we enjoyed a fabulous dinner on the Town Square at the Cadillac Grille.


High Five



Windswept

10. Skiing - LOTS of great skiing - Derek logged 11 days on his visit home! Jackson Hole has proved to be a fun place to enjoy lots of great skiing. Even in the "busy season" that we are in now, there are still no lift lines or crowds to speak of, maybe because we stick to the blue runs! Actually Derek & Barry have navigated their way down a lot of double blues and blacks too - Ashley & I stick to the greens & blues &!

11. Mountain Athlete - yes I got Ashley to join me at Mountain Athlete for a workout and she did awesome. Crystal commented when I went back this week on how athletic Ashley was & that she can't wait to train her over the summer (was she surprised at the athleticism since she was my daughter??).

12. FAMILY TIME - we enjoyed lots of fun family time together (although Derek may say that 21 days home/away from friends was a bit extreme)!

Mountain life is good!