Christmas and the New Year

I hope that everyone had a very Merry Christmas this year. I enjoyed celebrating the Reason for the season at my new church in downtown Macon (love it) by singing old Christmas hymns and having Christmas communion. I wish everyone could just sit back and realize why we celebrate Christmas - realize that it is a wonderful spirit-filled time of year and forget some of the commercialism that our society has so willingly associated with the holiday.

But on the note of commercialism, I really did get some amazing gifts this year. Here are a few highlights for those of you that might be wondering:

• A new digital camera - wide angle lens, 12 megapixel, 7x optical zoom = amazing. It is seriously a very, very cool camera. And I got a huge memory card and case and all that stuff to go with it. I am currently experimenting with all the settings (and have discovered that my dog automatically looks at the floor when I get it out because she has learned to hate the flash).
• A new printer - HP Photosmart with a touchscreen (this was really much appreciated as my old one hasn't been working properly in the last year) and a new printer cable (this one capable of reaching lengths longer that 2 feet), ink cartridges, and a ream of paper to go with it, haha.
• A new blender - hooray! No more "piece-of-junk" blender that can't even crush ice, haha. My new blender is glass and stainless steel and capable of turning ice into snow in a matter of seconds. Is it bad that I am at the age where I can really appreciate a kitchen appliance as an awesome Christmas present?
• Scrubs, white lab coat, stethoscope - all these things were needed for my medical placement... and I look legit in the whole get-up.
• Season 1, Volume 1 DVD of GLEE = love, love, love.
• Volume 1 and Volume 2 of GLEE CDs = good for jamming out in the car.
• 17 Again on DVD - Ah, Zac. Where have you been all my life?
• Clothes (yada, yada, the usual)
• Money, gift cards, etc.

Anyway, the new year is approaching and I am very excited to say goodbye to 2009. (Dear 2009, thank you for teaching me that I never want to take another standardized test ever again, that I can get through graduate classes just fine and still maintain a life, how much stuff I really have and how much I don't want to move it again, how pathetic my dating life was, and how much I actually hate being more than an hour away from home.) I have all sorts of resolutions that I am going to try and keep this next year. For starters, as you may have read on my facebook page, that I am going to read the whole Bible chronologically. Very excited about this process.

2010 already holds several wonderful things in store: graduation (again) from college, my first real job, my first real home, financial independence, the wedding of one of my best friends, the engagement of my other best friend, and the fact that this time next Christmas, I will be able to buy my family some nice gifts too.

Seriously?

Seriously.