children laughing, people passing.

children laughing, people passing,
meeting smile after smile,
and on every corner you'll hear-

silver bells, silver bells,
it's Christmas time in the city...

yay! christmas! (was approximately 3 days agooo...) sorry i'm a little late with this post, i haven't been on the computer a whole lot this past week. so. my christmas was pretty good, how was yours? :D we didn't do the scary movie thing again this year, which puts and end to what i was hoping was going to be the 2nd annual christmas scary movie experience. oh well, we'll try again next year. instead we drove my grandma up to a little bar & grill in BlueEarth, South Dakota. Ever heard of it? no, me either. we met up with my uncle, aunt and 3 cousins to exchange presents and well... grandma, so that we could hang with our relatives and grams could get up to Winona, Minnisota without us having to drive her the whole way. it was fun there. except we had to vegitate for 30 mins before we could even order our food because they had to start up the ovens and wait for them to get hot. no biggy though, they opened just for us. on christmas day. nice people in ol' BlueEarth...

you see the picture in the post below this one? with the kid crying? my mom printed that off and put it in a huge, expensivly nice, black glass picture frame and game it to my aunt as a christmas present. she loved it.

speaking of presents, not to be conceited or anything, but here's a list of what me and my family got for presents ourselves...

Me
gray/black striped cardigan
slipper socks w/ pandas
4 scarves
dark gray pea coat
black cadet hat
treasu(red) v-neck
Emery poster
magnetic healing braclet
gap giftcard
comforter
past famous photographs of "Life" magazine
supernatural season 3
Fall Out Boy- Folie a' Deux
Batman: The Dark Knight
Animal Crossing: City Life
earfones

Ron
zigzag wallet
striped sweater
billabong windbreaker/jacket
Emery- The Question (i'm totally jacking it...)
"undergarments"
Zunehom
How I Met Your Mother Season 2
How I Met Your Mother Season 3
Hot Topic giftcard
(other stuff...)

Brandi
Monopoly: World Edition
DS Lite
an awesome scarf that she doesn't take off (quess who that's from XD)
(other stuff...)

Family
Pictionary Man
Crazy Tunes Puzzle

fyi, the only reason i have more stuff listed is because i remember all of mine. haha mom makes sure we all get the same amount of stuff.

so, i hope everyone had wonderful holidays and i have great wishes for everyone in the new year! make your resolutions good...

love, lissa!

p.s.
my uncle David rocks! (lol, he told me to tell everyone that...)

p.p.s.
my ipod is back! well okay, its not MY ipod, but its a newly refurbished one that they traded in for free because mine sucked! yay! i'm so glad i have portable music again...

i guess i'm 16.

so... i guess i'm 16. 16 years, 3 days, 6 hours and 18 minutes to be relativly exact. weird huh? i don't feel older, but do you ever? november 27 was a lot of things. thanksgiving, my sweet 16, macy's... but all rolled into one made each seem a little less spectacular. i'm still wondering where my birthday went. where thanksgiving went. where the parade that we traveled 30 hours to participate in went.

but it was great. new york was amazing and i'll prolly post a couple of pics from the top of the rock here. but i don't know... it WAS great, but it just wasn't AS great as you would expect. its dirty, really dirty. and smelly... and the people are rushing rushing everywhere, going this way, going there. (nice little rhyme, i know.) i think i said once when we were walking down broadway, that tourists are the best new yorkers. we actually spend the time looking up. the buildings there are amazing- probably the best part, and it seems the only people that pay them attention are the people that don't spend their lives rushing between them. i felt completely comfortable walking down the street. i could see myself doing that quite often, though i'm not completely sure i wouldn't get lost. but i would never, ever live there. san fransisco was better XD

the actual parade was hard. obviously. your shoulders started burning by the 40 minute mark to the point where you could barely hold them up long enough for one song. by the end it was nearly impossible. spit was dripping down your chin and you're hoping to God no camera is zoomed in on your face. you have a ton of things to watch out for like front-to-back lines, side-to-side lines, feet (toes), horn angles, the ground so you don't trip, and playing all of the right fingerings even if you can't get sound to come out. it was tough. and yet it felt like it was over in a matter of minutes. after all of the work that we put into the preparation for this thing, and it was over so fast. it was hard to believe. i still don't think it's hit me.

but it was totally worth it. here are some pics for your entertainment: :D


(i don't think this needs an introduction. can i just say that it was completely not what i was expecting? on the ferry over it looked short, fat and green. it was supposed to be tall and imposing and comforting and amazing and huge. i suppose it was at one time. and it was for me at first. but after a while it just became a statue.)


(one taken off the "Top of the Rock.")


(a little kid on a leash crying outside of central park. :} )


(another picture taken off the "Top of the Rock.")