My family has had a lot of good fortune lately. MY MOM BOUGHT A NEW CAR TODAY!  Its a really sexy car, its a ford fusion and brand new. This is so great, she desrves this so much. Merry Freaking Christmas right?!? And we are gonna give the Scion to Kyle… well at least until I get my license back, around March.

**this blog gets very Christmas lettery**

Everything has just been fucking excellent recently, grandma had some sweepstakes luck, which helped with getting the car. My friends are all home for Christmas, the winery is doing great, my mom is happy, jenny and kyle are well and its christmas time. I got the chance to hang out with some “old school” ARC people, including my good buddy Dustin York who powered through school and just graduated from CSU Long Beach.

Our tree was real pretty

We are going to do the Christmas the traditional Ritchie way, Chicken enchiladas for Christmas eve dinner, wake up Christmas day, open presents, have champagne and tea and coffee. Then we have mimosas and eggs Benedict and watch elf. But then were gonna change things up a bit, were gonna drive to my cousins Suzy’s place in San Francisco. She has a beautiful little townhouse in the heart of the Castro. Lots of family will be there. We have never really done a big family Christmas, its usually just the 4 of us. So that’s new. AND its my first Christmas with little kids! My cousin Mira is 2 and my new cousin Ash is 6 months. It’s gonna be real fun.

Then I will head back to Pleasanton or Hayward with Jenny or Kyle, work at the winery on Sunday and then join Maggie and Tim Muldoon for our yearly tradition of drinking beer and playing wii golf. Where me and Maggie will sing Islands in the Stream really loud over and over again to annoy Tim.

It has been a great month off of doing plays and I have wholeheartedly embraced the holiday spirit, and I was at least able to get my family presents this year.

Jenny took my Grandma and Mom out to the Rockettes Christmas show which they all enjoyed. She recently got her business license for

before the decorations....

her nannying, Jenny is a legit business owner now . Kyle has been working non stop at Any Mountain and at the winery. He is still living in Hayward with Alex and Tim. The winery will open its new tasting room in the next few weeks and were all real excited about it. My mom is still working for AT&T although she had to switch departments. Hey at least we didn’t move to Georgia like we thought we might have to. My mom is elated to have this new car and have everyone happy and healthy and home for the holidays. Grandma spends her time painting and drawing and watching god awful soap operas, she got a suprise visit my cousins Tom and Jody who drove all the way up here from LA just to surprise Grandma, super cool. And me? The usual, been doing a lot of plays, had a great year of theatre and just got my first lead! I work for the winery doing their webmaster stuff. I’m still a socialite lush of Sacramento but I am much more responsible these days, learned some lessons this year.

I’m usually much more emo and depressing around this time, but I have NOTHING to complain about right now. I’m happy to report that I am actually starting to do real good. I want everyone to know that I am extremely thankful for all the good fortune we have all

AFTER!

been having. I don’t have the words for how well Slaughterhouse 5 went or how over the moon I am about Blithe Spirit. It’s time to sit back with my family and be thankful and drink champagne and watch elf. I hope I get cool presents I haven’t been this excited about a Christmas in YEARS. Well I hope this blog finds you well. MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYBODY!

heres one of the cards I made

peace!

First off I am blogging live from Pleasanton, I came down here last Thursday to stay with my sister Jenny for a few days, get some work done at the winery and just get out of town. It’s been great taking a little mini vacation, I work the tasting room pouring wine all day, then I come home to my sisters, make dinner have some wine and chill out marathon watching community, the office, and 30 rock. Sounds boring but I have had a GREAT few days. Sometimes in Sacramento I crowd myself with crowds and parties, its nice to have time to myself. It has really made me realize how satisfying living on my own would be. I need to move out post haste.

I guess I havent been blogging because I have less to complain about. I have some money in my pocket(some being the key word), I got a lead in the next play(!), the American River Review is out and its beautiful, and its fucking Christmas time and I have been embracing it wholeheartedly. yayy, I have hella more christmas pictures of our decorations at home coming soon.

I have been trying to visualize my life post Sacramento lately. Because I will be free of all Sacramento commitments come March. Done with my DUI classes(and I can have my license back phew), Blithe Spirit will be over, and big announcement… I’m going to take an 8 week statistics course(thanks Colleen).

If I lived here I could work at my winery (and we open an AWESOME new tasting room next month) and and and Livermore Shakespeare festival is doing Macbeth (my favorite shakespeare) this summer, and yeah it performs outside at the old white victorian house at Concannon. This is a viable option right? I could bounce between my brother and sisters place until I found a room to myself.

I’m just throwing it out there, but this sounds like a smart plan right now.

I’m heading back to Sac today because all my friends are back in town! Yayy.

peace

Went to SoCal last week to go pick up my Grandma and take her home with us to stay for a couple weeks and have Christmas and new years with us. It has been very chill, lots of food, watching elf, watching Christmas movies, and just hanging out.

I got some sweet presents too. I got an Itouch(I have gone wayyyy too long with out an ipod), a nice coach wallet, some movies, some CDs, some money. Oh and my sister got me a ridiculous huge canvas mounted print of myself from the body paint shoot I did with Terri. lol.

Here’s pictures of our tree and decorations and such. The white tree is my sisters tree. She has always wanted a flocked tree, but we never let her get one and then her boyfriend of 5 years never let her get one. Now she lives on her own and can get whatever tacky decorations she wants. I’m actually pretty proud. Not only does it have fake snow on it. Its is sparkling and glittery and covered in pink lights. Perfect.

Happy Christmas you guys!

**this marks one year exactly since I redid the website completely yay!!

peace

This picture was from back in like April at second Saturday with my brother and Mom. (look how beardy I was!)

Just an update to say what’s up. It’s December, and it’s getting to be Christmas time. Which means a my mom bakes and watches trashy hallmark holiday movies nonstop. I wear layers, long coats, and finally get to show off my scarf collection. I love this time of year. So much. My mom makes soup and scones and I light a fire and hang lights. Brilliant. And it actually snowed in Sacramento!

It’s week two of No Drink December. I have substituted coffee, tea, and hot chocolate for the alcohol this month. So far so good. I have definitely had to rethink my ways of getting to know people. Gone are the ways of bonding over taking shots and letting our guards down. I actually have to try to engage sober conversations with new people. Which is really great though. I have been getting to know a couple new people. We’ll see where this goes. Dating is fun, and without alcohol, is mostly genuine.

I have been doing a lot of improv. Which is really the only substantial money I have to make right now. I also performed in Winnie the pooh again this year, except instead of narrator this year I was Tigger and Owl. That was fun.Anything for a few bucks right now.

I have also been fucking up auditions again. Last week I auditioned for a murder mystery at ARC and I got a callback for the lead, great. Then I auditioned for Metamorphoses at Sac State. I had never auditioned there, fucked it up royally, and then got a callback (wtf?). Problem was they were both on the same night. So I went to Sac State first and left after about an hour and a half. STUPID. And then I went to AR and read all night for the lead. Of course, as it goes with ARC everytime, they call me back and “consider me”, tell me how great I’m doing. String me along to the very end and then give it to someone else.  I am super happy for my friends who get cast, truly. But I am done. I am so mad at myself for leaving such a sweet play for the chance to be in a murder mystery. I had this romantic dream about finally doing a lead at ARC, but yet again, I had to touch the stove to know that it’s hot. Anyways…. that was a rant.

Here’s cute pictures of me being domestic! I made a trifle for thankgiving! It’s layers of gingerbread, vanilla pudding, pumpkin pie filling, whip cream. crushed up ginger snaps, and caramel. It was sorta amazing.

mmmm yummy.

I leave you with what gets me into the Christmas mood. Sufjan Stevens.

peace out.