Christmas 2008... On Christmas Day, Jabus flew in from Tulsa. We made a great dinner, with Jesse and Sarah over, and opened some gifts under the tree. Super low-key and tons of fun. After Sarah and Jess bailed, Jabus and I continued to open some santa gifts.... He had a HUGE surprise for me with one of the gifts, which was a book he created, titled, "The story of Jabus & Liz". It had photos from the past year, and all our trips, and fun captions under them. As I flipped through it, the last page had a photo of a wedding at the Ritz on Maui, and under it the caption read, "On Christmas Day 2008, Jabus asked Liz to Marry him. And, the story continues....". He then, presented me with an amazing engagement set! Totally caught me off guard!

We didn't take any photos that night, but... a few days later, on the 28th, I celebrated my 35th birthday. Jabus, again, over-delivered. I was dropped in Santa Monica for a spa day (amazing!), and then we headed over to The Huntly hotel where we had dinner plans with Paul and Sylvia. Little did I know, Jay had invited others to join us! Jen and Jeff as well as Dani. Here we are, just before heading to dinner:

After dinner, we decided to go accross down to raid our friend Stella's birthday party. As we walked into the bar/resturant, we were greeted by dozens more buddies, who began to sing happy birthday TO ME! So, a surprise for me, but Stella and I celebrated our birthdays with many buddies in tow, organized by Stella, and Jabus from Tulsa! And, Josh & Anna. Thanks everyone!! It was so awesome! The best birthday EVER.

A few days later, Jabus and I joined a photographer friend, Andre Andreev, to have a few snaps taken at the beach, commemorating our engagement. Here is one of our favorites:

What a holiday! I can't wait to unfold the days in 2009 with you, Jabus.