In January, I got to travel to Florida for a few days to attend the Children's Pastors' Conference on behalf of Kidology. Lucky for me, the event took place on the grounds of Walt Disney World, specifically at the convention facilities of Coronado Springs (which we stayed at back in 2006 for the same event).

While we were all there in the official capacity of being exhibitors, we did get away from the convention every now and then. One afternoon we decided to hop the bus over to Downtown Disney for a bite to eat… and then this photo was taken:

Why is Steve perplexed?

As I sit in my yellow jacket between my coworker Daniel and my boss Karl, I really have to wonder what I was thinking at the time. 

Today I went to get our mail and…

Look what just arrived in the mail!

It would appear some new Ticket to Ride fun is in order!  (More about Alvin & Dexter)

Over the weekend, some friends joined us for an impromptu get-together to play Ticket to Ride.  After all, it's January, it's cold, it's full of doldrums… why not play a boardgame which takes you to exotic cities… like Duluth?

Amy, Megan, Branden, & Sarah take on TtR Europe

The 11 of us played every one of our TtR games, including the original USA version (with the USA 1910 Expansion), Europe (with the Europa 1912 Expansion featuring Warehouses & Depots), Switzerland, and Nordic Countries.

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Today Amy & I had our yearly physicals at the doctor's office. I had to get some blood work done. As everyone who knows me knows… I just hate needles and blood!

Steve gets stickers!

However, the nurse taking the blood thought I was a "big boy" for not crying and gave me some stickers as a reward!  I got Spider-Man, Finding Nemo, and Thomas & Friends.

Continuing a tradition we started in 2006… and continued in 2008 and 2009, Amy and I thought it would be fun to post a few photos from each month to create a photo recap of what we've experienced, written about, and shared with all of you over the past year.  We're sourcing the photos from our personal blog at SteveandAmySly.com, our beverage review site at BevReview.com, and for the first time, our odd site about Disney trash cans, MagicalTrash.com.

We didn't blog as much in the early part of the year, but then we relaunched our personal site using WordPress in August, which accelerated things once again and enabled the use of larger images.  At the same time, we started actively posting on MagicalTrash.com using the Tumblr platform.  Because of that, our posts were distributed across many sites.

Looking back, we posted a total of 80 personal blog stories this year, including 985 images, in addition to 73 beverage-related reviews and 42 trash can-related posts. Yeah, we've been busy on the blogs!

Enjoy the recap and thanks for reading!

January

Review: Pepsi Throwback (Rerelease)

Review: Heritage Dr Pepper

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Not sure this is real or a hoax (Update: It's real!), but what if you added monsters to the world of Ticket to Ride? Either the folks at Days of Wonder have a screw loose or this idea for this "Alvin & Dexter" expansion might actually be brilliant!

Ticket to Ride - Alvin & Dexter Expansion

A forum user at BoardGameGeek.com discovered this product being listed on Japanese site AmiAmi.jp, an online retailer for miniature figures. If this does play out to be a real expansion, it's quite an unexpected twist for the TtR world created by Days of Wonder. However, given that I'm a huge fan of the series, any expansion is welcomed these days.

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Culinary Christmas - December 25: A Merry Christmas At Grandmother's

Featured Foods: Pudding, pumpkin pie

Our journey through a Culinary Christmas has come to an end, and what do we end up with? Pudding and pumpkin pie!

We may all know the classic song "Over the River and Through the Woods" but probably not in the way that it's performed today by Danny Kaye and the Andrews Sisters. The song is expanded and modified to have more of a Christmas theme in this 1951 recording of A Merry Christmas At Grandmother's. I thought the journey to eat food with loved ones was a fitting way to wrap up our theme of this year's Steve's 25 Days of Christmas Music.

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We got snow on Christmas Eve here in Chicago, so Amy and I took a walk around the neighborhood. Here are some things we observed — when we weren't throwing snowballs at each other…

Pretty lights

It's almost Christmas!

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Amy & I continued our 4-year Christmas tradition of watching White Christmas at the Music Box Theatre as part of their annual Christmas Show.

Music Box Theatre in Chicago

It's a fun time where they not only show the movie, but also have a visit from Santa, group caroling, and all-around Chicago holiday fun.  (For those interested, recap posts from our Christmas show visits in 2008 and 2009.)

Steve & Amy in blurry, cameraphone self-portrait at event

The Music Box has been putting on a double billing of White Christmas/It's A Wonderful Life for 27 years and it seems to be getting more and more popular.

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Culinary Christmas - December 24: We Wish You A Merry Christmas

Featured Foods: Figgy pudding

My favorite version of We Wish You A Merry Christmas is performed by John Denver & The Muppets, and we featured that track back in 2002. During the song, Miss Piggy confuses the reference to "Figgy pudding" as "Piggy pudding" and has a little conniption. It's all quite delightful.

However, since we've already used that version, I present to you this track by Roger Whittaker. There are no pigs mentioned, but he sure does make a big deal about figgy pudding. You hear it a lot… and even in a round! Personally, the stuff sounds amazingly gross.

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