Aaron and I spent 2 nights last weekend at the Zermatt Hotel in Midway Utah for the Career Step Christmas Party. First off, I have to say that Andrea is the most kind and generous woman. Just to give us a weekend getaway was wonderful enough but the weekend continued to get progressively better. We had Jenny Kellis, who is a student at the Y who works for Aaron, watch the kids for us. It was nice to know that we had someone we could trust and feel good about watching the kids. When we got to the Zermatt, we found an enormous goody bag on our bed, filled with chocolates, baked goods, a DVD, a Christmas mug and a really nice Career Step Hoodie Sweatshirt. Once we were settled in our room we went to the opening reception where they had a chocolate fountain dessert bar and hot cocoa and hot cider. The Team Building activity for the evening was a game of bingo where we had to get as many people to sign our card and fill it up. We had to find things like someone who's lived East of the Mississippi, youngest child, hot wheels collector, ever been to jail (this one belonged to Gene-Andrea's husband--I'll have to get the story behind that later. . . ), etc. Karin Marie and I finished first! She was so excited that we had to go find her and tell her that her 1st two employees won first! For this game there was a large table with various prizes to choose.-- DVDs, cookbooks,bath gels, truffles, etc. So, the advantage to being first was having more to choose from. I got a Nestle cookie cookbook with a cookbook stand and Aaron got Truffles. We then went to have dinner at the hotel restaurant, but they forgot to put our order up so we had to wait a LONG time so they gave us a free dessert. We chose an Eclair to Share. I wish I had taken a photo! I t was enormous. We couldn't touch it that night. We put it in the freezer in our room and invited Karin Marie an Luis over on Friday night to help us eat it and we still didn't finish it it was HUGE! It was also delicious!
I have to say that seeing KM was so awesome! I don't get to see her much but whenever I do, I always feel so good. She is someone who I love to be around!
On Friday, we had the day completely to ourselves, so Aaron and I decided to go outlet mall shopping in Park City. I've never gone to them before. It was a lot of fun. We just strolled around, got our Christmas shopping done and also bought a couple things for us. I got a really cute $3 dress from the Gap. And a cotton white shirt that Aaron LOVES! We started watching Pirates of the Carribean at World's End but didn't have the chance to finish it so I just bought it the other day so we could "finish" our date at home.
Friday evening was the big party. We had a very lovely buffet style dinner. After dinner there was dancing (I thought the band was just a little too loud though). After dinner and dancing, Andrea began a presentation. She started off with a little company history and said some extremely nice things about me and KM and talked about how we had been with her for so long (I had forgotten exactly when I started but she said May 1996) and had us come up together and gave us these enormous lollipops, plus a free night stay to come back to the Zermatt. That was SO nice. It made me feel so good. She also recognized several other people in the company who have been with her for a long time. 
Next, the client development department brought out several locked treasure chests. Andrea started pulling names out of a cup to determine who would win the grand prizes that were located all around the room. If your name was drawn you got to choose a key and see which box it belonged to. Inside the box were clues to help the winner determine which prize they had won-- The prizes were a Canon Rebel EOS SLR digital camera pack, a projection screen TV, front load washer/dryer with pedestals, a King sized bed with all the bedding, a plasma TV, a trip to FL, trip to Boston, trip to Alaska, an outdoor adventure pack with a tandem bike,an ipod pack with speakers, and itunes gift card, $1500 cash and a kitchen set. Let me say too that anyone who walked away with anything less than these prizes was quite blessed too. The "regular gifts" were the likes of ipods, Wiis, Little Giant ladder, PSPs, etc. Everything was EXTREMELY NICE!
Well, My name was called and I won the kitchen stuff! It is so awesome! I love my kitchen! I now have a brand new heavy duty professional style Kitchenaid, A breadmaker, a new crock pot, All new dishes and silverware, all new kitchen utensils--whisks, spoons, can openers, potato mashers, food chopper, etc A LOT, All new corning ware, pots and pans, mixing bowls, and a buffet. Below is what it looked like at the party:
And here are some pictures at my house. I have to say-- I love the way it all looks! I literally emptied out all of my cabinets and am giving most of the stuff I had before to DI. My kitchen was quite a mess for a few days while I shuffled stuff around! So much fun! I haven't received the buffet yet. When it arrives, we're thinking of putting the TV on it since we have such a small kitchen.
The party was so fun! The weekend alone with my husband would have been wonderful on its own, but this is truly amazing. Andrea, you are wonderful! Thank you for letting me work for you and for all the kind things you have done for me over the years!
