REI Christmas Party

We had our Christmas party last night for REI. It started off with a big potluck at the store. About 75 people showed up. Everyone brought awesome food! Naturally, Keith and I brought a chocolate cake. During the potluck, there was a slide show presentation with pictures of employees doing fun and fantastic things. It is nice to work with so many people that love to do a bunch of different outdoor activities. Also during dinner, special recognition awards were given out to certain employees, by department supervisors. My supervisor started talking about someone in his department that always makes his day better, works hard at completing any task, and makes those around HER always feel good. I was shocked when he called MY NAME. It made me feel so special. I was very happy! A bit embarrassed, but happy. :)
We were all given a Christmas gift -- aluminum trekking poles, made especially for REI Staff. I know I see a lot of people using these for hiking when I'm out running. Maybe I'll end up using them if I go up Half Dome some day. It's very nice of them to give us a gift of any kind, I think. I will say this is an amazing company to work for. Everyone that works for REI, at least at my store, genuinely likes their job.
After dinner we went over to SharksIce for some ice skating and broom ball. I don't think I've ever ice skated before, honestly. I don't like being cold so it probably never interested me. When I first went out on the ice, I held on to the wall for an entire lap. After a while, I was able to make it around without stopping. By the end of the night, I was being pushed and pulled around by a lot of my friends. All I kept thinking was I didn't want to fall on my butt. I came close numerous times! It was great to see everyone outside of work and being silly on the ice. This is a picture of just a small handful of us:

This is me and Caeton. He was hired with me but ended up leaving during the summer to live in Tahoe with his dad. He showed up as a guest with an employee. I miss him so much. It was great to see him. I had a wonderful run this morning with a new friend of mine. I'll write about it tomorrow.

Until then.............