Our Christmas

I thought we'd have a quiet Christmas Eve, do an effort-less crockpot soup & call it a night. Jeff said we (more like he) had to have meat & a nice meal. He decided to make a roast & I would do the rest.  We had 2 friends whose wives were working, so the men & children came over to share the evening & meal with us.

At about 12:09...just after Santa's visit Ty wandered into the hall...no, not to peak, but to let us know that he was SICK. Poor Jeff got the worst of it...he always does. Then at 4am Sydney followed along & made more of a mess for Jeff.

Christmas morning began with calm children & baths.  Then came the gift opening. They overcame their weak tummys quickly & were SO excited. I love the anticipation, so I am just content to have a wrapped gifts, but not the rest of the family.

This is Sydney's TinkerBell Backpack. It's as big as her, but she loves wearing it.

This is Sydney's Ariel jewlery...she dressed me up.

Ty got a scooter. It wasn't officially on his list...BUT Ty's response after riding it was..."I've always wanted one of these." Our downstairs is 1,000 sq feet of tile, so it's an indoor toy too.

We had plans to hang out with 2 families in the evening. I called them to warn of the illnesses, but they decided to take their chances & still come over.

We carpooled over to the temple to see the lights & enjoy the music.  The picture is a reflection...can you tell?

Then we all came back to our house for games (Wizard...love that game) & cookies. Our 2 kids went straight to bed, but the other kids all had fun playing together.

With this being our 1st Christmas ever without family we were determined not to make it feel lonely. I think we succeeded, but look forward to having cousins & grandparents join us in future years.

The Merriest Place on Earth

One of our friends had a Christmas tradition that I just loved. Their big gift from mom & dad was a family vacation. We adopted the idea & took the kids to Disneyland this past weekend.

We expected unbelievable crowds, but didn't find them. The longest we waited for a ride was 30min. How great is that? We did make good use of fast passes though, maybe that had something to do with it.

I thought Sydney would love the Nemo Sub, but she begged to go home.

Small World was amazing. Their Christmas transformation must have taken thousands. I was thoroughly impressed!

This is both of their Disney faces...just in awe, taking it in.

We took Ty on a lot of big kid rides. He held up strong, but his heart was pounding out of his chest. He didn't shed a tear until on Pirates of the Carribean he thought we were going on it a secound time & just started balling.

Sydney fears 2 things...people dressed up as characters & mice. I knew I just had to take her to meet Mickey.

The castle looked amazing covered in snow. Here is our attempts to capture its magesty...

Our longest wait in line was for Mr. Toad's Wild Ride. I loved those books when I was little, but why do we wait in line forever for this totally lame ride? It's like the trip wouldn't have been complete without it.

I forgot to add the favorite...Astro Blasters. Whatever happened to letting your little girl win?

We had a fantastic trip. Getting back to the hotel was rough...wrong bus 1st, then the correct bus was doing 2 routes, then we were at the wrong Marriott. Luckily the kids were quiet & patient so that Jeff & I could try to be as well.

If you haven't ever gone to Disney at Christmas-time it is well worth the trip!

I hope you all have a very Merry Christmas!

Yikes!

Christmas is fast approaching. The last of the gifts are mailed off, everything is wrapped & ready to go. I thought I was finally getting things in order & regaining my brain function. Until...

Moments ago I got home from my 7 hour shift. Slipped my shoes off & did a double take. I was wearing 2 different shoes and had NO idea. Oh, how embarrassing!

Impress the Little Ones

This site has a super cute video to show your kids. You upload their picture & name, then the appear on Santa's nice list. Ty could not believe it!

http://family.go.com/santas-list/


OURS IS HERE

Thanksgiving in San Diego

I am in full-blown Christmas mode, but I still have to go back & add our Thanksgiving photos.

Our tradition has been to go to San Diego for Thanksgiving, because my family is so fun...an there is no way I would touch a turkey, even for Jeff. Someone else has got to do it.

When we drove in, my parents met us at Sombreros...my fav. Grandma Lu met Sydney for the 1st time (she has been living in MD since Syd was born).

Here's the lovely turkey at 5am-ish.

My mom's bff -Aunt Sandi, helping out in the kitchen.

We ate outside. It was beautiful. My humble dad wanted to make sure his garden was in the photos :-)

The kids table. Ty was so excited to bring the center piece which was his pumpkin turned into a turkey.

The next day Jeff had the most romantic idea, to recreate our wedding day. This is a rare occurance (the romantic side)...incase there were any "ah's" out there (unless bi-weekly massages count).  We went to the temple & we really think there was an earthquake while we were in there. It was pretty crazy. There was a close-up of us, but it was way to obvious which one of us has gotten cuter in the last 8 years & which has aged like mad, so here we are from a far distance.

Next we went for a walk at LaJolla Cove, also from our wedding day. This time we brought In-n-Out along. Love that place!

And this is 99% of the reason we don't live in San Diego...frizz! The other 1% goes to cost of living.

We had a blast playing scrabble all weekend. I think every round included tear-jerking laughter.

Of course the day after Thanksgiving included shopping. I was so excited to get an air-compressor, nail gun & staple gun. I have been wanting these So Bad! Now I just need time for all my planned projects. BTW, Home Depot is a great place to go on Black Fri. A bunch of men that are in & out. I think it took about 8 minutes.  Sydney lucked into this crown at  JoAnns...Thanks Grandma!

We went to Shelter Island & Ty fell in love! The boats, water, pelicans, fishing. He did not want to leave.

Seaport Village was our next stop. They had a fun "green" Christmas celebration. The kids made recycled ornaments, Syd & Jeff got a picture with surfing Santa, tree lighting & Carousel rides. (where did blogger's spell check go??)

It was such a fun weekend & holiday. I love the time around family for me, but also for my kids. I love the way they light up when they are surrounded by family & love.

Movie Week

I am feeling the exhaustion! I won tickets on the radio for Wednesday's red carpet pre-screening of The Blind Side. It is an absolute must-see! Before the movie there was a mini-concert by Lee Brice. He sings Love Like Crazy...such a good song. It was Jeff's 1st real force-fed country & I think he liked it. Things could have gone south if there were boots & wranglers involved. Luckily Lee wasn't that sort of country. It was a fun night, our poor babysitter though. We were out way too late on a school night.

Then Thursday was the long awaited New Moon midnight premiere. The venue had Embry Call doing signings & visiting each theater. I was standing about 2 feet from him for quite a while in the theater. He's not a big enough actor to risk a hand shake & the swine. This is him in the movie:

This is who showed up at the theater:

All Twi-fans seem to take Twi-criticizm as well as being fed dirt...BUT...

Rosalie's hair was awful and the Volturi looked way more papery (Pa-per-ee) in my head. The camera spun circles a little too much for the easily motion-sick, like myself.

I loved Jane, she was perfect. And Emmett was cute as ever. There was so much more about the movie that I loved, even parts where it strayed from the book.

Now the count down begins for June 30th...Eclipse. I hope my sister-in-law will live close by then. She is a guaranteed non-cancellation. I had planned to go with 3 friends. One cancelled, one got sick from the H1N1 vaccine & the other tore her rotator-cuff. I made some odd friends there that kept me company & had me laughing. It was a really fun, really late night.