Kudos to YOU!

For those of you out there who sent out Christmas cards or letters or emails or even a did a "Merry Christmas" blog post before Christmas, I say good on ya! I have been a Christmas slacker this year, but I wish a Merry (belated) Christmas to you and yours. We had a fun holiday full of family and food and more food. We were lucky enough to have most of Chris's family in town and we missed the ones who live to far to come.

Grandma Lynne made a Santa pinata that we posed on Grandpa Hal before we busted it open. Luckily his face came through the ordeal in tact.

Can I have orange jello for Christmas?

I know I put a lot of Dalin quotes out there, but three year olds are hilarious! The title is his latest request for Christmas (it's his new obsession with Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs). I told him to ask Santa.

I feel like I'm kind of behind on all things Christmas, but we made an effort to bring a little Christmas yesterday. And by we I mean Chris. He's good at getting us away from doing the boring stuff like grocery shopping. We went to the Winterfest in Henderson, where we caught the tail end of the holiday parade and checked out the craft fair. I learned later that all of the activities were free (ice skating, pony rides, petting zoo and carriage rides) but we didn't have a lot of time so we didn't do any of that. It was still nice to walk around and we found a small patch of snow on our way back to the car.

We then headed out to Boulder City for a ride on the Santa Train. It didn't go very far, maybe a couple of miles, but Santa and Mrs. Claus came through and visited with all of the kids which was pretty cute.

Dalin is a little impatient when it comes to getting my attention, especially when I am driving. He doesn't quite understand that I can't turn around when I am supposed to be watching the road. A couple of days ago he kept saying "Mom look at me . Mom look at this. Mom look what I'm doing. Mom see this. Mom, mom, mom, mom, mom, mom, mom, mom." You get the idea. I was a little annoyed, and when we finally came to a stop and could turn around my "whaaaat" surely conveyed that fact. His reply? "Mom look, I'm sitting like an old man." Hi-lar-ious! Where does he come up with this stuff?

Here's the old man on the train. I think it's so funny I keep making him do it.

So long, farwell, auf weidersehen, goodbye

Chris's sister Emily and her son Jayden moved across the country to start their new life in New York. They were living with us for the last four months so we were pretty sad to see them go. Good luck and happiness to you guys, and come visit when you can.

Doce Anos!

A couple of weeks ago Chris and I celebrated 12 years of wedded bliss and yes it has been mostly blissful. While we spent our actual anniversary traveling to California (see the previous post) we had two date nights in a row thanks to some great offers of babysitting from Chris's mom and my brother and sister-in-law Brian and Natalie (you guys are the best!) We went to Texas de Brazil, Chris's favorite and very tasty but still very expensive even with a buy one get one free meal coupon. We also tried to get free tickets to a UFC fight when Chris read on twitter that they were being given away just down the street from where we were. I know, how great a wife am I (I didn't even give him grief for checking twitter while we were on a date). We're not a mushy gushy kind of couple so I won't gross you out with confessions of undying love or anything, but I am a lucky girl to be married to my best friend and to still be in love with him every day.

The beach, a wedding and Sea World

We had a pretty busy November part of which included a trip to San Diego for Chris's sister Emily's wedding. She got married on a Monday afternoon so we spent the morning at the beach. The weather was a little chilly when we left the hotel, but warmed up to beautiful pretty quickly. That is not to say that the water wasn't fa-ree-zing, but we thought the kids would be satisfied just playing in the sand. We were only 25% correct in our thinking. Dalin wouldn't go near the water, but the other kids headed straight for the waves.

Kaylee Ashton and Aiden trying to jump the waves


There was a huge pile of sand along the beach, so of course everyone needed to be buried

The wedding was at the beach and bride, groom and their new family all looked beautiful.

and Aiden lost a tooth (at the hotel, not during the wedding ceremony)

Earlier in the year we bought passes to Sea World good through the end of December, so we decided to spend a couple of days there to soak up a little more San Diego sun (it's always nice to have a little tan at the end of November).

The kids playground is my favorite part of Sea World( unless I have to climb through the tubes)

Snow in San Diego