Christmas Cheer

This is Spencer with his cousins Emma and Kelly on Christmas Eve. They are great pals and have lots of fun together. Kelly is a Freshman at the UW and Emma is a Senior in HS. They made a fun little scavenger hunt for the for the three youngest boys to do on Christmas Eve.





















Cooper on Christmas morning. He LOVES penguins as I think I have mentioned before. He also recently celebrated his 10th birthday (12/21).




















Spencer loves Christmas. I think he pretty much wrapped every present--even some for himself. He is always asking "got anything to wrap??" I think he liked it this year. He didn't get all 37 things on his list (of course) but he got a few.

Tucker wanted camping gear and that is mostly what he got for Christmas. I think he really is serious about want to hike and camp more. Perhaps he will be ready soon to go on a Death March with his Uncle Chuck and Inkom Crazy Lady??

In Search of the Tree

Every year since Tucker was a baby we used to go down to Centralia and cut down a tree with Oma & Opa. This continued even after they moved up here to Seattle--until last year. Last year we got a tree from the lot where Tucker was working because we got it for free and we just couldn't find a good time to travel all the way to Centralia to get a tree.

This year Oma decided she had had enough of fresh trees and bought an artificial one. They boys are still trying to get over the shock of it.

We decided we wanted to cut one down again. Instead of heading south for Centralia we went north to Stanwood where Douglas and his family live. Dennis researched tree farms online and we selected the first one on the list. It just happened to be right off the exit to Doug's house. In fact it was probably less than a mile away from his house.

It was fun to tromp through the fields and search for the perfect tree. We finally agreed on one that was a little shorter than usual and a little more full on the bottom, but perfect for hanging the tons of ornaments we seem to have collected over the years.

I didn't realize how the star was really making the top lean until I took the picture. Oh well. I do love the smell of the pine of the fresh tree. We also go some cinnamon scented pine cones so the house smells really nice.

I threw in the cross-stitch stockings for Des. When I was around the same age, I was really into cross-stitching and it lasted for years & years. I made stockings for each of the boys--even though they have really cute ones that Oma made for them--and also made the ones here for Oma, Opa & Dennis. I also have a cute little doorknob hanger on black fabric that is really cute. I don't cross stitch at all anymore, but it is nice to have these little keepsakes.

I think I might be getting more in the Christmas spirit. Still haven't done any shopping to speak of. Although I did manage to get an invite out for Cooper's birthday yesterday. And so it goes.

Thanksgiving Weekend

Just a couple pictures from our Thanksgiving weekend. The Miste/Cooper picture are the place markers that Spencer made for everyone for dinner. He loves doing that for special occasions. I think he is pretty darn creative. The paper is obviously pre-printed but the names are pure Spencer. Note the gravy spill on Cooper's--no explanation necessary other than it's Cooper's which should be self-explanatory.
The day after Thanksgiving Tucker worked and hung out with friends and Spencer went shopping with a friend. That left Cooper home with mom & dad by himself. When asked what he wanted to do it was go to the zoo. So that's what we did. He totally loves the zoo and it was a beautiful, sunnyish kind of day. Fun day with mom & dad.
Saturday the two younger boys and I went to see The Fantastic Mr. Fox which is one of the weirdest movies I have seen in a long time. Creepy animation to boot. The boys didn't laugh once I think--three thumbs down. Although I have heard that some people think it's the best movie ever--must be a different sense of humor than mine. (Maybe the Napolean Dynomite crowd).
Dennis & Tucker went to the shooting range with Dennis' brother Dan and his son James.
A fun weekend for all. This weekend it's the search for the Christmas tree. Maybe that will get me in the mood. I have done zero shopping. Spencer pointed out the other day that I didn't even put out the advent calendar Oma made for the boys--still haven't, that's how bad I am. Here's hoping the tree gets me in the mood.!

Halloween Eastern WA Style

We drove over to Eastern Washington this past weekend for the annual pheasant scare. (I guess I shouldn't call it that since Bill & Dennis generally get a pheasant or two for all their traipsing around the Palouse.) We went sans Tucker who had to stay home to work.

On Saturday, Dennis goes out with Bill and I usually drive from Pullman to Colfax to visit Aleta. So here's a few pictures from the trip.

Spencer, Kimberly and Leah played a rousing game of Phase 10. Much to Spencer's chagrin, Kimberly pulled out a win on the last Phase. The girls are getting so grown up looking. Kimberly is a Junior in high school and Leah in in 8th grade--same as Spencer.

James is looking more grown up all the time too. It's hard to beleive he is 5 already. Of course I am always thinking he is older than that. He had a great time with Cooper and was sad to see him leave (or maybe it was the Lego men that Cooper had brought with him).

Jumping on the trampoline is always a fun time too. The kids stayed out there for quite awhile, even though it was a very blustery day. They had some game going that involved someone laying in the middle pretending to be a "dead man". James was in 7th heaven to have two new playmates, and boys at that!

After our day at Aleta's we headed back to Bill's house in Pullman to get ready for Halloween. Cooper & Laura carved pumpkin together. Then Cooper

got dressed to go trick-or-treating. He was very excited to be the Grim Reaper. I especially like the skeletal gloves. Kind of creepy.

Laura & Spencer volunteered to take Cooper out in the neighborhood and although neither of them dressed up, they still managed to come back with their pockets full of candy. The said they never actually asked for candy, that people just gave it to them. Cooper made quite a haul with his pillowcase too of course.

Now last but not least, the creepy family photo. I hate the inside out eyelid thing that Dennis does, but you have to admit that it does make a great Halloween picture!

Hawaii

So here are a few pictures from our trip to Hawaii. We were there from October 17th to October 24th--so a nice long trip. It was alot of fun and a very relaxing trip. The first picture is of a the catamaran we got to go on for a sunset cruise. It was a very balmy evening and I didn't get seasick, but Dennis did. We did the cruise on Wednesday. The new picture of us on the side panel of the blog is from this cruise.

The first picture is the helicopter we got to ride in for an hour tour around Maui. That was the way coolest thing we got to do on our trip. It was amazing! I've always wanted to ride on one so this was pretty awesome. This is the view from the helicopter of the hotel strip where we were staying on the north end of the island. We stayed at the Westin Ka'anapali.

This trip we decided to take the road to Hana which is a 30 mile windy, twisty road on the south end of the island. This was one of the stops along the way. The water was this incredible blue and there was all these volcanic formations in the water. This one kind of reminded me of a turtle. It was really cool to see the waves crashing against the rocks. There was a blowhole but no water ever shot up through it.

This is another shot from the road to Hana. There was this cute little town way down in the valley with a white clapboard church that looked really cool. I was trying to frame it through the plants. I thought the pictured turned out kind of cool.

Dennis went boogie boarding with this other couple that we spent quite a bit of time with. We found this great beach just north of where we were staying and the waves were really good. Some of them would have gone right over people's heads if they were standing up as they came in. I didn't do any boogie boarding myself, but Dennis had a great time.

I don't know how we missed this tree the first time we went to Maui. It is in this square in Lahaina a little coastal, tourist town on the north coast. It is a huge banyan tree. I know it looks like alot of trees, but is is all one tree. You can see all the twisted, gnarled stuff in the middle, but all the ones that look like separate trees surrounding the middle stuff is part of the main tree. The sign says there are 19 different major "trunks" for this one tree. It was totally cool.

Yes, I know there aren't really any pictures of me and Dennis, but we didn't really take any of ourselves. It was kind of weird to be there without the kids to take pictures of. We only took a few of us and they weren't all that great. Oh well. It was a really fun trip though.

GRRRR! I Hate Computers!!

I have been trying to update my blog with pictures from our recent trip to Hawaii (last week) and haven't been able to make it work because of our stupid computer!! Between our computer at home & the computer at work I am going crazy. I takes my computer at work 20 minutes or more to warm up every morning. The good news is that we are scheduled to get new computers at work in December. Meanwhile I just have to grit my teeth and find other things to do while I wait for the computer (s) to get it together.
I was able to get one picture on as you can see, but that is it! The only reason I can do this is because I am using Dennis' laptop. Unfortunately, I do not have access to the photos from Dennis' laptop.

The Old Man

Dennis' 50th birthday was Wednesday, October 7th. We both took the day off and played golf together. It was a gorgeous, sunny day, perfect for golf. He had a great round and despite being barely able to walk I did pretty well (The new exercise routine at the gym the day before left my quads like jello. Going downhill even slightly was a bear!) That's how we celebrated the day of his birthday.
Since it was his 50th after all a party must be held (even though I didn't want to, party pooper that I am) and Wednesday being the middle of the week and all it had to be another day and someplace else. Kathy (Oma) graciously allowed us to have it at their place. Luckily Saturday, the 10th was also a pretty decent day and we held the party in the back yard. We had most of his family (including his aunt & uncle from Port Ludlow) plus a few of our friends. It was a very nice evening. We had tons of Mexican food and everyone just hung out in the back yard.

We lit a fire in an old washtub so that everyone had some place to get warm as the night got a little chilly as the sun went down. The kids also strung up some Christmas lights to give a little light and set the mood.

I figured I would throw in this picture of me, with my friend Peg and sister-in-law Lisa just because I hardly ever include pictures of myself.