Merry Christmas!!

I hope everyone had a terrific Christmas this year.

This year Chris & I enjoyed a Christmas full of family, laughs, food and most importantly - GOOD HEALTH (minor sniffles don't count)! We are thrilled to report Mom & Grama well down the road to a great recovery.

The celebrating begins a week early around this household. Happy 28th birthday Christopher! We generally keep things low key in this house, not a whole lot of fanfare, but birthdays are always marked with a "special event" rather than a gift. Chris selected a hockey game this year. Last Saturday we saw the Seattle Thunderbirds face off with the Portland Winterhawks. And yes, we won.

Thunderbirds celebrating their 4-2 victory.

A hideous photo, but evidence there was a birthday celebration.

That weekend Kyanne & Ryan came up to Mom & Dad's and we helped them decorate for Christmas. Apparently decorating the tree was a very hilarious event...

Kyanne & I found Mom's Christmas sweater stash... we tried our best to pose for a tacky Christmas sweater photo :)

We had a busy week preparing for Christmas. Decorations were a bit sparse this year around our house (life got in the way) but the stockings were hung with care (we had to substitute the stairwell until we own a fireplace :).


Chris & I did early stockings to each other.

We had a great Christmas Eve celebration with the Book side of the family. This year it just so happened all of us kids were in the same place at the same time! I'll just throw out some photos to round this one up.

The evening entertainment:

Dad's gingerbread cake:

Can this family be serious?? Nope.

Payton with our gift to her - she'll grow into it.

Chels with Payton's bib - but very true :)

Good looks run in the family.

I think Chris was being forced to take a photo. (No denying I look like my dad here).

Hey Grampa - did you know there's a bow on your head?

Grampa with the guest of honor :)

The Christmas pajama tradition continues...

Christmas day was spent with Mom, Dad, Kyanne, Ryan, Grama & Grampa. Some photos -

Obligatory unflattering Christmas morning photo:

Grama's cute little boating hat!

Christmas makes for a tired doggie...

Here's a video of Bear enjoying the wrapping paper, shouldn't have wasted the money on the Christmas bone for him.


Bear reduced this entire cardboard box down to scrap, yet again - should've skipped the bone...


We capped the weekend off with a visit to my NEW car. It's sitting on the lot, just waiting for the legal process to finish! Yay! For the next few days we'll just enjoy our mini van (don't get any ideas...) rental while my Escape is in the body shop.

We wished the entire family could've been together, but we hope everyone enjoyed a relaxing holiday. Chris and I are going to rest up this week - we have a crazy busy new year ahead of us :)