New Years Eve

We made a quick trip up to Idaho when we got back from California and went bowling, which the kids loved. Our trip was way too short but so much fun. We had an arm wrestling contest with everyone since it turned out to be a ton of fun when we did it in California. John beat all the brothers on both sides of the family, while I lost to all the sisters on both sides of the family! But I made up for it with my top bowling score;) (My dad did however beat John, but everyone was such a close match it was so funny to watch!) Im sad all of our family time is over, we need more soon.

More Christmas

On Christmas Eve we did a Nativity narrated by Cari for the first time this year, the kids were so cute as mini characters, I have so many memories growing up doing this with my cousins!

We did a pretty low key Christmas this year as far as gifts go, we just really kept it simple, nothing homemade, nothing extravagant, pretty minimal, and it was so nice, no stress:) it was especially fun to watch the kids open their gifts on Christmas morning this year, kids make it so magical.

Phoenix Field

On Christmas Eve we all met at the park, my Dad brought rockets, Josh brought a remote controlled airplane and some slingshot helicopters and Alec brought Bjorn and a frisbee. It was so much fun! We all just hung out and played in the warm winter sun. Vera practiced her walking, the kids chased down the parachutes as they fell from the sky, and the ladies hung out and talked, it was my favorite day.

Newport 2011

This year was a blast, as usual, here are all my favorite pics, most of them are repeats you have already seen, but we really had such a fun time.

one more

We stopped at a local fruit stand and got some fresh pineapple and sugar cane, the best pineapple I have ever had. And I forgot to mention that John went surfing with his iphone in his pocket, oops, so we had to make a trip to the apple store while we were there to get him a new phone. Expensive surfing trip.

these two also

Hawaii 2011

Well we had a super fun trip to Hawaii. Let me just start out by saying that there were a few things that kind of put a damper on things, I was super sick, Vera was super sick, and just when we were feeling better John started getting sick. Because I was sick my ears never adjusted from the plane trip and I felt like I was under water the whole time, lame. With that said, we really enjoyed it. (no more complaining)

We spent a couple of days on the North Shore on Waimea Bay, the boys surfed and boogie boarded, we played in the water, dug in the sand, and soaked up the sun. We really had perfect weather the whole time, it only rained the last day we were there. We found tons of fun local places to eat that were sooo yummy. We went to the night show at the PCC, the fire dancers were way cool. John went golfing and ended up loosing a bunch of balls. I went shopping. We really didn't plan much to do and didn't want to have any expectations, it worked out great.

Here is our week in pictures. check out the cool night shot from our hotel balcony, Rose and Josh on a water bike, the golf course and Vera asleep on the beach.

Also we were super lucky to have John's parents watch Wes and Mae, we left them with fevers and colds and came back and they were feeling better. They loved having time at Grandpa and Grandma's.