Alison's Christmas dance

The most beautiful girl there is.

Also, the braces are off!  We celebrated with In-N-Out and a teeth whitening party.

 

 

           

Alison, Addie, Lily

Christina, Lily, Addie, Alison, Tabby

It was a beautiful evening, full of fun and wonderful friends.

Christmas time!

Eli, just so you know, I asked you if this is really how you wanted to remember this event and you said, "Yes", so here we are.  To your credit, your eyes look SO blue.

We decorated sugar cookies :)

 

 

 

We strolled through Gemini street with Ms. Brittany and the boys.

Colin and Thomas

One house had a snow machine going and was handing out popcorn.  It was a favorite for sure!

We came home and had our hot cocoa bombs that Ms. Brittany made for us.

 

Maya's Birthday

Maya is 6!

 Her favorite spot is stealing Alison's bed.

We carried on our birthday tradition of a treat and a walk.

 

Happy Birthday Maya!  Thank you for 6 years of making us smile.

Decorating for Christmas

We went to Home Depot to pick out a tree.

 

 

Later that night, decorated the house and put ornaments on the tree.

The tree ended up being taller than we anticipated and Colin needed a little help putting some ornaments on.

 

 

 Best gifts...

Thanksgiving

It was another quiet year here.  We missed being with family, but after several weeks of stressful house hunting, it was nice to have some super relaxing days.  Each of the kids picked a dish to help make and we did half the cooking on Wednesday, which made Thanksgiving all the more relaxing.  

Alison made Nonny's mashed potatoes.  She said it was fitting that she master this dish since they share the same name.  They were delicious!

 

 

Colin helped Ben make a pumpkin pie.

Not Thanksgiving related, but Maya got a new coat and she looks so cute in it!

   

 On Thanksgiving, Eli helped make pigs in a blanket and we had charcuterie and salmon dip for lunch.

 Ben smoked the turkey, I made zwiebach and we played games while everything cooked.

I am so thankful for this beautiful family of mine.

Some of my favorites...

Eli thought Maya was cold, so he wrapped her up.  This site had me cracking up all morning.

The boys and I often go down to Heritage park.  This day they were playing frisbee and boy were we thankful for the big field.  That frisbee has been stuck on our roof for over a year (until the rare rain brought it down) and then got stuck in a tree!

 My girl...just love her.

Girls weekend in San Diego

For the past 3 years, Laurel and I have talked about meeting up for the weekend...maybe Santa Barbara or Palm Springs...and then Covid hit and what should be a fun getaway just seems like a nuisance.  So we put it off.  Until our husbands came to the rescue, told us to skedattle and booked us a hotel in San Diego.

First we met at Fashion Valley, a place we used to take day trips to when we lived in Yuma.  We did a little shopping and catching up and then headed to Trader Joe's to stock up on all the necessities.  Ben booked us a hotel right in the gaslamp district so we could just walk to whatever dinner we wanted.  We opted for seafood :)

Somehow we showed up matching!

 We spent most of the next day relaxing on Coronado beach.

We picked up Burger Lounge for dinner and ate in our hotel room while watching way too much HGTV.

It was a wonderful weekend with such a great friend!

Halloween Weekend

Friday night, Alison went to a Halloween party.  She went as little red riding hood and it looked like an epic fun party.

Saturday, Brittany invited the boys over and decorated skeleton cookies with them.   

 

Sunday afternoon, Alison decided to dress up as a "Facebook mom" and started digging through my closet.  I jokingly said that maybe I should dress up as her...she thought that was a great idea and dressed me up.

This is how Facebook moms take pictures.  Teens always pucker their lips for pictures now, so I thought I should too.

 

I'm holding a poptart to be a true Alison and Alison is holding an ice pack because I hurt my back that morning putting away a heavy pot.

 

 I stayed 'Alison' for the night, but she changed back into little red riding hood when her friends came over.  They planned to have an at-home party, but ended up trick-or-treating and cleaned up out there!

 

Brittany and the boys came over for a chili dinner and then we all went out trick-or-treating.  Brittany's husband is deployed right now, she lives in our neighborhood and our boys have so much fun together.  Connor is 3 and SO cute.  He made Halloween even more magical as he ran house to house, shouting, "HAPPY HALLOWEEN!"