Christmas 2009!

We know that we are actually posting this in March but that is so that we can take full advantage of the 2010 Christmas shopping season. It should be starting any day now.
Our season started with home made hats.

It continued with decorating.

Here we are making cookies to deliver to all of the neighbors we still have not met. We did not meet many of our neighbors because we ate most of the cookies and decided that delivering an empty paper plate and forcing them to listen to our caroling was not the way to make a first impression. From our caroling experience we recommend "We wish you a merry Christmas!" sung quickly and enthusiastically. Rudolph the red-nosed Reindeer was waaaaay too long and made both performers and forced listeners clearly uncomfortable.
We went to cousins in Salt Lake City to celebrate part of the time. I do not know if this is a photo of elves or what.

Finally a posed picture for posterity. Happy Holidays come and gone!

Happy Solstice!

Our anniversary and Sonja's birthday are right in the middle of the holiday season. We intended on skiing into Hogan's cabin to celebrate both. We do not have any pictures of the celebrating, or cabin for that matter. The cabin has a combination lock and we neglected to write the combination down before we left civilization. Luckily Sonja remembered our forgetfulness before we had skiied the whole 6 mile approach. We ended up returning to the van and spending the night in a rental cabin just down the road from our old house in Whiskey Gulch. We did enjoy some nice sledding and snow-angel making out in the middle of nowhere.

King for a day

I did a search for "king for a day lyrics" and several came back. Based on your age you may recognize these lyrics: age 15-20 years, 20-30 years , 30-40 years (click on years and scroll down to watch the video). I do not know the demographics on this one but it is kind of catchy............... Okay I am back. I just finished break-dancing and doing the robot to my age appropriate "King for a Day" song. After watching the Thompson Twins video I also got a haircut.

We had another birthday to celebrate and it involved trains big and small.

The small train was Ivan's birthday present.

The big train was the Copper King Express. It is a pleasurable ride beginning just a few blocks from our house. I think we rode on its final trip. It had a couple of more rides scheduled after ours but they may have been cancelled due to weather. It was nice. Santa and the Grinch were both part of the trip. The kids each had their own response to seeing Santa approaching our booth.

Ivan seems excited and pretty confident that he is on the good list.

Liza had more of a detached, "I hope he does not see me, I am not positive which list I am on and I would like to improve my qualifications for the good list before I talk to him and force him into a decision" look about her.

As birthdays should, this one came with numerous presents.

One was a nifty Firehouse wooden piggy bank. It involved some assembly.

A little hammering.

Our rule around here is: Once you turn five years old, that's it you're out of the house. At least three mornings a week anyway. Ivan started preschool the day before his birthday. He was psyched to start and still likes it a lot.

Carving pumpkins leads to ...

After all that practice with those safety knives it is time to break out the real stuff.
Time for a Butterfly and Pirate SWORD FIGHT!

Happy Ween!

How about October?

October brought a couple of birthdays. One celebrating 39 years and one celebrating 3 years. I will let you figure out who turned what.

Sonja has gotten very creative with the cakes!

"mmmmmmmmm" (said like Bob from What About Bob)

After the cake come the presents!

Sweet Ride!

September in AK - Teaming up with Kodiak Wilco

Alaska here we come!

It took us a long time to get to Alaska. Sonja had the great idea to bring a tent for the long lay-overs en route. As usual, I was a little skeptical. However, it worked fantastically! It kept the kids from sleeping on the airport floor. Not that airport floors are not clean or that our kids are not dirty, but it seemed better this way. They got a good rest and we were the envy of many parents. We felt our parental skills were clearly superior as we watched their children mop the floor with sweaty, drooly faces while our little angels slept cozily, wrapped in their cocoon. Safe from the discarded chewing gum and cigarette butts.

They did not sleep the whole time.

I did clean a few seats with my sweaty, drooly face.

Upon arrival we were greeted by a delightful family

and soon began to feast on berries. Lots and lots of berries!

Berries give you energy!

We saw a bunker of some sort.

We found a hole that was just right for looking at.

It also proved to be the perfect size to jump into.

The beach was lovely.

Look more skydivers!

We joined the crowd for some serious fishing.

I did not say catching. I said fishing.

A rainy day was perfect for visiting the touch tank. It has a way cool large aquarium so that we could see all the kinds of fish that we were not catching.

We did end up catching our share of fish.

We even had time to have a few of them mounted before we left.

We had a great time boogie boarding!

Thanks for a wonderful visit Wilco! See you soon!