Family Pictures

I love my little family! I could just stare at pictures of my kids for hours.  They are so stinking cute.  And so is my hubby!

O Christmas Tree

As Brett and I were discussing our Christmas tree this year he said, " Maybe we should get a fake tree."   I agreed, but felt a huge pit in my stomach.  " Wait... It just feels wrong, " I said.  I love the idea of no mess and saving money - eventually - but then we will be robbing our children of the EXPERIENCE.  My dad was big on trees.  Real ones.  He trained us well about the value of a real Christmas tree.  We drove to Home Depot where we were going to look at the fake trees.  We stopped at the tree lot out front first where we spotted the perfect tree.  And it was real.  It just felt right. 

I remind myself of that as I vacuum up the needles every day!

I like to call our tree a "memory tree".  When I was young, my dad started giving us ornaments that represented something about the past year for each of us.  When I got married, he gave all of the ornaments to us and passed the baton to Brett who has carried on the tradition wonderfully.

 The ballerina is from my ballerina days.  Some of you may be scratching your head as to how I had ballerina days.  Trust me - they didn't last long!  The plane was given to me in college with the note " home is never far away".

In about 3rd grade I went through a major " save the earth phase". This ornament helps me remember that!

Brett gave this to me the year we moved back to CA with a note that said " Welcome Home!"

Our tree is a reminder or life and love.  I can't wait to give these same gifts to our two boys!

 Merry Christmas!



Ryans Birthday Breakfast

Presents + Family + Buzz Lightyear+ Food = A great morning!

We ate: quiche, turkey sausage, pan-fried sweet potatoes and DELISH( and not too bad for you)chocolate muffins that can be found on this great blog... it is vegan - I just de-veganize it!  Sorry Morgan!

November in Denver

The boys and I literally spent half of November in Denver.  I babysat my cute nieces and nephew for a week then we came home for a week and turned right back around to celebrate Thanksgiving with them.  It was a blast.  Ryan starting thinking that Denver was our home and we were in fact living with our cousins.  He even joined their family photo as you can see.  He smiled way better in theirs than he did in ours! 

 We celebrated Rys birthday with the cousins.  He wanted strawberry cake... strawberry.  Let me tell you, I asked and asked " are SURE you don't want CHOCOLATE cake?"  Every time he said he wanted strawberry.  Crazy kid. 

 A little birthday freeze dance in his almost his birthday suit. Very appropriate.

 Cute Luke was loved by all and did great on the trips!

three today

my baby is three.  can I have some Kleenex please? 

Ryan puts a smile on my face everyday. He is sweet, thoughtful, determined and funny.  I love this kid more than words can say.

We are in the middle of a birth-week.  More pictures to come!