Christmas Fun

We had a wonderful Christmas. We had our traditional Christmas activities on Christmas eve, so Christmas day was laid back and relaxed. We took a drive down the beach and went to breakfast at The broken Yoke in Pacific Beach. It was a gorgeous day and we stopped for a bit to walk along the beach and take some pictures.

After breakfast we came home, ate leftovers and relaxed the rest of the day. It was happy and fun, the way a holiday should be. :)

Christmas eve

I love holidays. Wether they are relaxed and lazy days or if they are full of people and fun and excitement, I love them either way. I think we were blessed to have one of each kind this year. Christmas eve was a day packed with people, good food, and Christmas-y things like carols and presents.

My parents and Daniel and Maria were heading up to see my Grandma we had our Christmas dinner earlier than usual. Gunnar's dad and his friend Ann came up. This is our third year of doing Christmas eve dinner at our house and I always have a wonderful time. We had green beans, twice baked potatoes, ham, salad and rolls. It was all delicious, if I do say so myself. :)

Grace was super excited to wear a "party dress". My mom had told her she was bringing her two presents so she ran around the house all morning saying "ta, two presents" over and over again. I guess the whole Christmas greed thing kicks in at a young age. She also learned to say "merry Christmas" and "baby Jesus" both of which I found to be quite cute.

After lunch we opened presents. Grace got a back pack full of plastic animals and stroller for her baby dolls. The stroller said on the box "some assembly required" which in actuality meant "for your sake I hope you either have a degree in engineering or are related to MacGyver because if not you are in for it". Thankfully Maria and Gunnar were able to figure it out. Grace LOVES it. And by LOVES it, I mean she woke up at 4 am wanting to play with it and pretty much keeps it within arm reach of her all day long.

Ann taught Grace how to sing "ba ba black sheep" which she was waiting for her stroller to be assembled. When Grace sings it, there is a lot of waving of her plastic sheep while yelling ba ba ba.

Gunnar scored some socks with moose on them. What else could a guy want?

After opening presents we headed over to the house we are in the process of buying so we could show it to Gunnar's dad, who hadn't seen it yet.

Our family left around 3:30 which gave us a little down time before we headed back to church around 5:30 to get everything ready for the Christmas eve Service.

We were so excited and blessed that our friends the Brach-Tani family came up from La Mesa for the service. Grace's friends Lilah and Isabel are both super precious sweet little girls. They were looking particularly cute that night decked out in their holiday wear!

The service included lost of singing Christmas carols and the reading of the Christmas carol.

It was an exhausting day, but packed with so much fun.

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and were able to enjoy being with those you love.

Thanks for reading! :)

Cousin fun!

We were so thankful to have our niece Jenny and nephew Nick come visit yesterday. After hanging out around the house, we went to the Wild Animal Park to see the lights and the animals. We took the tram ride around, but it was pretty dark by then so we it was hard to see the animals.
Nick brought a bunch of change and bought Grace some food to feed the ducks. Grace loves feeding ducks so she thought that was great.
He also gave her a bunch of change to throw in the buckets to get some stickers. She didn't really get the throwing concept, but took each one up and dropped it in the bucket. Not only was it a good way for Nick to get rid of his change, but Grace found it very entertaining. :)

After the Wild Animal Park we came back to the house and hung out and had hot tea and coffee to warm up. We had a wonderful time with Jenny and Nick and were so thankful that they were able to come down and visit!

Happy Birthday to me!

Or as Grace says "Happy Mommy". Yes, the reason for it being the most wonderful time of the year has come again! :) I turned 25 on Saturday. This was a rather big mile marker for me. Not quite as depressing as when Gunnar turned 30, but close. Gunnar kept reminding me that I would soon be closer to 30 than to 20 and that I am half way to 50. I guess that is what I get for all those old man jokes I pull out every year on his birthday.

For my birthday we had a dress up/murder mystery party. I had just heard of this recently from my Mother-in-law, who consequently lent us the game. I emailed out the week before so everyone would know what part they were coming as. Once they got here, they got a script and then fun began. Mostly it consisted of accusing people and them trying to defend themselves. I thought it was really fun. I have always loved mysteries and I have always wanted a dress up party for my birthday. I had a wonderful time, it really was as Grace says a "happy mommy".

Here are some pictures from the festivities.

"Tiny Bubbles" and "Ralf Rottingrape"

"Bud Wiezer" and "Papa Vito"

"Hedy Shablee", "Otto Van Schnapps" and Gracie

"Marilyn Merlot" and "Bonnie Lass"

To Grandmothers house we go Part II

Thursday and Friday of our trip were spent with more family. Thursday morning we met my Aunt Alison for breakfast. She quickly scored points with Grace as she brought her two shinny silver purses with stickers and paper and markers inside. Grace loves shinny things, purses, and stickers so it was a big hit.

After seeing Alison, we went down town San Luis Obispo and walked around looking for Chinese food to take up to my Grandma for lunch. We ended up finding Chinese food and in the process, we also found the world famous bubble gum alley. I happen to have been chewing gum at the time so I added a piece to the wall. Seeing as my mother always told me not to stick gum on the wall, I felt like quite the rebel.

We headed up to Grandma's for lunch. We spent hanging out with Grandma and taking Grace out to see the animals.

Our attempt at a self portrait didn't work out so well. This is the best one, Grandmas dog Dot decided to sit there with us. I was trying to get the cows in the background, but yeah, that didn't work out so well.

Friday morning we packed our car to head home. Before we left, Grace was able to pick a strawberry off the plants in my Aunt Jan's yard. She loved it and keep asking for "more strawberries".

My aunt Jan lives blocks from where my dad grew up. My grandma had given me directions the night before so we drove around and found his childhood home. I know he had driven me by there before, but I really didn't remember where it was.

After seeing my dad's childhood home, we headed over to my mom's childhood home.

My Aunt Marcy lives behind the house in a new house she built. We met up with my cousin at her house. We were early, so we were able to spend some time with my aunts cat Lumpy. Grace loved him and continues to ask me where "flumpy" is.

Grace enjoyed reading with Natalie and Marcy

Finally we headed home. Grace was really good in the car. She played with her stickers from Aunt Alison and then took a nice long nap. I on the other hand got a little bored. :)