On to a New Year

As December nears to an end and I take down the Christmas decor I secretly am happy.  This year December was exhausting!  I did not over due it with buying Christmas gifts for everyone or baking until my oven blew up, but I felt like I was in an overwhelming state of insanity!  I am hoping this does not carry over into 2011(between us my pants can't handle any more stress, I stress I eat).  Maybe the upcoming trip to SLC will be the breather I need but in anyway I felt like I did not enjoy December to it's fullest.  In honor of the December I am happy to see go I took a few pictures before it all came down...

 

The Festivities Break Down...

Yes this might be boring for anyone but my mother but here are the festivity break downs of Christmas Eve and the Big Day.....

While Justin went off to work (Addie gave me an earful about how I had to make daddy work on Christmas Eve) the girls and I got dolled up to hang out at the mall.  Justin met us there and we talked with Santa, had lunch, and finished up some last minute shopping.  It was so wonderful being together as a family as the last two weeks we have not seen much of Justin.

 For dinner we whipped up some home made pizza that the girls "decorated" themselves.  And yes Brynn is naked, she acutally has been naked more than clothed for the past two months, but I am proud to say she is almost the conductor on her potty train.   * note to husband...I will only be picking the pictures with your "special" faces keep this in mind next time I have my camera in hand... ~sigh~ and I wonder why my children are not normal.

After dinner we opened up the one present (matching jammies) and went to look at Christmas lights.  However that did not last long, Brynn started throwing up (I think it was the consumption of oranges) so we got home and sent the kids to bed.

We did see some elk in our backyard and got to listen to the cow calls at night (along with the usual coyotes).  I have yet to hear an elk bugle but the cow calls were amazing to hear!  Of course we tried to tell the girls they were Santas reindeer but born and raised Montana girls were not fooled even Brynn said that's elk. 

Here is the video of Christmas morning...

We had a nice big Christmas lunch with the Posts and hit the hills for some sledding. 

This picture is one of many that Addie likes to take, hopefully she will leave my camera alone since she got one of my old ones for Christmas. 

 Like last year this years Christmas was mostly made up of garage sale items for the girls, where else can you find a lite bright for a buck (I might have played with it more than my girls).  Yes I am cheap but for as long as i can get away with it the girls will be getting hand me downs.  It was a wonderful Christmas, the girls never brought up the dog they didn't get,  they even did a great job sharing, and we spent most of the morning playing doctor (I found an old school fisher price doctor set...I've never had so many shots in one day). 

What do you call a fish that is not yours.....

A Nacho Fish!

You will have to excuse my emotion, as one of our family members has passed on.  Our fish Nacho (named after Addie's favortie movie at the time Nacho Libre) quietly passed away three nights ago.  He has been a Winward for almost three years..  He had many medical issues with the bubble like growth on his face and his wierd tentacle like growth on his fin, but he was a trooper until the end.  Even though he has been absent from our lives for three days now the girls have still not caught on....I just do not have the heart to tell them...maybe after Christmas :)

Introducing the next Dr. Suess...

Will Santa Deliver....

Unfortunatlely in our household no one can be that good to get a dog (at least not until they can take care of it).  These two might be pretty disappointed Christmas morning...

Another use of alcohol (the rubbing kind)

Removing white out on little girls

Oh Christmas Tree O Christmas Tree

The Chopping of the Christmas tree was another success.  It took a little more hiking than the girls would have liked, but we found one. 

Here is the tree Addie wanted

And behind them is the tree we found

This is how much fun Brynn had

And the final product

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving was supposed to be in Utah, but the weather quickly changed our plans. So we spent the Thanksgiving weekend in Bozeman (we are thankful that we were still able to spend the holiday around family).

Hallow's Eve

When Halloween is your favorite holiday you tend to get swept away! 

Here is the fantastic Hubby who allows himself to get swept away with his wife (always a good sport)

Seven days in paradise...

We dropped the kids off with Justin's sister (Jeana you rock!) and away we went.  Seven days at the Marriott Beach Club in Ko Olina.

We spent our days snorkeling, swimming, eating Hawaii's fine food (see post below), hot tubing,  we got massages by the beach, got some quality reading in, got naps every day, watched the sun rise and the sun set, body boarded, even enjoyed the water slide at the resort.  My parents flew over from Maui to spend a few days with us and we even got to celebrate my mom's birthday (doesn't look a day over 30).  It was a most enjoyable week...

Even without the children Justin needed to dig in the sand

This is the actual Black Pearl from the Pirates of the Caribbean.  They filmed the fourth movie here (I did not even know there was going to be a fourth)

We hung out at Lanakai beach and saw our first turtle here.  The sand here was amazing powder soft.

We found Justin some killer waves to go body boarding at Wiamea Bay.

Here you see Justin (the little black dot)

Now you don't

The waves here were ten feet tall.  We got rid of the body board and went wave jumping.  It was pretty fun until you misjudged the wave.  I got smashed and with those waves you get trashed then sucked back out to get trashed again.  You would think I would have learned but I went back out there and got smashed again! 

Here is our favorite turtle friend.  He is the third turtle we found snorkeling and the most friendliest.

I liked that they had this warning yet Justin thinks it's okay to almost kiss one.

Justin found a jelly fish on the beach

Here are my parents at Lanakai

And here is the happy Hawaiian group

It was a fun week but when you have two angels to come home to how can you stay away...