Santa Claus is Coming to Town

Christmas Day Homerun Derby - 07

It was a beautiful day for the derby. We meet every year at Snow Park and go at it. It was a tight race this year with Mason coming out on top. (Spencer wants to make sure you all know that he wasn't there) with Eric a close 2nd and Jarrett giving them all a run for their money. JoEllen made a good showing for the women of the group with Russ and Ryan taking home the prize for "Most Improved". Way to go guys (and girls). It was a goooooood time for all.

A quick trip to the Happiest Place on earth leaving Tuesday morning at 3:00 a.m. arriving at the gates in time to find whatever rides had no lines, enjoy our favorite Disneyland cuisine and just have a great time leaving the "real world" behind for a while. It was an awesome 2 days and a fun time was had by all. After getting stuck on Splash Mountain (pictures below) and getting off the boats and being ushered off the ride with George viewing, in awe, the behind the scenes workings he exclaimed "Nothin' in Disneyland is real" and really folks, isn't that why we love it????? Buzz Lightyear has become one of our new favorites with even Scotty scoring a cool 1100 points for the day. George has given up Thunder Mountain for his new favorite The Matterhorn and Emily would have been pleased to just stay in the stroller and write in her new Tinkerbell notebook. "Please, just let me stay here, I'll be o.k." she would say at each ride but she did go on Space Mountain (oh, wow) and I won't say she was coerced, just really didn't know what she was getting into and neither of the 2 adults with her at the time wanted to stay and tend her but, oh well. I personally think there is quite a bit of child abuse going on at DL with children being "bribed" to go on rides they don't want to and dragged around in the cold (and heat) way past their bed time in the name of "happiness". But I have to admit, I love it for the escape from the "real world" myself so whatever it takes; those babysitting passes are great.

Stuck on Splash Mountain.....one of the highlights of the trip; being able to be ushered through the 2nd half of the ride and see all of the characters up close and personal and then out the back door to where my engineer son could marvel at the structure and creativity involved in this place.

Thanksgiving Day Fun at the Holiday Inn

Thanksgiving in Kentucky

Lauri and I went to Louisville for Thanksgiving, picked up in the early morning by Spencer and greeted a few hours later by the kids.....then took the fam to Micky D's for breakfast/lunch. Lauri and I had a restful night at the Holiday in preparatory for the big day and arrived there to be surprised as "guest of the day" which came with my name at the entrance of the hotel and an upgraded room (meaning only moved to a higher floor) but I felt important. On Thanksgiving Day, we buffeted at the Inn then swam and the kids spent the night with me while the adults had a wild game night. I love havin' the kids stay with me at the hotel and they are so good. Sethy even joined us this time and I actually had them all to sleep by 9:30 miracle of miracles. I think we pretty much wore them out in the pool and the hot tub. Hope you can all enjoy my slide show. (Who am I kidding, no one looks at my blog) O.k. now......was it a good thing to "eat out" on Thanksgiving Day? Well...here's my take on it. If it's about the food then the answer is NO. But.....if it's about the family, then it was a resounding yes, yes, yes. We had a wild, fun time with no mess, no fuss but then again.....NO LEFTOVERS. I have to say I was glad to get back home Sunday and be able to go to my mom's and have her leftovers. Would I do it again? Probably.....it really was fun but I did miss the home cookin'. So to those who may say "how could you break a tradition", well we did and it was o.k.

Back home now and enjoying my kids here. Had George and Emily over last night and spent most of today with them. They are a joy to have around and Emily came in yesterday and announced that she was here to help me put up my Christmas Tree so that's what we did yesterday. She emptied out the Christmas Box and when George saw it today he asked if he could have it and I said "it's my Christmas box" and he asked if he could have it when I got through with it and I said "Probably, but it's been my Christmas box for 26 years" so I'm not sure when that will happen. It's my microwave box so you all know how old that is. He could have made something fun out of it I'm sure but I wasn't quite ready to give it up to my little "lover of boxes" just yet.

Looking forward now to Christmas having Mason's family and Traci's family with us this year. It's been good to enjoy the rain this past couple of days. The leaves are wet and heavy on the grass but the sun will be out soon to dry them out then hopefully more rain will fall.