San Diego

After Christmas, we headed down to San Diego to spend some time with Christian's family. We arrived late in the morning, the kids ran around playing together while we figured out what we were going to do. We ended up going to Coronado Beach, but it was chilly and windy. Only Christian and Austin, one of the older nephews, went into the water itself.

The rest of us just strolled along the beach collecting shells and playing bocci ball.

We had originally considered staying at the beach and having a bonfire but ended up going back to Christian's sister's house after a couple of hours.

The next day was Sunday so the kids just hung out and played together until church started in the afternoon. Christian and I got dinner going as Christian's mom bought a huge rack of prime rib for our Christmas feast that evening.

We had dinner and handed out a few gifts.

We made a lot of Shutterfly gifts for everyone this year. Christian's brother is basically bed ridden at this point so he and his wife have not joined any of our gatherings including the dinner. We went over to visit them for a while at the end of the night.

The next day, we went out to the Anza Borego desert with Christian's dad to do some shooting. 

We have not gone in a very long time. A couple of the kids cousins came out with us. The girls also did some archery practice. We had gotten Emily a bow and arrow for Christmas and Christian's mom also had some that the other girls used.

Christian's sister packed us some snacks and lunch for us. She has to work in the evening so she did not end up coming with us. We left for home afterwards. We were originally going to explore a little more in the desert before leaving but we did not have much gas left and could not find anywhere to procure more until we were on our way back so we cut our afternoon short in search of gas before we got stranded!

Christmas

On Christmas Eve, Marian came over for our traditional Christmas celebration. She loads the tree with gifts and has activities with the girls ready. After lunch, we had a bit of time before working on dinner so Marian took us into Costco to do some shopping since I dropped our membership this past year.

We stuffed ourselves with rib roast, braised carrots and potatoes. We were tired and turned in a little earlier than usual this year. In the morning, we opened presents and had our annual Belgium Waffles for breakfast.

Of course, we had to clean up the melee that was now our living room! The kids played with some of their gifts while we chatted and got ready for the next part of the day. Soon Marian had to take off and we had to get ready for Christmas dinner with my family. 

After making our offerings for Christmas dinner, we packed up a few gifts and headed over to my brother's house.

All the cousins played games together. It's nice to see everyone getting along so well. Even my sister's older boys played with their younger cousins more now that they are not so very young any more.

We had another feast. Luckily, my brother decided on salmon as the main dish this year so we didn't have to have more meat after the feast we had the night before! My dad wanted to leave early for some reason so my mom took him home and came back for dessert and presents.

As usual, we visited longer than we planned. We didn't leave until nearly midnight I think and we needed to get up to head to Christian's family the next day!

December Musings

I am getting woefully behind on my posts. I am starting to forget what we've been doing so I will put down what little I can remember of what we've been doing in December really quick so that I can catch up.

On the second weekend of December, we stayed in town and went to our ward Christmas party. Emily was taking her time, enjoying her dinner thinking that she would no longer have to rush off with the other kids to get ready for the Primary Christmas Program halfway through dinner. Caitlyn finished her dinner and took off. Some minutes later, the Primary Chorister comes over and taps on her shoulder to see if she would stand in for Mary during the program as she could not find any of the older girls remaining in Primary. She reluctantly consented.

One of the older Primary girls was, in fact, standing next to Caitlyn. I guess she got overlooked in the chaos of kids getting dressed for their parts! Emily was a good sport though and after the musical numbers, Mary and Joseph each had a speaking part that she was not prepared for either. But it was okay, she just read from the paper they slipped her with her fake baby Jesus doll.

I think we had spent most of the day prior to the party trying to catch up on work around the house...especially on our woefully neglected yard.
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The kids had their last week of school before the break. On the last Friday, we had dinner with a friend. The next day we were having dinner for the missionaries. We ended up inviting two different people over to join us but both cancelled separately for different reasons.

The girls did their chores and helped get the house ready for company all morning. There was no problem but after lunch, Emily seemed to be excessively tired and sedate...very unlike her normal behavior.

About an hour or so before our dinner guests were to arrive, she threw up. She had not said anything about not feeling well but we knew something might be up since she was acting so weird. She did not have dinner with us and spent most of her time in bed after greeting the guests. She attempted to eat a piece of mantou (steamed bread) after the missionaries left but that just got her throwing up again.

We eventually figured out that she had the stomach flu. She was not well all of Sunday but started recovering Monday. She still had hardly eaten anything of any substance (just a bit of toast, crackers and rice porridge) to this point but ate a small dinner Sunday evening. She seemed almost back to normal Monday (albeit with her stomach a bit shrunken). We were supposed to have my brother and his kids over for a visit on Tuesday but ended up cancelling because it was supposed to rain and Emily did not have an appetite again for dinner Monday. It was just not worth the risks with the holidays coming up very quickly. The kids were very disappointed.

Except for the small setback Monday evening, Emily still appeared to be on the mend and seemed fine Tuesday after all.

I had planned to be using the time before the holidays (since Christian had to work) to make treats and take the girls to visit with friends we had not seen in a while but it was not in our cards. No one wants treats from a house full of sickness. There were a couple of times here and there that Christian and I thought that we were not feeling that good but nothing became of it.
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On the 23rd, our friends came by to carol for us.

They always put us back in the Christmas spirit. They even got super cute costumes this year!

Joshua Tree

On the first weekend of the month, we took the opportunity to run out to Joshua Tree for the day. All the rest of the weekends for the month will soon be filled with festivities for the coming holidays.

First on our itinerary for the day was an easy climb on Outward Bound Slab in the Wonderland of Rocks area (North). Christian had us doing leading practice again. He went up to set the anchor and then we all took turns leading the route.

The route is a 70' climb called Mastering Five-Two. There was one small section that was a bit difficult to protect.

Emily went up first and then Christian would go up and critique her placements. Since it was a relatively easy climb, he didn't bother even roping up.

After which, Catilyn took her turn.

She had a little trouble so, Christian was able to climb up next her and instruct her as she went.

I went up last and repelled down while the girls walked up the back and took down the anchor. We had lunch before continuing on. Outward Bound Slab got pretty crowded with a big group shortly after we began but they spent most of their time on the backside setting up and giving instructions. By the time we were done, they were swarming all around us which made us want to find our next area all the more.

Our next climb was a short way off (still in the Wonderland North area) on Bear Island. The climb is called Shardik (5.3) but we found it was much easier than the 5.2 that we just did. I went up in my hiking shoe and stayed up there to take pictures. It was just a short 55' pitch.

Caitlyn went up next with her sister belaying her.

She enjoyed the climb a lot better as it was super easy! Emily followed after.

After we were done, we did the climb that Christian wanted to do, which was Ursa Major (5.7). This was an even shorter 40' route but considerably more difficult as the first section could not be protected at all.

Emily and I did it on top rope as we are not anywhere ready to lead anything like this.

As usual, we were racing the sun back to the car as we lost the last traces of daylight.

I love Joshua Tree sunsets but the days are considerably shorter in the winter.

Caitlyn

When we got back to school, Caitlyn had her first trimester award assembly. We almost forgot about it! Caitlyn remembered and reminded me just as I was dropping her off to school. It's hard to get back into the swing of things after a week off!

She made the Principal's Honor Roll again. She also had perfect attendance. We are so very proud of the hard work she has put in to maintain her grades.

Before the break, Caitlyn was working on a poster for a contest the Metrolink was promoting for the grand opening of the Perris line. All the schools near the tracks got to participate to create "awareness" of the safety issues involved with having more traffic on the tracks next to the school. We found out that she won 3rd place and got a $25 visa card. She is so excited! It took them a while to announce it and there was a rumor going around that no one in her school won anything but there were a bunch of kids at her school that won prizes.

See tracks? Think Train!

Thanksgiving

After we got back from Yosemite, we got some rest and then hit the kitchen to start preparing food for the feast. Emily made bread and Caitlyn made a Swedish visiting cake. Both turned out really good.

Dinner this year was at my sisters house with her in-laws. There was a lot of food! My contribution was some pumpkin pies and garlic mashed potatoes. It is so neat that the kids are starting to cook now and are learning but sharing a small kitchen with so many cooks is not quite so fun. We had a big potluck.

While everybody finished their dishes, the kids got to hang out and play.

We were there pretty late and did not get to bed until very late again. 

The rest of the vacation was spent working on school projects. Caitlyn had to finish her science project and Emily had to do her history day project.

We took a break to decorate the Christmas tree and take our annual Christmas picture, but that's about it.