December Happenings

Merry Christmas from the Slacker Family...

Yep... we're slackers. Between Ryan working on his MBA at USC and traveling, adding a fourth child to our family, preschool and primary, our life has been a bit CRAZY! We have had multiple failed photo sessions and couldn't come up with a family picture where everyone had their "normal face" on. So we are sending out a digital greeting this year, and it doesn't mean we love you any less. I have enjoyed receiving so many wonderful cards in the mail and we are making a goal to get it done next year. Hope you enjoy...

My Girlies...

My beautiful friends... Niki and her new baby Crew, and Kyra down for a visit.

Preschool Thanksgiving Feast

Our little Wampanoag, Davis mastered his part for the Thanksgiving Presentation... "The Pilgrims sailed across the ocean on a ship called the Mayflower."

Davis, Feasting with his buddies Brendan, Jackson, and Daxton

Close, but No Cigar

We tried to do a photo swap with our friends... mostly the kids just wanted to play with each other... no luck with a final Christmas card shot. :(

One Last Visit

My sister and her kiddos came for one last visit before they are shipped abroad to medical school in England for two years. We will miss their sweet family and hope they have an amazing adventure... and come back with cute Brithish accents.

California Livin'

So our state government is in shambles, we pay an arm and a leg in taxes, our freeways are almost always congested, and our school system is sub par... but spending a gorgeous November day like this, makes it all worth it... right???








...and why not top the day off with a little Cafe Rio!

Thanksgiving in the AZ

Thirty, Flirty, and Thriving

30. I have been dreading this number for some time. Three decades have come and gone and now I am thirty. I reckon, (I can say words like that now) that it's really not that old in the grand scheme of things... but it sure feels old.

My actual birthday pretty much stunk... I was up all night with sick, puking, coughing kids on the eve of my birthday. The morning of my birthday, I woke up, only to find myself desperately under slept, cranky, and also sick. We were visiting family and friends in Arizona, so I put on my happy face and just tried to survive the day. Ryan had an important assignment that was due that night and he ended up working on it a lot longer than he planned... pretty much all day. The best gift of the day came around 11pm when I downed a couple NyQuil and finally got to go to bed... on an air mattress. I am not huge on birthdays, so it really wasn't a big deal... but it didn't go down as one of my favorite days.

This last weekend, my friends announced a three day belated celebration for my birthday. I don't like to be the center of attention, so I was a little embarrassed. Each day, for three days, they were going to present me with ten gifts. First thing each morning I opened ten gifts... some fun, some silly, some sentimental, all meaningful. One of the gifts each day was a letter from my hubby describing a decade of my life. The letters were so sweet and funny and usually brought me to tears.

I felt so loved and so very, very blessed... to be surrounded by such wonderful people. After tucking my kids into bed tonight it hit me how good life is. It is chaotic, we don't see as much of Ryan as we would like to, and all to often I feel like I am coasting in survival mode. But I am happy. There is so much love in my life and joy comes in little unexpected ways. I think thirty will be good.