Happy New Year - 2008

Well the New Year is here and the holidays seem to have passed so quickly. I will try and give you a brief idea of how our holidays went. We finished work on the Thursday and I had Friday off and the kids and James finished school at 12:30pm. We all went for Fu Lam (our kids most loved Chinese buffet) and then we headed to Upper Canada Village for the Alight at Night. The weather was beautiful, huge snowflakes falling, not many people and just a wonderful magic evening.

This is what the website says "Bundle up for an evening stroll around the Village, and see heritage buildings all magically lit, with over a QUARTER MILLION lights … a true winter wonderland! " and it truly is.

That Saturday my Mom and Dad, Nancy and Kev and my nieces came over for a nice visit and we had a great dinner of Roast Beast Grinch Style. It turned out great and my folks really enjoyed it. It is always so nice to spend some time with them.

Sunday night we were up wrapping gifts until 3:30am. What a feat that was!

Christmas Eve came and Santa was preparing to make the big visit to our house. The kids were so wired they could light the Christmas tree if you could plug into their energy. We made fresh cookies for Santa and we ate a few and left him some along with a big glass of milk.

As we tucked them all in they were just so happy that the long awaited day was so close. Presley was lying in her bed with her cozy blankets up to her chin singing Santa Claus is coming to town and kept asking..is he coming? It is so great to see her get into Christmas and being so excited.

Each one tucked in and kissed, James and I finally had a bit of time to relax and talk and laugh about the kids and all the excitement that was to come the next day. We reminisced about when were were that young and how we remember being so thrilled.

Here is our tree after Santa finally visisted.

Our tree is a 9 footer and was just so beautiful with all our decorations..many of which were given to us by friends or many we have made ourselves. Each one as they are hung brings back such memories. I love getting new ornaments.

Thanks Jen and Kev for our Reindeer family of 8. Great addition this year.

The tree has 1500 lights in there so is truly georgous when the lights are low in the living room and the tree is just glowing. I love it!

Christmas Morning finally arrives..the kids are up and excited at 7am.

To tie our secret in with Christmas, during our summer vacation we brought home 2 bags of sand with us from Old Orchard Beach. We spread it in front of the tree with sandals, flip flops and sunglasses for each of them. They wondered what that was all about..I just played dumb until the time came to share the news with them.

Here is Jagger with his flips and sunglasses on.

Funny as they grow how the gifts change, Kennedy a few years back would hate clothes or anything like that. If it wasn't a Brats doll or a toy you could tell she wasn't happy. We have now moved up to high heel black boots and she was so happy to get them.

Here is Presley just after waking up and opening her stocking. She was so thrilled with all that was going on and all she could keep saying was more presents for me?

Madison opening her first gift..her wheelies or as she calls them Speedies..kind of like Heeley's with wheels in the shoes. She has wanted a pair for the longest time.

Here Jaden has just opened her Furr Real baby dog that moves and cries. She wanted her own pet as our kitties belong to all of them.

Sorry Colby I didn't have any good pics of you sweetie..Mommy was too busy helping everyone to take lots of pics. The ones I did take were the first 5 minutes when the chaos had just begun.

How did we tell the kids about the secret we have been holding onto since July? The Big cruise and Disney you ask? Well we put 2 envelopes in the tree one indicating Puzzle 1 and Puzzle 2. Each envelope had letters in them and their task was to figure out what the letters spelled.

Here they are starting to piece it together.

And here is the final results:

The surprize for the family is we are going on a 7 day cruise out of Miami for Spring Break and then heading to Orlando for a few days and going to DisneyWorld. They were screaming when they figured it out. Kennedy was crying with excitement. We will be taking a plane which will be a first for most of the kids as they don't remember their journey's home from China.

The big Christmas Feast was at our place and my parents, Nancy and Kev, Jason and Dee, Anne and Brianna, Doreen and Faith and Mia joined us in our celebration. We had a wonderful evening and yet another round of gifts.

The kids went to sleep that night so happy and content with all their loot.

The 26th arrived and we basically spent the whole day in jammies as the kids opened their toys and got to play with everything. Can you say "What a mess".

The 27th and 28th we headed to our Home away from home...Burlington, Vermont and spent 2 nights at the Hawthorne Suites. Presley had started to have a fever and was coming down with a cold.

We finally headed home on the 29th and Presley was getting sicker. I tried to get her an appt at the clinic but had no luck. So guess where James spent until midnight..the hospital. Presley was diagnosed with acute sinus infection. Poor Baby! So antibiotics for 14 days. Withing 24 hours she was a much happier camper and so was Mommy. She is almost back to herself and Mommy has recovered from the 2 nights of crying and high fever as well.

New Years Eve we had some great friends over, Jimmy and Laura and their kids Katie and Benjamin, Anne and Brianna as well as my sister Nancy and Kev and the kids. We had a very enjoyable and relaxing evening ushering out the old year and welcoming the new one.

Fun and some serious Bingo games was enjoyed by all. LOL

Cleanup and cleanup and laundry and snow filled in the rest of the gaps I have left out and now it is time to head back to the real world of work and getting ready to head back to school.

The holidays were wonderful and passed to quickly.Spending time with Family and Friends is so enjoyable.

May all our friends have a wonderful 2008. Be safe, be healthy, have endless amounts of love and lots of laughter this year.

Hugs from all of us to all of you,

Karen, James and the gang.