I'll Have A BLUE Christmas

...or should I say 'blue' poinsettia. Okay, this was a first for me. But going to the nursery at this time of year is beautiful.

Christmas letter 2007 coming tomorrow.

J

Christmas Letter Coming Soon!!

For those of you who has received our Christmas card this year....the Christmas letter will be posted on December 1. I need some way of making you come back to this site. :)

J

Seatbelts Everyone!

We have had a big break through this weekend!!! Alex has learned how to fasten his own seatbelt! I know this may seem like a small thing but not for us!!!!!! We have been working on this one for awhile and we have arrived! Thought I'd share....

We also saw Disney's "Enchanted". What a great movie. A combination of a few Disney classics with a new twist. A fantastic feel good movie for all. We had fun - the music was toe tappin' and the acting was fun.

Kevin and I are heading out on a 'date' tonight. :) Dinner and some shopping. It'll be good just the two of us.

Hope you all had a great weekend.

Happy Day After Thanksgiving

We have officially celebrated our first American Thanksgiving! We went over to Troy and Deb's house for dinner, Hannah and Eoin (pronounced Owen) are their kids. Deb's sister Kathleen was there too. Yummy food, great company, good conversation and excellent time relaxing and playing cards. Kevin even played! For those of you who have tried to get Kevin to play cards before...this is astonishing!!

Eoin and Alex



Hannah and Chelsie



Kathleen, Troy and Deb



Kevin and Janine




It's great getting to know more people in our neighborhood.

Today we decided to go for a drive and ended up driving through Chelsea, Maine. There are a few places around the New England States with the name Chelsea. But we always notice that it is spelled INCORRECTLY! :) Chelsie is now blessed with how her mother feels about her name being spelled incorrectly. It's become a game to see how many different ways our names can be spelled. We have to look at the bright side of things! We have just been relaxing the rest of the day - it's nice having Kevin home too.

Happy weekend to all!

Baby - It's Cold Outside!!!!

It's SNOWING!!!!! This is our first taste of what's to come! The Kids are happy - Momma, not so happy. Oh well, this is where we live! And we have all our gear, so we are good to go. We have this week off school as it's American Thanksgiving on Thursday. We are going to our friends house for the traditional meal. I'm sure we will have a good time.

I made it back from the Pacific Northwest, obviously. I had a wonderful time catching up with Ricki, Sara, Nancy and Wendy. What a blessing to have such incredible friends! I love these girls! We ate, shopped, talked and drank some wine, ate some more and shopped, talked, etc... It was a full weekend but definitely worth the travel time to Seattle and back. As Sara said, we have to start planning next year already. Gig Harbor has been built up more in the last year, so we had a lot to see. The weather was great - the day I left a big storm was rolling in but gave us a tailwind of 160 MPH!!! We made up for lost time!

Always good to come home though. I thought about that on the way back - six and a half hours to think - home is where your family is. Even though we are on the other side of the continent, this is where my little family is. Vancouver will probably always be home but right now, we are enjoying our lives here too. It's good to come to this conclusion.

Have an awesome day in 'no snow'!

Halloween - Come and Gone

We have had a busy week with getting ready for Halloween as I'm sure some of you can understand. We were given a couple pumpkins but only one got carved. Chelsie decided that we should have a 'happy' pumpkin so here he is.



And then the costumes: Alex was Mr. Incredible and Chelsie was Lola from Disney's Hannah Montana. Yes, those are Tim Horton's treat bags. Nice to have something familiar around.



We now know the route for treat-or-treating. Alex was literally dragging his feet at the end of the trek. But we made it. :)

We are headed up to L.L.Bean to get 'outfitted' for the fast approaching winter season. We have our boots but all of us need jackets and the kids will get snow pants. You can 'feel' it in the air - those of you that have lived on the prairies, know what I mean. And apparently we have a hurricane on it's way too! I say 'Bring it on!!'- as soon as we get our jackets!!!! :)

Here's what we have been enjoying though ...


Spring Light Point, South Portland, Maine on my morning walk


Enjoying a warmer afternoon at Willard Beach, South Portland


'Periwinkles' - Empty Hermit Crab Shells

This picture reminds me of when I lived on Fox Island, Washington. You could not walk without stepping on sand dollars. Here it's these! They are everywhere on this beach! Chelsie and I found one that was still inhabited! Cool!

Speaking of Washington, I'm flying to Seattle on Thursday this coming week to catch up with Sara, Rickie, Deanna, Nancy and Wendy!! Should be fun! I'll let you know when I get back. Hopefully I won't need my 'Maine' jacket there!!! :)

J