March Review

March wasn't too eventful, but we did have some fun. There was a lot of nice weather and some flowers. Here are a few highlights:

We had a playgroup outing to CALM. It was a lot of fun. Cordelia loves Luke and followed him around quite a bit. The kids loved the animals. Cecily preferred the birds and Cordelia is a big reptile fan.

We had an informal baby shower for two (well, three really) ladies. I had a nice time. It was at a funky little coffee shop in town, which I had never been to before. As far as the pregnant ladies go, two have had their sweet little boys!

Then my sister-in-law, Shannon graduated from the accelerated nursing program. All of Nate's family came (practically!) and it was a lot of fun. Cecily had a great time with her cousin Clara as usual.

Wow, that was pretty exciting, eh? More posts are coming, including the Easter festivities. I am getting back into the blogging thing again. I have just felt so unmotivated lately. It is picking up though! More soon!

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December Recap

OK, I am finally doing this. I don't know why I put it off so long or even why I feel obligated to do it. At any rate, here was our December.

It was mostly uneventful really. Nate was working on his projects as always and we actually got a lot of things accomplished before the holiday. I didn't take as many photos as I would have liked, but what can you do? The girls loved everything Christmassy. We went around to the lights around Bakes and it was pretty fun. We had lots of snow the week before and the girls had lots of fun playing in it and having "snow bites" (I have some pictures somewhere, but I haven't gone through them yet!)

Christmas came and went pretty quickly, as usual. Christmas eve was spent cleaning and then going to the McG Christmas party. It was much quieter than last year, not all of the children were there! Then we drove home through the rain and fog and had our traditional homemade Chinese food fest with my family. Then we read the Christmas story and went to bed. Well, I played Santa a bit before bed!

I think the biggest difference this year was that Cecily had an idea of who Santa was and she was totally shocked to discover all of the presents he had left her! She was a bit taken aback at first. Then, we did stockings and breakfast at Kirsten's. Next, everyone came to my parents' and did the big present unwrapping. As that was ending it started to snow! We left as it was coming down quite a bit. Then we had the big H family dinner at my in-laws. Most of them were there, I even my the elusive cousin Heather! I had to keep checking in to see if we would be able to drive home that night. I discovered that much of T-town had no power. We were able to return safely and without too much trouble, thankfully!

A couple days later, Leigh and Eliza visited and that was a lot of fun. New Years we spent at Kirsten's making caramel popcorn and playing games.

Then, Melanie and family came down and we had a second Christmas with them. It was a bit of a whirlwind, but when are the holidays not?

Here's a slideshow, I don't feel like copying and pasting codes at the moment!

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Halloween!

OK, these pictures are not great by any stretch of the imagination. But hre are is an idea of our Halloween!

Nate was Wolverine (Huge nerd!), I was Rogue (slightly less nerdy!)

Cecily was the witch Kiki from "Kiki's Delivery Service"


Cordelia was a pumpkin. She has a bit of an obsession with them now!

Kiki, Little Devil, Draco Malfoy, The Joker, and a Pumpkin

We went to the trunk or treat downtown. It was loud and crazy. Cordelia loved it. She thrives on craziness!

Cecily had a bit of a wardrobe malfunction. Her tights kept falling down.

We also did one street of trick or treating. Both girls loved it! Even Cordelia banged on some doors. She would bang the door going, "Open, open!" When someone cam to the door, she would hold out her hands and said, "pease" and then "dey do!" She is so polite.

Then we had dinner at Maren's and Cecily smacked her nose on the stairs. She got a nice bruise for that, poor thing! That was basically our Halloween. Thrilling, eh?

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Happy Birthday or So Not Worth It.

Yesterday, we went to P.F. Chang's for our November birthday dinner. Actually, it was a lunch and my dad wasn't there, so it was more like the 3 girls and Cecily birthday lunch. November is our big birthday month. The 7th is my Dad and Kirsten's birthday, the 10th is my grandma's, the 16th is Cecily's, 17th Maren's and 19th is mine, etc, etc...

When we were younger, we'd have two birthday celebrations. One for Dad and Kirsten and another for Maren and I. This has been condensed into one, if any birthday celebration.

So, back to the food! We made an attempt two years ago for our November celebration to be at P.F Chang's. It had opened recently and we were not able to get in. So we had China Bistro out in the cold, on one of the few cold days in Bakersfield. Haha!

This year was to make up for it. I like the food there, but upon opening the menu, I discovered that their prices had gone up significantly, averaging around $13-14 per entree as compared to $9-10 that they were a few years ago. I mean, the food isn't that great. It certainly isn't worth $20+ a person. I mean, we can go to Panda Express (my family's favorite) for less than half and quite honestly, their food is more than half the flavor of P.F. Chang's. Of course, you pay for the service and all of that, but I am still not feeling it.

Some restaurants are worth it, but is P.F. Chang's? Meh, I am thinking not.

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Family Reunion

So, the first weekend of the month, we had a H_____ family reunion in celebration of Grandpa H______'s 80th birthday. We had almost everyone there. 5 of the 6 kids and many of the grandkids and a handful of great grandkids were there.

Saturday, we had a swim party at the B___s:



Jolie:

Valerie's little guy, Kristoffer, who really seemed to like me!



After the pool party, we hung out at my in-laws and the kids played:

My cuties:








Jolie & Clara


Swinging




Wyatt's Ready For Battle

It's On!



Landon

This is for blackmail:

Lemme Out!


All three little ones together



Sunday, we all went to church and then had lunch and a talent show:

The B__rs had their turn

Jokes with Andrea:

The Mens Choir!

Marcus

Grandma and Grandpa

David played trumpet

Poppa got to hold the mama's boy!

AND the mama's girl!


Enjoying the show


It was a tiring but fun weekend!

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