The Holidays

OK, so I realize that I am extremely late in updating the blog. I can't believe that the last post I made was right after Thanksgiving. But since one of my main reasons for maintaining this blog is to preserve all of our family memories, it is time to finally get on it! :)

Lucca had her annual holiday dance recital in the middle of December. She is taking jazz/tap now after 2 years of ballet. She wanted to try something new, and she is really enjoying it! Her performance was really cute, and all of her grandparents were able to be there to watch her. Grandpa Bruce and Grandma Lissa even drove up from Sacramento. After the performance, they came back to our house and we had a baking day. We made sugar cookies and toffee-yum! It was lots of fun!

Another fun event in December was our annual ballet performance at Chico State. Lucca, Grammie, and I always go to the ballet together at Christmas time. This year, we went to dinner at the Raw Bar and then saw Sleeping Beauty. Lucca had a blast. It was so cute to watch her performing in her seat!

During the last week of school before Christmas break, Lucca's class had a winter concert. They sung songs with the other kindergarten class in the multipurpose room. It was very cute! Here is Lucca with her teacher, Kevin, and her best friends Lily and Emma.

I took off that Friday from work, and we started our vacation early by going to Fort Bragg with Grandpa and Nana Pam. We stayed in a beautiful house right on the ocean and had a great time running on the beach, shopping in Mendocino, reading & relaxing at the house, eating good food, and watching the ocean. The highlight of the trip, though, was riding the Christmas Train. The Skunk Train transforms into a Polar Express during the holidays. We wore our pajamas, sung Christmas carols, ate sugar cookies and drank hot cocoa, wrote letters to Santa Claus and then got a surprise visit from Santa Claus himself when the train stopped to turn back around towards Fort Bragg. It was a wonderful experience and Lucca really enjoyed it! Thank you Nana and Grandpa for making it happen! We were home for a few days before the Christmas festivities began. I enjoyed my annual girls night out with my friends from high school, although many of them were missing this year. :( We also got to spend some time with Myriah, Blair, and Matias, who were in town for a week. We were so excited to see Myriah's growing belly! We can hardly wait to meet our newest little niece or nephew in April!

On Christmas Eve, we went to Lita and Lito's for a big family Christmas celebration with Grandpa Ray, Grandma Pat, Aunt Maureen, Aunt Jan, Uncle Bob, Kaysen, Lance, Myriah, Blair, Matias, and Grandma Julie. We did our annual white elephant Christmas gift card exchange, ate a wonderful brunch, and opened presents.

That evening, we drove to Forest Ranch to celebrate Grandpa's birthday and Christmas with Nana and Grandpa. We had a delicious prime rib dinner and opened lots of presents. We came back home around 9:00 so that Lucca could prepare for Santa's visit. She decorated sugar cookies for him, poured him some milk, sprinkled reindeer food on the lawn, hung the Santa key on the door, and wrote him a letter. She was so proud to do all of these things by herself. After she was done we went online to track his progress around the world and we learned that he was in Texas. Lucca quickly went to sleep so that he wouldn't miss our house!

The next morning we woke up bright and early and opened presents! Lucca was thrilled to find that Santa left her a big cardboard house that she could decorate. He left all of her presents and her stocking inside. Siena wasn't so into the gifts this year, she just enjoyed trying to eat all of the wrapping paper. We really had to be careful with her this year! Gabe and I had Eggs Benedict and mimosas for breakfast and Gabe made Lucca pancakes in the letters of her name. We relaxed around the house all day playing with presents and then went up to Grammie and Papa's for Christmas #3 with Heather, Ricki, Luciana, Suzanne, and Ryan.

The next morning we woke up early and drove to Sacramento for our fourth Christmas with Grandpa Bruce, Grandma Lissa, Auntie Britt, and Grandmarty. We had a relaxing day spent snacking on appetizers, opening presents, drinking Golden Cadillacs, and watching TV, then we had a great prime rib dinner.

Once again, we are so blessed to have such a loving family and it is such a treasure to get to share in the holidays with everyone! Even though it can be chaotic at times and a bit stressful trying to squeeze everything in, I wouldn't change it for the world!