Happy Holidays!

So I guess my weekly posts have extended to monthly posts. Life truly is busy and busier and busier still. We've had some fun stuff happening so no complaints here.
We had a wonderful outing to the Monterrey Bay Aquarium just before Thanksgiving. We went with a home schooling group that the Westons belong to. Tanner liked to watch the diver feed the fish. We all liked the sea horse exhibit and learned a lot about tide pool animals. The aquarium has an AWESOME section for kids. There is a little baby zone that has a giant water bed that the babies can roll on, and a little water fountain that Parker couldn't get enough of. Tanner liked the climbing area and the dress up stuff that the kids could put on to look like rays, sharks, sea horses etc. We had a great time and made it back to Fremont with just enough time for me to get to the dance studio and teach my class. My dancers got a good laugh out of seeing my chaparone stickers that the boys helped me put on the back of my jacket and I forgot about.
With the holidays upon us we have had a blast. Thanksgiving was at home this year. Darryl took charge of the Turkey and I did the side stuff. We outsourced a few of the sides to our friends the Hancocks for the remainder of the trimmings. Thanksgiving morning dawned bright, clear beautiful and warm. The Hancocks ran a 5K with their kids in San Jose, while we went to the bowling alley for the annual Turkey Bowl. Darryl made the best showing with a 147, but we didn't make much of a splash and I definitely didn't maintain my champion status from last year. Maybe I need to be pregnant to properly balance the weight and really bowl well :) Tanner made a great showing by bowling without the ramp this year. He loves to bowl and we enjoyed every minute of his "wooo hooo" after each ball thrown. He made it thru about 1 game and a half then he was done. Parker wanted to walk the length of the bowling alley, so we took turns with that. He smiled at everyone along the way and made some great friends. We had a wonderful time. Dinner was so delicious we just kept eating. The kids ate like birds and ran around all over the place. The Hancocks have 3 kids so with all 5 it was a fun circus all afternoon. Luckily we had beautiful weather and enjoyed being outside a bit in the evening.
We opted out of braving the black friday crowds. I did a bit of shopping over the weekend, but long after the 4 am craziness. On Saturday we went to pick out a real Christmas tree and pulled out the Christmas decorations. Darryl hung the lights on the house and we put our ornaments on the tree. Tanner had a great time helping. He especially loved the nursery with all the trees. He ran through all the rows and finally decided on a tree that was about 3 feet tall (just his height). We trumped his decision and opted for a 7 foot tree. Tanner wasn't trilled about that, but he got over it pretty quickly when he learned that we were strapping it to the top of our car. He thought that was a good idea and wanted to help. His best helping was staying in his seat, which he did rather well. The rest of the weekend was fun and relaxing. It was the most time we've had with Darryl in a long time and we really liked it.
Work for Darryl has been crazy with all of the year end projects coming to a close. He's been working with Dreyer's ice cream lately and will often get samples...not too bad. His client in Sacramento is pushing to finish a new computer program and they have to get about 1000 parts finished before the first of the year, so Darryl has put in a ton of time with them too. We see him when we can and he is looking forward to some much needed time off for Christmas.
I am still my crazy self with about a dozen irons in the fire. I'm the gardening group leader for our relief society and recently we had a fun group/potluck lunch at one of group member's homes. She does some great stuff in her garden. There is a company in Fremont that will deliver a load of compost to your house for free. She took them up on the offer and they brought her a whole driveway full of chopped up trees and bushes. She spread the compost between her beds in the garden to used it to cover the walking paths. We walked all over her garden and it worked great to keep our feet from getting muddy and to define the walking areas. I think I want to incorporate the idea.
Recently I've been doing a lot of interpreting. One slightly strange experience happened at a mental institution. I had a job fairly late in the evening and I had parked on the wrong side of the building. When the appointment finished I had to walk across this big parking lot by myself. I wasn't thrilled about the idea especially since there are guards posted at a few of the entrances and creepy trees and bushes all around the building. I couldn't find an escort, so I called Darryl on the phone and gave him my exact location and told him if anything happened then he should call for help. I think I could hear his eyes rolling at me, but the place gave me the creeps. I told the agency I'm not up for any more late evening jobs there. In all I like interpreting and have a goal to certify nationally within the coming year. We'll see if that happens in 2010.
We are excitedly getting ready for Christmas and we look forward to visiting with family and friends. We hope you have a wonderful Holiday season!