Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Christmas Morning

Christmas morning was sooooo much fun.


The hit of the morning was definitely the drum set.


Other highlights included: A Hot Wheels slot car track, Dora dolls, a magic set, aprons, shopping carts, Connect 4, ocean animal sets, and more.

After more family parties and gatherings, I can officially say we are done with Christmas.

**Side note for those that read (and here's a little hint if this particular family does)...we have ONE Christmas present left and it's for our good friends the Worthy Family. And....it promises to be awesome!

Mt. Spo.kane Tubing

While family was in town, decided to do a little tubing. It was sooooo much fun (aside from the part where I hit a wall of ice and sprained my ankle).




Christmas 2011

Yay for Christmas! Dan and I both agree this is our favorite Christmas yet. The kids are old enough to both understand and enjoy everything. We happened to find the gifts they wanted for a price WE wanted and it all fell together wonderfully.

Here are some pictures from the beginning of this glorious season:


Our first family celebration was with my parents and both of my brothers and all our families:

All the girl cousins got dolls with little chairs and afghans:

Annual cousin in Christmas jammies picture:
Greatma made all the kids capes each with their monogrammed letter. Adorable!

Nevus Update 2011

Every December we have Joshua's nevus check-up appointment. Because he's been growing out his hair we convinced him to get it shaved short (required to have better ability to see the nevus) by giving him a mohwak!


The nevus appointment went really really well. The nevus remains normal and consistent with his growth. This appointment was the first time I've ever heard the doctor say that I shouldn't remove it. The doctor's generally list the pros and cons and tell me to decide for myself. This is gut-wrenching and always leaves me stressed out, but this time he gave me a solid answer and for that, I am so thankful!

Joshua does have some swollen lymph nodes/glands in his neck and armpits which SHOULD be related to cold/flu season, but we do have a follow-up appointment with the pediatrician to confirm this. I will be relieved to just have that section closed.

We did switch to a July appointment, so we'll have a brief follow-up in July and then switch to yearly appointments in July so that we don't have to attempt the pass not only at Christmas time, but also in the dead of winter.

But overall....GREAT APPOINTMENT!!!!

**Also, while in Seattle we spent the day at the Paci.fic Sci.ence Cent.er. The kids had a blast. Here are some of our finer moments:




Ugly Sweater 2011

Every year we do an ugly sweater party. As our children have grown, the participants have changed, but it's always great fun.

Here are a few great shots of all the kids and adults:



Posing

A moment strikes, and what is a girl to do? Apparently a girl poses. And it only gets better.







A Moment

Sometimes you look at your kiddo at just the right time and you get to SEE that MOMENT. It's amazing. It's the greatest gift ever. It could be learning a new skill. It could be hearing something funny. But seeing that moment is magical.

This time I happened to see Katie gazing at the tree. She was looking with such wonder that my heart melted. Her pure joy in the lights was something I'll never forget. Seeing her feel that joy was magical.

I didn't catch that particular moment, but here are some of the following moments:


Christmas Party #1

Our first Christmas party of the season is typically Dan's military party. It is one of my favorite of our usual Christmas parties. The party is in a massive airplane hanger, Santa flies in on a KC-135, it's awesome. The kids were happy to sit on Santa's lap and for the first time, NO TEARS! Hooray! There was rock-climbing, bouncy houses, a cake walk, Bingo and more. The kids won tons and tons of prizes and presents and it was just a great gathering of people!

PLUS, we got some great Christmas pictures.

The Domrese Family 2011 in a KC-135

The kids in an engine intake:

The kids with Santa (our first Santa picture of the season):