Happy 2012.
We rang in the New Year at 9pm while visiting the Solanos up in Northern CA. The kids watch the ball drop at 12am NY time and go to bed happy with how late they stayed up. The kids loved the noise makers suprisingly enough...they are usually such quiet children, except when Warren screams like a girl. :) It was a fun Christmas break and I have picked out some pictures to illustrate some of the highlights. It was great to be with family and to celebrate together.
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| The girls had a great time dressing up a few times to pose in living Nativity scenes. Angels, shepherds, sheep. They really got into their parts. |
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| We spent a lot of time with animals, both fake and real. Claire got a cat Loulou which walks and meows...hopefully that bought Brock and I some more time before we have to get any real pets for out animal loving daughters. |
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| Warren was extremely happy about this Lion from Grandma. |
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| We hiked up Steamboat Rock to relive Brock's childhood memories. It was fun to get outdoors and the girls got into it and Brock carried the Warrenito the whole way up and got a good workout. |
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| Unfortunately Jim and Angela (Brock's cousins) had to raise the stakes a little higher by getting a real dog for Christmas. |
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| I don't think Lara will be asking for a turtle anytime soon After staying with Grandma and Grandpa Solano, we drove over to San Francisco and got a backstage tour of the Zoo courtesy of Eva and Branner...it was AWESOME!! We got to see, hold, pet, and feed so many animals. The ball in my hand it a curled up armadillo, the girls got to feed the rhino celery the giraffes bananas and lettuce, and the ostrichs some salad they really didn't like. Lara was excited to pet the soft Koala which she might call a gorilla accidentally |
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| These moustaches cracked us up |
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| Sweet Carolina the giraffe. |
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| PENGUINS!! |
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| a 40 year old Sea Lion is behind the girls that used to work for the Navy...neat. |
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| Ashlyn got to sing in a Children's choir for a Christmas concert. We were so proud of her. She stood up in front of such large audience for the first time and was very confident and sang so well. She practiced a lot and sang the songs in Church and for our family Christmas gatherings as well. |
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| The girls had fun buying presents for eachother. This was the first year we had Christmas morning at our house. |
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| We had Mexican Pastries, |
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| We had Abuelita (Mexican Hot Chocolate) and Tamales. |
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| Mom made everyone new hooded towels. :) |
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| We had a delicious Christmas turkey dinner with my parents and brother Riley, sister-in-law Kristen and their cute little girls Julia. They will be having a second little girl this summer. YEAH! |
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| The girls can't get enough of their cousins. Unfortunately the Stomach flu inflicted some of our poor cousins on both sides of the family this year :( We thought our kids were doomed to get it, but it passed by us. |
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| Cousin Daniel gets the prize for the most appropriate present for Claire--princess Claire. |
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| We gathered for a Christmas Eve Eve with the Plumbs and had a fun time singing and exchenging gifts. We love our families!!! |
