Holiday Marathon

The last two weeks have been a blur. A blur of fun, family festivities. I'm going to do my best in recapping everything here....

Before leaving for St. Louis on Christmas Eve we had our first holiday get together with our family here in Phoenix. The kids opened presents and we made cookies for Santa.

Christmas Eve morning began at 4:30 a.m. We were quite the sight to see working our way through the airport with all our "stuff."

Finally in St. Louis, we had lunch on the Hill and headed to SHF for mass. So good to see old friends, I'm pretty sure we talked through the entire service. :) After a quick note for Santa, hoping he would find us in St. Louis, we headed to bed. Christmas morning came, and we got everything we wanted.....including snow!

Christmas day was spent with my family. Filled with all the expected moments of family get togethers, awkward conversations, over consumption of food and beverages, lots of laughs, a few tears, secret bear meetings, and even some caroling.

Saturday morning, brunch at the Ohler's with my Dad and of course more presents for the boys. That afternoon we headed out to Union for Christmas with the Helling's. It seems to be a horrible tradition that I am starting, but I again forgot to bring my camera with me. The food was amazing, as usual, and the company just the same. Noah, of course had a blast running around with his cousins and Caleb spent much of the afternoon playing with his Great Grandpa.

Sunday it was one more Christmas celebration at Bushia's followed by an old school football funday. More presents. More food. And more fun. The rest of the week was filled with outings, basketball games, Christmas lights, and dental visits. Living so far away from "home" makes the holidays that much more special. Every get together becomes a huge deal and a major event. The only problem is that there is never enough time to see everyone and to do everything...especially with out our own car. A huge thanks to everyone, including Uncle Dave for letting us use his house, Bushia for letting us basically steal her car for the week, and to the Ryan's for all entertainment.