NEALON: Long Overdue...December Review

Here's a month of pictures for your enjoyment! :)

On December 1st we went to the Festival of Trees in Tacoma. It was employee night (the Hospital puts on this event), and in addition to hundreds of beautiful and unique christmas trees, they had cookies, milk punch and live music! What a great way to start the month!

Making advent chains...let the countdown begin!

The kids made these cute christmas crafts (I bought the kits on clearance LAST year...definitely the way to go!).

Working hard...

Greg & I got to go out to dinner at a nice restaurant with some of Greg's co-workers.

We went to The Red Barn again this year to get our tree.

We found our perfect tree!

Good thing we brought these two along to haul out the tree! ;)

The kids did most of the decorating this year...

Guess who decorated this area of the tree?!

Maren got a "real" haircut by my favorite stylist, Amber. She said that Maren was the best kid she had ever cut hair for!!

A sweet little bob.

My Tuesday afternoons....face-to-face with my sister, in Germany!

Maren's pre-school did a little program for the parents before Christmas...

A little wave as she walked to the stage :)

Afterward, they had a cookie reception. So fun! I love how the cookie matches her dress!

We also got to help out in Joel's class when they made gingerbread houses.

They turned out really cute and it is so fun to be in Joel's class!

We had a little christmas party with some close friends. We were having so much fun, I forgot to take any more pictures!

Greg's boss and his wife have this neat moving nativity. Apparently it is from Germany...I might have to go there to get one! :)

We decided to take the train to Portland for Christmas this year.

We had a great time on the train coloring, playing games, reading and looking out the window.

Our first night in Portland we had dinner with my dear friend Kristin, who I hadn't seen in 6 years! She is married and has a sweet little girl...We had a great time catching up, eating good food, watching the kids play and laughing!

Sweet Ellison.

I didn't get very many pictures of our Christmas celebrations, but I love this one I got of the kids on Christmas Eve at my dad's.

On christmas morning we went to my mom's and spent the day opening presents, eating good food, playing games and watching tv. :)

Greg & Kevin (my brother) took the kids downtown to get out of the house. Despite the rain, they had a great time!

Even the statues in Portland need umbrellas!

Silly uncle Kevin.

They ran all around Pioneer square, had a donut at Voodoo Donuts and rode the max. A fun outing!

We took the train home on Sunday...it wasn't nearly as fun in the dark, so we let the kids watch movies and we read books and ate dinner in the cafe car.