Christmas

Merry Christmas! 

Abbey setting out cookies, milk and coffee for Santa. 

 The only guideline that Abbey gave Santa for a present she wanted, was that she wanted a "blue present."  Santa wanted to get a Grover doll, but apparently they don't make them.  Or I guess I should say he didn't have one in stock.  So a blue magnet board is what he brought instead.

 Did he drink the coffee, too?!

 Santa forgot to put some of Abbey's toys in her stocking.  They magically appeared later.

 Too much excitement for the littlest one:

 Amelia is laughing, not crying:

 One of Abbey's favorite playmates:

 Amelia with her G.G.:

 Her Great Aunt Lynne:

 Her Great Aunt Meredith:

 Honey Nut Cheerios dipped in whipped cream?  Thanks, Daddy!

 Abbey reading Amelia a book... how sweet is that?!

Hope you all enjoyed your day!

Hawaii

Hawaii is in Stu's territory, so he has had to travel there a couple times over the past year.  It is a great place to go, but his trips are usually flying out of CO in the morning, arriving in Hawaii in the afternoon, dinner meeting, meetings all the next day and then taking the red-eye to arrive back in CO early on the 3rd morning.  Not really a lot of fun can be had with that schedule!  So when he had to go for a couple days of meetings, we decided to accompany him and extend the trip with a bit of vacation.  

This is why we love Colorado. 

 Four sets of footprints:

 I don't think she's having very much fun.  ;)

 The wonder that is Hula Pie.  Stu doesn't eat ice cream, so that left Abbey and I to eat this on my own.  Abbey can put away her fair share of food, but I admittedly ate about 80% of this.  Yikes.

 The results of eating Hula Pie while holding a baby:

 Abbey learning to Hula:

 Petting a penguin:

 Playing with a friend:

 And this is where our camera stopped working.  Oddly enough, of our 3 family trips to Hawaii, our camera has broken on 2 of them.  Those aren't great odds.  The rest of the pictures were on a cell phone, so they aren't great.  Plus Blogger decided to re-rotate them, and I can't figure out how to get them back in the portrait mode.  Oh well.

I included this one because I love it.  If you want, you can click on it, and then right click and do a "Save as."

 

Star Lighting

Our town has a large rock mesa in it.  Every year they have a "Star Lighting," where they light a big star for the Christmas season.  Feel free to read about it HERE.  We decided to brave the crowds and cold to be a part of the tradition.  It was a lot of fun.  There was a real-life nativity, a petting zoo, and lots of goodies.  A lot of places had free hot cider, hot chocolate or coffee, but the lines were forever long, so we decided it wasn't worth it.  Here are some pictures.

 Really??? It's freezing out here!

 The Rock

 We did the count-down... 5-4-3-2-1... no star lit.  Fireworks, though!  Apparently it's common that the star doesn't actually come on when it should.

 There it is!