Christmas

Daley Ranch, Escondido

Matt gave me the honors of blowing the flowers for our photo shoot

Lucky Lady

Paine Boys

Grandma's 90th birthday lunch "she insisted on the gyro's!"

the birthday girl, going strong

We had a full two weeks in Southern California this Christmas and New Years. We spent a few days with my family before christmas tying last minute details together for the holiday while avoiding the crowds at the malls. One of my families traditions is to go out christmas eve for a fish dinner and to come home and open one gift. Of course one gift usually leads to a couple more as my excitement heightens as I see each expression of gratitude and surprise as each gift is open. Michael and I usually try and bless my parents with a date they have never been on before, this year we got them tickets to Cirque De Solei! Christmas morning we enjoyed homemade cinnamon rolls and had brunch with my family. We ended up bringing in the New Year with my parents as well and of course Michael ran outside at midnight with the rest of the high schoolers on the block, hooing and hollering :)

The second week of our trip was with the Paine's in Oceanside. Michael's oldest brother Matt flew in from Denver and we pretty much harassed him the whole time:) Matt has a witty and sarcastic sense of humor which I play off of a lot! We enjoyed a lot of family time together and had several classic moments.
-singing Happy Birthday to Jesus & fighting as to who would blow out candles

-gerry decking herself out in her biking gear for our bike ride along San Luis River to Oceanside Beach

-the Paine's overtaking the Flores's on our Sunday Soccer Tourney

-Matt always having an opinion about the movies we watched (he actually left one time because he thought it was so bad, lol)

-the Paine boys devouring an entire cake, 2 dozen cookies, and a 9x12 pan of gerry's jello dessert

-grandma turning 90 and still being as feisty as ever. At one point this very handsome elderly man came into her party and I asked her if that was her boyfriend. She looked over yonder and said, "which one?"

-scrabble slam most nights

-Hiking Daley Ranch

Thank you family for being such a blessing in our lives. It never feels like quite enough time together:) The Paines were missed in Hong Kong this year!