We seriously love visiting the Golden State, although time seems to fly by way too quickly when we are there and we never get a chance to visit everyone we would like to. Plus, with it being the holidays, I didn't want to interrupt anyone else's family time...which means we pretty much kept to the Hoopes' homestead in Fallbrook this trip. It was cold and a little rainy, but that didn't stop us from living it up and having a blast with family, games, and LOTS of good food. Doug didn't get any surf time in this trip, but he did have fun hitting up the go-carts and movies with the other guys in the family....not to mention the hours of video games he was able to play without the fear of getting in trouble from the Mrs. The only bummer of the trip was the leaky roof we all woke up to on Christmas morning...not exactly the kind of present you hope to get on the traditional day of cheer.
The trip was very short, as we all had to return quickly back to AZ for the baptism of our niece....the baptism was wonderful and we are so glad to have been there with Ashley on her special day. Since everyone on the Hoopes side (well, almost everyone...we missed having Uncle Dan out here with us for the after-Christmas festivities) remained in Arizona for the week after the baptism, it continued to be a very fun, chaotic, non-stop week for all. I don't think AK or Roo got to bed before 10pm for an entire week straight...and daytime naps were completely out of the question. We spent New Year's Eve at Doug's sister's house...it was pretty low-key (especially since I was one of 3 adults who fell asleep before ringing in the new year). Other than drinking the traditional Martinelli's, we didn't even do any poppers or noise makers or bang on any pots and pans. I guess the activities from Christmas to that point had finally caught up to me! Needless to say, we were ALL pretty exhausted by the end of the week and have since taken a few days to relax, recover, and recuperate.
So, now that I've brought you all to speed on the latest happenings of our lives, here are some pictures from our hectic holiday!
These were taken in AZ, before we decided to go out to CA. It was a lot of fun decorating the tree - I did the lights and garland while the girls hung the ornaments. It was really cute because they chose only 3 or 4 branches on the entire tree to hang ornaments from, so all the ornaments ended up being clumped together like in the picture above. AK demonstrated some OCD tendencies - she went through and picked out all the striped ornaments and hung those first, then she went and picked out all the sparkly pink ornaments and hung those next; she continued in this pattern until all the ornaments were hung...it was pretty amusing to watch!
Christmas Eve jammies (a Hoopes Family Tradition) - Roo's response was "Oh, I love them!" while she clutched them close; AK's response was along the lines of "Look it - HEARTS! Jammies so pretty, mama!" I cannot tell you how much I love, love, LOVE these girls.
These are of the girls being silly with their cousins (always) and opening presents on Christmas morning. AK and Roo seemed pretty happy with their gifts, but I think some of their favorites this year were their princess sets, their pink "laptops," and the adorable tin of hair bows, necklaces, and bracelets from their Aunt Smecky.
Boys will be boys...as long as there is a video game system close by. And of course...Doug had his furry little sidekick near him most of the trip. Yokwe, Kupua! Ej et am mour? Jouj im jijet.
We did things a little differently this year as far as family gifts were concerned. The cousins drew names and gave only to one person; the adults did a "favorite things" exchange. I was pretty used to the drawing names thing, because that is how my family has done Christmas for years (c'mon, with seven kids in the family you HAVE to think of some way to make Christmas affordable), but the favorite things exchange was something new to most of us....all-in-all, I think both turned out pretty well and we all seemed to have a lot of fun.
POST-CHRISTMAS CONFESSIONS:
1.) I am a complete moron and left our camera in AZ during our trip to CA, so all the pics from Christmas are compliments of my sister-in-law Kary and her totally awesome camera. Thanks K for sending those my way...you totally saved me!!2.) I also forgot my cell phone charger at home...which is totally random, because I only have a car charger, but whatever. So, for those who didn't get calls on Christmas it was because my phone battery had died and I was completely out of luck until we got back to AZ. Sorry...I'm a complete space case, I know.
3.) My seemingly incurable tendency for tardiness has resulted in us not getting Christmas cards out. For those whom I had email addresses for, I did manage to send out a little Christmas e-card. I know it's not the same as the real thing, but it's the best I could do for me. I would still like to get something out in the mail for the New Year, but I'm not making any promises. I am sorry to those who felt shorted or neglected this year...please just know I will try and do better this year. Here is the Christmas card I sent out by email...Enjoy!
4.) Shauna - I feel like an absolute shmuck for not coming by to see you. I really wanted to, especially to see how you all were doing after C's surgery, but I talked myself out of it because I didn't want to bother you guys after being in the hospital for a week. I felt I was being selfish by wanting to see you because it would have taken time away from you, AJ, K, and C...I also felt we would have created more stress and excitement than you guys really needed. I realize now I should have just gone down anyway, so please just know how bad I feel and how sorry I am for missing out on visiting with you guys.
cute. You always use your words so fantastically. Smart cookie you are. I would love to see your ecard too. it was a fun 2 weeks! Love ya
ReplyDeleteWhat a fun Christmas. Your girls are so cute. I want to know more about the favorite things exchange.
ReplyDelete