Christmas 2019

Kylin joined us to make gingerbread houses on 12/21/19.

 For Christmas eve we went to Heather's church in Walnut Creek and then ate at the former China Village.  Walt used to love the China Village even though I thought it was just okay.  Heidi took home Parker and Hanna since she didn't think they'd survive the restaurant.  The food was better than expected. 

On Christmas we went to Heather's for din din.  Tom and Barbara and Bob and Betty came.

Heather's home is always put together.

This was a game involving unwrapping toys that were tightly wound up in cellophane.  When the group rolled a five, your unwrapping turn was up.

Someone in Concord builds these huge light spectacles every year.  This year featured the Star Wars scene, appropriate since episode 9 released this month.  The boys and I saw it yesterday and I really liked it. 

It was a good Christmas.  The kids got way too much stuff but were happy with their gifts. 

December

The boys had their winter concert on 12/18/19 at Adams Middle School.  Scott was pretty stoked to play in all the groups: 6th grade band, 7-8th grade band, jazz band, drumline, and accompanying the Creative Dramatics, which is the boys and girls choir.  

  

Tyler on the snare.  Check out that motion blur.  I brought my 70-200 lens and the tripod but the lighting was so bad I had to use shutter speeds of 1/5.

Scott on the keys for jazz band

Tyler on the keys for jazz band

Mr. Fallon, the director, recognized Scott, and that made him feel good.

Kylin with Scott.  Overall the bands and choir did a nice job and the set wasn't too long.

Hanna, the uber cutie, hanging out with me and the motorcycles

The jazz band did a set in the streets of Brentwood.

The Marsh Creek ward put on a live nativity and had a real llama!  Yeah.

I wanted to bring my tripod but we were rushed getting out the door.  This was 1.6 seconds with a flash fire.  A little motion blur but not bad for a handheld long exposure by Scott.  Plus, Heidi and I have so few pictures together.

It's been a pretty busy month.  The kids got lice last week and that was not fun.  You can't appreciate how much work is involved until your kids get it.  Heidi was combing out her hair every night for two hours.  I've been working five days for quite a while and Heidi started working evenings again at Diamond Hills.  It looks like our offer on the Walnut Creek home is not going to be accepted, so I'm a little sad, but also relieved.  We always felt like if it was meant to be, then it would be.

Now I'm going to post some more motorcycle pictures to my blog.

November pictures

Blake's been doing better in the form of fewer meltdowns and an improved work ethic.  Today he washed a couple of things so we could post them for sale on craigslist.  We already sold the lawnmower.  Nice! 

Kira and Hanna are growing right up.  They are always happy and helpful. 

We left for Utah last night but the snow was coming down so much that 80 got shut down in both directions from Alta to Truckee.  We waited for two hours and finally turned around.  Today we spent getting the home decluttered, watching TV and running the RC cars. 

Okay, bye. 

The youngest three

Hanna is into getting her picture taken lately.  Oh, yesterday I asked her whether she wanted to run the RC boats with us.  She started jumping up and down, which is her way of excitedly saying Yes.  She still doesn't talk, but that's okay.  

Mister was happy vegging in front of the TV.

Blake likes playing Nintendo Switch, which usually results in sibling fights and I take it away and hide it. 

Fun times!  Yeah.