The beach

Enjoyed time with the family on the beach this week. Pics to come.

My dad streaming online

http://www.commongroundcommittee.org

Exciting national meeting bringing together differing experts to find common ground in government. Event will be streamed online tomorrow night see the link above and spread the word.

Richard

Happy Valentine's Day

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY TO ALL!

It's been a difficult week on many fronts, but we are so thankful for our "little princess" and every day with her.  Of note, Monday 2/16 is the 2 year anniversary of when we found out her cancer had spread.  

Santa

See the post below entitled December fun.

This is the Santa experience I referenced. Notice "Santa" on the right, and Kerith's head planted behind my knees.  Poor kid. ;)

Julia's Home!

My sister returned from Tanzania last week after being there for 15 months! We were so excited to see her home safely and have been trying to enjoy every moment we can with her. Here's a picture of the welcoming committee (I'm taking the picture) and our first glimpse of Julia! You probably saw my earlier post on what happened to her a few weeks ago. Check out her blog for more details. She did recover her computer (amazing!) and had a friend take all her files off of it. After thinking about it for a while, she decided to reward the man that had turned it in by giving the computer back to him. How cool is that?

December Fun

We've had LOTS of fun things to do this month getting ready for Christmas.
A week and a half ago we got together with 4 other 2 & 3 year olds and their mommies to make gingerbread houses! (Well, graham cracker houses to be specific.) We had a great time and hope it becomes a yearly tradition! Here's a peek at our creation:

Then a week ago Friday we took Kerith to see the Nutcracker ballet for the first time ever...and she LOVED it! (Thanks Matt & Lisa!) She sat through the entire performance in rapt attention, even getting upset at intermission when the curtain came down. We thought she'd be ready to go home, but she turned around to my dad and said, "See ballet again?" and almost started crying because she thought it was over. Then I explained to her that the dancers and musicians were just taking a break and she was much better. She was transfixed through the second half too - even though it was waaaay past her bedtime. What a great night! I think much of the fun was wearing a fancy dress and sparkle shoes...she wanted to wear them to bed. :) Here's a pic:


The next day the pediatric oncology dept. at Brenner's had a Christmas party, so she got to get all dressed up for that too. It was very nice and they had a present for every child. Only catch was she had to go get it from Santa...and she was terrified of him! She would just bury her head in my legs and scream NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! So I didn't make her. It was really cute though.

I'm glad she got to wear that dress, because now it won't fit over her cast! That's right, she broke her arm Tuesday at church. (I usually go to a Tuesday morning Bible Study and this was the last week before Christmas.) Actually it was not a break but a buckle fracture which is pretty common in children of that age. (Not so common that I had heard of it before, but anyway...) She won't have to keep the cast on longer than about 3 weeks, so that is good. She got to pick out the color cast she wanted, and out of about 15 colors she chose pink (of course). She did waffle a little bit between pink and purple, but pink won out. Can you tell she's a 2 year old girl??? She looks great and we keep telling her how cool it is. And maybe I'll take apart the sleeve of the dress and add some elastic. We do have other Christmas dresses though, so she will still be able to look fabulous for the rest of the season.

Politics

Being the Mac lover that I am, I had to share this with you...