Christmas Eve

We had a very calm and relaxing Christmas Eve.
The kids and I made a Gingerbread house and ate all the leftover candy.....



I sewed the rest of my Christmas presents for the family, everyone got aprons this year, hope you all liked them!

Then I set in on making our Christmas Eve feast. We have been having fondue for xmas eve for ages, it started as a tradition with my parents. Well this year I made deer sausage meat balls, little smokies, and fresh pan de agua (PR french bread). All those items came out great, but my fondue, not so much. I don't know what happened, but the cheese never really combined with the Guinness and it was kinda chunky, tasted good, but was not think and perfect. Oh well. We did our best to eat our fill anyway.

The kids set up the plate of goodies for Santa and headed off to bed.

Major Updating Needed

Last weekend we actually had plans! It was amazing. Friday Marshall and I helped out at the Cascade HS Wrestling Tournament. Fun stuff.
Then Saturday we went to our friend Sara's 7th birthday at the Kroc center, its a brand new, huge rec center sponsored by the Salvation Army. It is amazing! The kids climbed on the rock wall, then went swimming, at a ton of food and then played in the game room.

Here is Caymus giving his best on the rock wall.

Saturday night we went to our good friend Tyler's house for some UFC, Pizza, Beer and good company. We all had a blast, even the kids!


Sunday we went back to Sara's house to see the tree they got from our Open house. They bought the biggest tree we had and it looks amazing! They also have Donkey Hill Vineyard and wanted us to try some of their wine, being the good friends we are, we sampled it all. It did pass the test, but we took some more home just to be sure.

Marshall standing next to the tree so you can get a visual for how big the tree is.....


This is the Cascade HS Wrestling room. I have to say I think this is the nicest wrestling room I have ever seen. One thing about this area is that Wrestling has some major support! We are so lucky to get to use this room for our practices.


Today was our 3rd Tournament of the season. Great Tournament in West Albany, those guys know how to put one together! There were 450 competitors there and we were walking out the doors at 3pm! Now that's a great day! Oh and 28 of those kids were ours!

Lucy rockin the head gear!

Caymus - my little stud. He took 2nd place once again today.

Lucy wrestling one of her best matches we have seen yet. This kid beat her at our first tournament. This time she ended up beating him 5-3, nice job girl!

After 5 years of coaching together, this is our first picture. We are coaching Lucy's match when it was taken.

Well the kids are out of school for the next 2 weeks, so I guess that means I really need to work on entertaining them! I think we will be making a gingerbread house one day, possibly going to the library, going to Washington to visit my family including my little brother who will be home from his Army training for the holidays, eating and drinking lots and enjoying the holidays as a family.

School Pictures

I have not had much of anything to blog about these days, so I thought I would share the kids school pictures from last year and this year.

Caymus PreSchool 2008

Caymus Kindergarten 2009

Lucy Kindergarten 2008 (Fall)

Lucy Kindergarten 2008 (Spring)



Lucy 1st Grade 2009

First REAL Tree!

This year we cut our first real tree.
When we got married, we bought a fake tree from Fred Meyer and have been using it every year since. I have liked it because I can put it up as early as I want and leave it up as long as I want. I don't have to plan to go out and get one, its always waiting for me when I want it. It was a small, 7' pine. It worked well for us for the last 8 years, but since moving onto a tree farm, we can no longer get away with a fake.......
A friend of ours gave me a tree stand she had laying around, so no excuse there.
Marshall and I went out on Friday and walked every inch of our property. We looked at every tree. Found a few we really liked. Then as we were coming back up to the house to get the saw we decided on one we had in our yard landscape. It is perfect!

Marshall the Tree Farmer! Getting ready to cut our tree.

It did not look that big out in our yard. We measured the height, and the width. But when you go to bring it in....well that's another story!

The kids loved it and were so excited to start decorating it!

Here with the final product! Its a good thing we have moved up to a bigger tree, we have a ton of ornaments!!!

I am so happy with our decision to bring a fresh tree into our house. And it was so nice to just go in the back yard and cut it down!

Now we will see how I do in the watering department!

2nd Wrestling Tournament

Saturday was our second wrestling tournament. We had 26 kids come to compete for Cascade Wrestling Club! This week we got our team singlets and tee shirts so the kids really looked like a team!
Lucy, Caymus and Marshall after another great Tournament. Lucy placed 4th and Caymus 2nd.

Civil War

On our drive down to Eugene for Civil War! The kids enjoyed their new 3D movie.

We have learned after 7 years how to tailgate the right way! I have made my own chili recipe and it is oh so good! So we enjoyed a case o beer, homemade chili, cornbread, chips and cookies! We danced around trying to keep warm and got excited for the game!

My girl! She is such a nut!!!


Marshall, Justin, Caymus and Lucy! Lets go DUCKSSSSSSSSS!!!!

The boys! Justin had found these cool hats/masks and got one for both of the boys! They looked so creepy!!!!

The field during the national anthem. What an amazing game! O is for the University of Oregon (Ducks) and OS is for Oregon State (Beavers).

The winner of this game goes to the Rose Bowl. HUGE game for us!

Marshall and I, trying to keep warm! It was 29 degrees when we headed home!

Creepy man (Marshall) and Lucy during the 4th quarter of the game! So loud!!!!

The game was so exciting from the very beginning! Both teams played so great and kept us all on our toes! In the end the Ducks pulled if off and got the win! 37 - 33 and the Ducks are headed to the Rose Bowl!!!

This was our last game of the season. Its always sad when it comes to an end, but we had an amazing year once again!