December had its greatness and sadness to it. Dan's cousin JD passed away after battling MS for a while. We drove to Moscow, ID to be with his cousin's family for the funeral because there is no better way to send your deepest love and hugs than to be there. It was sad. We were all teary eyed. We learned a lot about him. What a beautiful legacy he left.
January started off with a reunion of the Stevens clan. We left Moscow, stayed a night at a hotel in ID and then drove the next day to SLC. We decided to drive because why not. We disposed of our $40,000 to get that Honda Odyssey 2014 and you bet ya we will try to get our money's worth. Dan declared to us "Family, experiences are better than things so we are going to go to a lot of places this year and have great memories together as a family". Not that we don't do a lot, I mean we do a lot and that's why Dan asked me to keep a blog of things we do to help him write the monthly newsletter that his mom requires all of his siblings to write. We get around to reading some of those, the shorter ones at least but a picture says a million words so hence our blog. But ok honey, I'm up for doing more or I'm up for you taking the older kiddos out for daddy and daughters date and I can stay home and snuggle with my baby boy. We spent a lot on the "thing" and now let's go have fun. And boy I have to tell you that was the smoothest, nicest, most comfortable ride in my whole entire life!!! We loved every moment of it. Ronin did AMAZING! Debrie had one tantrum and Reena had one emotional breakdown but other than that we all had a great time.
Loves from aunt Tiffany
Loves from great grandpa!
Loves from great grandma
My crazzzzy ecstatic girl
My pretty looking hubby and baby. Reena and Debrie couldn't wait to put that headband on Ronin
Happy New Year!!!!
Ronin with his 5 month old cousin. He looks just as big as her. Guess it helps when you start out 8 lbs 10 ounces 20 inches long and grew 3 inches and 5 lbs after 2 months.
I sat down for about 2 hrs and knitted a football helmet type of beanie for him. I never thought he would look so cute in it. This kid looks adorable in anything! This is one of Dan's favorite picture of his son
Grandpa was so good at rocking that Ronin fell asleep
Cute little cousins all around!
Loves from Papa
Loves from aunt Krista
Loves from aunt GayLynn
Loves from Micah, who Ronin looks a lot alike
Here's the whole gang
The original Stevens
I love my man with the yellow pants
So tired after all those pictures. Well when you're so famous and everyone wants your pictures ya know...
She was excited!
Dan went snowboarding and had a lot of fun. He was sore for several days after.
Playing pool with the hubby
Got lucky and won. Just like the old days at DT ( Deseret Towers)
Loves from cousin Chad
Loves from cousin Amber
Food fear factor game
The final challenge: pickled pigs feet. Even I haven't had this stuff. Everything else I've had. This = gross but looked worse than it tasted. I was actually pleasantly surprised no one threw up. I said a prayer
The winners got a few dollars each
The kids begged me to take them to the hot tub. Seattle might just be the perfect place to own a hot tub.
Singing Christmas songs with Papa
Ronin embraced the snow as well. We were very surprised how warm it was.
Sledding and tubing. The last Stevens reunion we went on the white sand, this time snow, at the next one where we're in charge we will go tubing on the water
The kids begged me again for another round of hot tubing. I guess it was too fun to have aunt Thuan dipped her head in the water and played Marco Polo
Skiing I have done about 3 times but not snowmobiling. I guess there is a first time for everything. I was nervous driving that thing, MOSTLY I was worried about hills. I've gone on a couple of dates in college where we went wave running on jet skis, but that was on WATER and water is FLAT. I was nervous but Dan convinced me to go anyway. I made it out, down the hill and then driving on the bigger road was easy peasy. If I had seen the road I wouldn't have been so nervous but yay I did it all the way!
Aunt GayLynn wanted to take Ronin home. He loved being held by her
Yummy jello treat from Nama!
Last laugh and last day. That concluded the reunion.Our kids had so much fun playing, sleeping in the same room with their cousins. I'm so glad Reena brought down other girl cousins with her when she broke the mold. She needed those girl cousins to play with her. She's a a little shy at first but once you get to know her she is non stop. She is very much like her daddy.
So we slowly make our way back up to our beautiful Seattle again with the first stop to our rental home as we usually do when we go to Utah. We wanted to make sure our renters are doing their job. Our other house in Philadelphia we're not to worried about because well my parents are there but this house we just found these renters online. The trees we planted have grown a lot over the Summer.
We then took the kids to BYU with the first stop at the Creamery. Across the street was the comprehensive clinic Dan and I spent many hours working there. Always such fond memories to revisit
Eating at the WILK
Then crashing at my sisters' house again. She was in Manhattan and Philly visiting my other sisters, brother and parents and came home a few hours after we got there. We weren't able to stay very long but we got to see them and the kids loved that.
What I loved most was that Dan and Alex loved talking to each other. Thanh and Alex hope to move to Seattle after he's done with Law School and she's done with Nursing School. I hope they do. Besides the incredibly expensive housing, more like land, and clouds, the evergreen city is an awesome place to live. Where else can you go skiing and boating within a 30 mile radius. Seriously a wonderful place to live. Dan declared his favorite line again when we reached the Cascades, about an hour from our house ''AND NOW THINGS ARE LIVELY AGAIN"
We saw our friends the Frasers and stayed the night so Jo could snuggle with Ronin and the kids could play with their besties
When we came back we had the Amazon Post HOLIDAY party and concert
We had a fun night with our friends Wendy and Tim Strobell
Part of our experiences this year is ice skating. The girls loved it.
We also went to the usual favorite, the aquarium.
Then it was back to me teaching preschool and music at Highland co-op PG
Reena in hip hop dancing (yes she likes this way more than ballet which she has done the last 4 years) Brie is still in ballet and they're both in gymnastics
And Reena GOT GLASSES!!!!
And eating out with friends (Yep we all had the same idea last winter:)
And lots of cheeks eating
And game playing with friends,,,that's the life!!
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