Merry Christmas!

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Charlie Meets Santa

At the BIPD Christmas party, the Chief always dresses up as Santa and gives every officer's child a gift. We were excited to see how Charlie would respond, since her favorite book this month is The Night Before Christmas, and she points out Santa everywhere we go. But since she was terrified of the life-sized characters at Disneyland in October, I had my doubts. When we arrived, she headed straight for the tree, her favorite thing at last year's party as well, and touched every light and ornament until it was time to eat, and then we waited for Santa to make his appearance. Since the kids were called in age order, our friends the Ziemba's daughter Morgan was called first, and then Abby, so Charlie was eagerly anticipating her own turn with Santa until her name was called. Then she grabbed Jeff in a vice grip, and when he carried her up to sit next to Santa, she tried to climb Jeff like a tree to get away from the bearded stranger. She couldn't wait to sit back in her seat next to me, but then she waved sadly once the gifts were given out and Santa was leaving, saying mournfully, "Goodbye, Santa. See you next year." Later she proudly told us she saw Santa and he gave her a present, as if she had never been afraid at all. At least it's apparently a happy memory for her, and she isn't dreading Santa coming again in a week and a half.

O Christmas Tree, Hopefully Spider Free

We went Christmas tree shopping on Dec. 4, hoping to get a tree that was small enough to fit in our living room without reducing our usable living space by half, and also hoping to get one that would not cause us to relive the Great Jumping Spider Incident of 2007. We purchased a new tree topper as well, a lovely silver filigree star from Target, spider-carcass-free. My brother went tree shopping with us, and we chose a six-foot Grand Fir, the most fragrant and beautiful of the Christmas tree varieties, but also known to drop the most needles all over one's living room, perfect if you happen to have a newly-crawling baby who finds miniscule bits of debris on the floor and eats them. It remains to be seen if we acquired any living creatures with our tree, but I hope that we got no more than we paid for. Merry Christmas!

Abby Chuckles

Mom's Group Trip to Bremerton Police Station

We thought it would be fun to take our group of mostly little boys (Sorry, Charlie) to see a real, live police station. It probably would have been fun if the PR guy had not tried to give a group of one to three-year-olds the same speech he gives to new recruits and high school kids writing a research paper. The poor kids were dragged from one grey hallway and office to another, no officer would turn on the flashing lights of his car until Heather ran into an old friend and he did it for us, and the only redeeming thing was the shiny sticker badges they gave us at the end. These are preschoolers. Flash the lights, show them some real, live police officers in uniform, and give them a sticker. That's all they need. It was a good idea, but next time we should all meet at my apartment, Jeff will wear his uniform, show off his car, flash the lights, and give out high-fives and candy. It will be the best day our sweet little boys have ever had. And I've got plenty of parking. And yes, I know there's a duplicate picture, but I can't get it off!

Abby Update: Two Teeth and First Word

Abby is in that magical baby age of being fantastic and cheerful all the time, mobile enough to not be frustrated anymore but not enough to get into trouble, happy with everyone but especially Mama and Daddy, and in love with her older sister but not stealing her toys yet. She sprouted two teeth last week, began sitting up with a Boppy around her, and just today she started saying "Da-Da." She says it all day long, but Jeff swears it is just for him.

There were never such devoted sisters...

What's Your Name?

California Trip Photos

After saving up a lot of vacation time and money for a three-week-long homecoming to Southern California, we knew we had to make the most of every minute we were there. And did we ever-- after flying 1200 miles to see our friends and family, we then put even more miles on Scott and Kristy's cars driving to see people nearly every day. We went to Vegas with Scott and Kristy, to Disneyland with Jeff's family, I went back to Oaks to see Michelle and Kellie, we spent the weekend of Kylie and Zack's wedding in Orange County, and we even made it to church at West Valley all three Sundays! It was bittersweet to be there; we missed our family and friends so much, but so much has changed that it doesn't feel much like home anymore. Someone said "A man cannot step in the same river twice. It is not the same river, and he is not the same man." We have made Washington our home, and while it was wonderful to be with the people we loved in California, it was also great to come back home to our little apartment with the view of the mountains, the beautiful, crisp fall weather, and the gorgeous colors of the changing leaves. Now we just need all of you whom we visited to come visit us!