Tye tries out the new toys 122909-123009

For Christmas we got the Wii from Santa. We also got Mario Kart and Tye just LOVES it! He isn't good at all but he has a blast playing it.

So here is Kevin and Oma Junior with his tongue sticking out. (They swear it works, but I'm not so sure! lol)
Yeah, I remember doing this same type of movement when we first got our Super Nintendo way back in 1980something! lol

This takes some serious concentration!

Also for Christmas I got from Kevin a gazelle! I am so excited! I tried it out at my friend Loretta's house several months ago and have been DYING to have one ever since. I love, in a weird way, how my legs feel all wobbly when I get off. I know I am working muscles in a different way than I normally do. So of course, something knew, so Tye had to try it out too.

He is just so darn cute, how can you not love the boy?! lol Sorry, no pics of me on it. Maybe some day so I can put it in my weight loss scrapbook.

So there are a few of our new toys from Christmas. :-)

Parties!!! 12/18 and 12/19

On Friday December 18th we had our annual Christmas party. This year we didn't play board games, but just sat around and chat and ate! lol Our food spread included Cuban Sandwiches (a food I had never had until I moved to FL and I LOVE them!), Chili Cheese Dip (which everyone wanted the recipe for and it is so super easy it is almost embarassing! lol Let me know if you want the recipe and I will make a post of it) with tortilla chips, Buffalo Chicken Dip with crackers, shrimp with cocktail sauce, popcorn chicken with BBQ sauce (I get rave reviews on this too, it is the Banquet popcorn chicken and it is cheaper than the walmart popcorn chicken for a larger bag!) and then I made chocolate zucchini bread, Peppermint Crunch cookies (see first picture), and Candy Cane Cookies (see second picture--sorry I had to take a picture of the last one tonight before it gets eaten tomorrow by Tye! lol). My friend Karina brought a Nutella Cheesecake....YUMMY! Everything was delicious and the party turned out great! I must say our house was packed, good thing I didn't invite too many more people, but it was so much fun to have so many people there enjoying themselves!

Here are the Peppermint Crunch cookies! Everyone loved these!

Here are the candy cane cookies, I really liked these!

Poor Devin the kids beat up on him all night long.

Jared and Sister Clayson--she says I always catch her with food in her mouth. At least it is good food!!! :-)

The Rhodes family...we helped them venture out of Brandon to the thriving metropolis of Valrico! lol

Karina and Amanda (holding Karina's baby--Amanda left her baby, West, home with her parents who were visiting for the weekend).

Jaclyn and Alexis the food guards! lol

Carolyn and Gordon

I was glad that when everyone left most of the food was gone (except those cookies! ARGH! lol) I had a wonderful time, I was beat but it is always worth it! Thanks everyone for coming and I am sad for those of you that missed it. Hopefully you can come next year!


Saturday December 19th, my friends Amanda and Devin, had their Christmas party. I had planned on taking pictures, but I guess I was too busy stuffing my face! lol They had ham sandwiches and cheeseballs with crackers and then for dessert they had fondue! YUUUUMMMM!!! I must say I think my favorite was the White Chocolate fondue, then the Chocolate Marshmallow and finally the Milk Chocolate. The others were good but those three were my favorites and I had a hard time staying out of them! lol Tye had a blast playing with his friends, especially Noah his other best friend who he never gets to see! lol He was eating his dinner when Noah came in and he went screaming to the door "NOAAAAHHHHH!" lol Dinner was over at that point! lol There were lots of people there and lots of fun chatting away. Thanks for a great party Amanda and Devin!

So two nights in a row we were partying hard and Tye was up WAAAAYYYYY past his bedtime, but it was so worth it!

Christmas Family Pictures and our Christmas Letter

Here is our Christmas letter. If I have your address yours will be arriving in the mail soon. If not, well this is what you get, or maybe an email!! lol If you want a paper one next year please provide me with your mailing address and I will include you on our list next year! :-)

Dear Family and Friends,

Merry Christmas!! We hope this letter finds each of you healthy and happy and weathering the economy well.

Our year has been filled with family and friends and lots of fun! We have been blessed to go on many trips and other activities around Florida. We visited PA this summer and went to Kennywood Park and the Children’s Museum and road two real trains (Tweetsie Railroad and Strausburg Railroad)! Then we went to Utah and visited family and friends there. We spent the Fourth of July in Idaho Falls watching their awesome fireworks show! Also this year we went to the Strawberry Festival (where Kevin and Tye went down the HUGE slide 16 times!) and Novemberfest (Tye even rode the Farris wheel with Michele!) like we do each year. They are some of the local fairs around here.

In January the company Kevin was working for lost a couple of their major contracts and ended up laying off most of the people. He found a part-time job with the Geek Squad at Best Buy. Tye calls it the “Squeak Squad”! In August he found a full-time job with a company called Vangent. They take Medicare calls for the government. He isn’t thrilled with it but at least it is a job.
Tye turned 5 and had a waterpark party! He thought that was fun playing with his friends. He graduated from Pre-K in June and then started Kindergarten in August! He loves it! Michele is the homeroom mom and volunteers at the school when she can. In November Tye started soccer. His first game will be next week. He loves it and wanted to stay the night after the first practice!

Michele still works part-time at the credit union. She also tends her friend’s baby boy twice a month on Thursday and Friday while she works. Michele has been doing lots of scrapbooking and is still trying to lose weight. She has been on a plateau for several months now, but has lost a total of 70 pounds since she started two years ago! She was training to do a 13k but it filled up prior to her signing up. So we will see what comes up next!

We hope that you are enjoying this year and that the holidays bring you great happiness. May God bless you and bring you peace this holiday season!

Love,
Kevin, Michele and Tye

Of course after I printed half of my Christmas cards I realized that I had forgotten to include anything about us celebrating our 10th Anniversary! lol Oh well, guess I will have to put it in there for sure when we hit our 20th or 25th! lol

Anyway, here are the family pictures we took. I had a hard time picking, as always. lol But I restrained myself and only got 4! lol

Isn't he just the cutest thing?! lol