Happy Holidays!

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Life is Good...

We have had things in order for a while and just finally got around to taking pictures.  It's not perfect but at least its in some kind of order.  Here are the before and after shots of the apartment.
(Our Bedroom)

(The Kids Room)

(The Living Room)

(The Kitchen)

As usual we have some very cute kids, and when they want to be they can REALLY be cute.  Tyson was playing with his cars one day and I asked him why all the cars were surrounding the blue car in the middle.  He told me that the blue car was "sick" (the batteries are dead) and the other cars were giving it a blessing!

Ruby's friend Zaya had a birthday recently and as a present to her and a reward for all of Ruby's hard work at school we took them to the movie "Tangled".  They had a great time and the cutest part was hearing the two of them giggle and laugh out loud.  There was a horse in it I liked...

Tyson keeps asking me if he can listen to my iPod, but the earbuds don't fit in his ears.  I found these headphones in one of the boxes we unpacked and he was in heaven.  He especially likes Hip Hop music and can't get enough of Erasure.  Ruby was just about to head to her Nutcracker rehearsal.

We unpacked our Christmas boxes the other day and although we didn't put everything up the kids and I had a great time getting things out.  Why is Tyson always naked?

And the Christmas movies came out too and they started the season with The Grinch Who Stole Christmas.

We're looking forward to a busy December.  Ruby is playing the part of an Angel in the Nutcracker Ballet, and she is also in the children's choir for the annual Christmas Concert at the Honolulu Tabernacle.  To say the least our weekends are anything but relaxing.  Maybe we'll get to go to the beach again in January...

Happy Thanksgiving! Etc...

Tyson being a nerd

Ruby being cute

Being cute again

Tyson being a nerd again, which he does a lot

Tickle monster strikes

We had the wonderful pleasure of spending an afternoon and evening with some friends of my mom's, which are also our friends, from England.  Jeff and Lindsey are so fun.  We had a great time and the kids LOVED them.  We went to Kailua beach.  Since moving into a smaller place, Tyson's Tonka truck has become an outside toy.  Note to all: the wheels fill with water and yet, it floats.  Tyson really liked that.  I'm not sure who had the most fun, the men or the kids!

Ruby tried on her angel costume during the final fitting for the Nutcracker Ballet.

Thanksgiving Day!  Geoff took the kids to hike Diamondhead so I could get an extra hour of sleep.  Love this guy!  Then he washed the cars with the kids while I cleaned the up the apartment.

We had Thanksgiving dinner at our friends' the Wardell's house.  It was WONDERFUL!  We had a great time and then had pie at the Holbrook's house.  It was soooo fun.  This is my plate.  And this doesn't even represent all the food that was there.

The kids' table

The grown up kids' table

The after math on the kids' table

The kids- and Geoff- watching Toy Story 3 while the grown ups chat and clean up.  It's always good to have an adult to provide supervision.  It was a wonderful day.  We love you all and have been thinking about you.  Hope you had a great Thanksgiving!

Halloween and New Things...

As an aforenote we made an AWESOME frenchbread pizza one night that my absolutely fabulously brilliant wife came up with out of what she could find in the fridge (we hadn't been shopping in a while).  It was amazing, and I can't wait until we make it again...

This Halloween Ruby couldn't decide what she wanted to be until right before.  It was always something different but in the end she decided she wanted to be a Princess (Shocking, I know).  Her best friend from school (Katerina) was dressed as a Russian Princess - complete with authentic Russian headdress - and that clinched the deal for her. 

We went trick-or-treating with Katerina, her dad, and a bunch of friends from the ward.  Andrea caught this picture of me holding Jojo's hand.  She is just a bit older than Tyson and the little golden curls always get me.  In fact, I once made a deal with her father to trade Tyson for Jojo.  To say the least, the mothers of both children objected vehemently (although Andrea did say she would take both...).

Tyson, on the other hand, knew exactly what he wanted to be- "a bee with a stinger on my bum."  An awesome woman in the ward made an adorable "Bee" outfit for him we just attached a stinger!  Because we were in transition we could only find a purple head band for him though.

The church had a Halloween party the night before  (because Halloween fell on a Sunday this year) so Ruby and Tyson went together and were so excited they wore their outfits for a while before we even left for the party.  Mega Cute! The party was chaos, so we don't have many good pictures of the action there.  Tyson loved the penny drop game where you tried to get the penny in a cup at the bottom of a fish tank.  He had to go back 4 times!  Ruby...  I don't know what she liked because as soon as we walked in the door she was gone with her friends off gathering hoards of candy.   She is a very independent little girl...

 

I think for a kid the candy afterwards is really the best part of Halloween.  Tyson was so busy knawing on this "Candy Ka-Bob" from Aunt Gail that he had a hard time taking a moment to smile for the camera!

Aunt Gail and Uncle Brian finally sold their house at the end of October.  We are very grateful for them letting us stay there and are very happy that they get to go back and be with their new grandbaby, Jacob.  Luckly, we found a great apartment in our old neighborhood (a stones-throw from both our old apartments in this neighborhood) and were able to move in before the buyers took possession of the house.  The sleeping arrangements for the kids was unique for the first few days!

We're still sorting everything out but the apartment is a mess.  Andrea would probably disapprove of me publishing pictures of the place in this state but this is how we are living for the time being until we get everything in it's place.  A little difficult considering we came from a 1500 sq/ft 3 bedroom apartment with plenty of storage and a yard to a 600 sq/ft 2 bedroom with a small lanai.  Can't complain though, the carpets and tile are new, the cabinets freshly painted and new fixtures in the bathroom, and it's pretty big for a honolulu apartment.  The price is unbelievably low for this neighborhood and for an apartment in this condition, but maybe "the catch" will surface after we've lived here a while.

In any case we are settling in and life is stabilizing.  It's nice to feel like after the great unknown of joblessness we have landed sqaurly on our feet, mostly.  Until next time...