a california-style christmas eve.

    december 24th, 2012.

san clemente, california.

christmas eve kicked off with breakfast in huntington beach with troy, tiff & her baby bump 

on our way back to san diego, danny and i took our time on the pch and stopped along the way. 

watched the surfers

and walked along the beach

it doesn't get much better.

this year's holiday card collection.

do we have to take them down? 

we love having our friends and family in the kitchen with us.

our very merry california christmas.

we had such a nice christmas. 

lots of quality time with the whole family that was the perfect combination of mellow and fun. 

we lounged around and watched National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation.

ate all the traditional fare - deviled eggs, eggs benedict, homemade salsa & chocolate mousse 

laughed our asses off playing hours of "the game of things" on christmas night. 

there was no shortage of activities: golf, darts, ping pong, walks to the park, piano sing-a-longs and playing jayden's new memory game featuring family photos (pssst.. this was a huge hit for everyone. make yours here.)

each of the packages were beautiful and filled with goodies.

and then on the 26th, almost 30 of us got together for a big family christmas fiesta.

just how being home for the holidays should be. 

decided to make a the photos into a festive slideshow, enjoy!

photos from our last christmas in california (2010) in this post.

the every december 23rd christmas party.

for 20+ years, tiffany's parents have hosted a christmas party on december 23rd. i've been lucky enough to partake in the tradition a couple of times, and finally introduced danny to the annual event while we were in southern california for the holiday break.

it was so good to see so many people.... troy, tiff & her growing belly. the wilburs. donna, chris & their precious paige. lauren, miranda, julie, katie and the rest of the huntington girls. the party really put us in the holiday spirit. there was food, cocktails, mocktails, gifts exchanged and a game of charades. there was even a special chocolate fondue dessert table and tribute for tone. it was a merry way to spend december 23rd. xo

tiff looks fantastic. nixon, too. she's due in early april.

yup, that's about right.

i'm afraid little nixon is going to have a hard time sharing his mama with baby. #ultimatemamaspooch

ting saying hello to chris & donna's perfect little paige monroe

we hope you had a very merry christmas.

>>> ours 2012 holiday card <<< 

better late than never

december has felt like this...

a big blur. 

anyone else with me on this one? 

it's december 20th. 

i've already been at the new job for three weeks.

lacey jaye is getting married on saturday! 

ornaments never got hung on the tree (but it's still so beautiful).

holiday parties have come and gone. 

just once i saw the inside of a gym. 

our christmas cards barely got dropped in the mail today.

and my fingers are crossed that online orders get delivered on time. 

and if not, oh well. 

it's been a bustling holiday season - just the way it should be.

.....

bockting christmas brunch.

last sunday was the day we celebrated christmas with danny's family. d and i hosted his mom and dad, sister and makaela (earl was out of town) to a brunch and gifts at our home. having christmas shopping, wrapping and decorating done by december 9th was pretty aggressive, but also a nice push to get things done.

our bockting brunch was fun and mellow. i made a night-before breakfast casserole, biscuits, cinnamon rolls (a bockting christmas tradition), fruit, mimosas and brownies for dessert. miss makaela kept us all entertained and "side" (outside) for as long as she could.    

....

it's been fun to have a new home to decorate. new places for garland, trinkets and the tree. i mean, trees - plural. yup, this is our second christmas tree of the season. remember the debacle we went through to find the first one? well, yeah. about that. days after we hung the lights on our huge tree it was officially dead. as i started to hang ornaments in preparation for sunday christmas brunch, crunchy needles just started falling to the floor and i was not having it. i mentioned getting a new tree to d and he laughed like i was kidding - and then realized i was not. sooo my wonderful and extremely patient husband humored me, pulled out the ladder, unstrung all the lights, hauled the tree out of the house and we started over. back to the lot, loaded up a new tree on the mini, brought it home, re-strung the lights... i think this is a prime example of "happy wife, happy life." 

i really don't like hunter's lame stocking. anyone want to make him one? 

our new tree is so green & fresh. now only if i could find the my missing box of ornaments. hmm.... 

our "merry & bright" sign from last year's christmas card fit perfectly between two sconces.

christmas in arizona. festive, huh? three of the sweetest i know hanging out in our backyard.

what's not to love?

checkin' out the loot.

little miss snacking on cinnamon rolls.

the brunch spread... minus the casserole that took forever to bake.

we decided to all squeeze into our tiny dining nook to eat

makaela's "woooow" face checking out her new purse. huntie obviously in on the action.

awesome personalized gift tags.

me and the dogg.

an inside joke. a special chex mix batch for b-joe.

i love this snap. every single thing about it.

matching toms for makaela and tricia!

time to get crafty! 

take your bone dogg dogg

our attempt at a self-timer family photo. not too shabby. you should see the 12 outtakes. ha. 

my (new to me) 1970's french mixte.

with a big red bow and everything! 

on sunday, december 9th we hosted danny's family's christmas brunch (early, we know. but it was the only weekend that worked for everyone) and i got a big christmas surprise from ting!

he found an old 1970's french mixte bike, ordered all kinds of parts and then spent hours resorting and modifying it to make it perfect for moi. i'm beyond obsessed with the double basket on the back. how great is that? 

i feel like i should have a fresh bouquet of flowers, a bottle of wine and baguette in the back at all times.

 checking things out while hunter & makaela check each other out.
let's be real, this bike is way cooler than i am. 

babe, i love it. 

and i know how much time you've been spending in the back house working on 

mysterious things (i was really starting to wonder). merci! merci! merci!

je t'aime
(i love you en frances)

christmas tree success in suburbia!

a totally failed attempt at getting a big christmas tree.

it was saturday night. december 1st. we were totally pumped to get our first christmas tree for the new house. our new little tudor has super high ceilings so we decided we'd go big this year... like 10-feet big. much to danny's dismay we can't find any "chop your own tree" farms anywhere near phoenix (anyone else not surprised?), so we're relegated to the super awesome parking lot farms that pop-up around town this time of year. 

the problem with the ones in our area? there were no big trees. everything stopped around 7-feet. except this one tree.

it wasn't perfect. or even close. so we kept moved on to the next lot... and the next one... and after a few failed attempts at finding a tree we gave up. totally over it. so to salvage the night, we took advantage of being in our old hood and hit up our favorite 'lil thai restaurant, thai lahana...

 and then during dinner a lightbulb went off - they must have big trees in the 'burbs, right? yup. 

and so the great hunt continued....