Mama teaches Baby too swim!

A new baby hippo was born at the zoo weeks ago, and Pete has been desiring to visit. We spent a Sunday afternoon there, and most of our time was spent "oohing" and "ah-ing" at the Hippo pond. Here the mother is guiding the baby into the water. The mama looks SO big with the baby hippo next to her.
The mama was teaching the baby while we were there. Guiding the baby as it was in the water, then lifting the baby up to get air. It was fascinating.

The boys were "boys" and were tree climbing right after and being silly. Here is our younger son' "EEEE" pose:

And now you can tell they are on a tree:

If you are in the area, maybe try to stop by :-) Happy Hippo Day!

The Cat Walk

 What a blessing to have a picture of the three sisters together. We were hiking the zoo with our 3 boys and the main animal attraction on this trip was the Big Cat family - mountain lion, cheetah, jaguar, leopard, et al. Josh enjoyed seeing the differences between the cats. My favorite sight that day was seeing the panda bears. The have such personality! It was one of the bear's birthdays, and he had tons of bamboo to feast on.

Crazy Hair

It was a crazy hair day in our parts

Saying goodbye to another tooth

Trail Hike

christmas morn 2010

Wow! Aidon and Josh crawled into our bed at 4AM on Christmas morning. Josh fell right back to sleep and Aidon actually stayed up and waited for us all to come out to family room to start our morning!

Loyal father, Pete, got up too and they looked through their stockings that were filled with stuffers from the Suggett clan, while waiting for Josh to wake up...

I can't even remember what time Josh woke up, but I think it was 2-3 hours later, 6AM or 7AM:

Singing Happy Birthday

What better gift than the promise to spend eternity with God in Heaven?

God, the Son, came down from heaven. He entered as a baby, was crucified as an adult, and rose again, proving He was "I AM." He lived a life span, infant to adulthood, and in his sacrifice, He covered our lifetime of sin. So, with God's forgiveness through Jesus Christ; God cleanses us and makes us white as snow as we accept Him as our Savior.

We continued our tradition of enjoying a birthday cake for Jesus on the 25th and singing Happy Birthday: This time, we made sure it was an ice cream cake - the traditional family bday cake.
Happy Birthday to you, Jesus!
Thank you Jesus.

Christmas Eve 2010

We were blessed to continue our Christmas Eve tradition of gathering together at the Concepcion's house. Although Bob & Minda were in our thoughts and prayers, they were enjoying the holiday in the Philippines [only the 4th time they've celebrated Christmas there over the past 50 years]. Marnie and Jason hosted this evening with lots of support from Robin. Missy is faithful to make sure we have yummy desserts!
The Christmas tree was beautifully decorated by Lolo, Lola, Marnie, Jason, Oma, Missy, & Nico in early December The kids' enjoyed playing, eating, and of course being glued to the television before dinner:

A few days before Christmas we planned a family fireside dinner indoors - on a blanket, near the Christmas tree, with a fire, and s'mores for dessert! The boys got really into it, and made a construction paper fire to sit around during dinner:

Josh moves in close just as I snapped this photo! They are both finished with the spaghetti dinner and ready to roast marshmallows:

Enjoying our first round of indoor s'mores:

Thanksgiving Tradition 2010

Lolo Bob led us in prayer around our Thanksgiving feast. It is an honor to have the tradition of celebrating this holiday with the same group of families since the early 1980s:

Concepcion Clan:
For the four of us, its a blessing that it is a late dinner, since Pete typically works on this day every year :-)

Summer in November

The weather has been GORGEOUS at the beach here! After work, I called up my family and we agreed to meet straight at the beach - and it turned into hours of connecting :)

I personally enjoy the feel of bare feet as you walk along the wet sand and the water trickles up the shore. our kids do too....

The wading turned into splashing and soon we were all wet! [see little one's face above? that's how pete posed for pics in his twenties]

All this reminded me of many 'college-days' afternoons at the cove, tidepools and beach trying to study. I soon learned that studying at Scripps library was effective, plus still got the view.

The kids enjoyed our stories of ecology lab experiments that Pete and I completed together at this very beach - studying hermit crab migration, sea anemone dessication...together!

The kids embarked on "researching" these tidepools and discovered sea anemones, barnacles, mussels, 'sea coral', kelp, hermit crabs....

So easy to pass on something you truly enJOY to others, isn't it?

Gotta love living so close to a respite from Hot hot weather!!

The transluscence of the ocean, that silvery reflection of light off the water, around dusk, has been a personal favorite of Pete and I for years. I remember walking on this beach together at 18 yrs old, wondering where we'd be in 20 years. Still here! together, at that! Praise the Lord!

Sing to the Lord, a new song! Sing the Lord, all the earth!...Let the heavens rejoice and let the earth be glad; let the sea roar and all its fullness. Ps 96:1,2,11