Holiday's

This year was Jack's first Christmas and he was ready for it! We've had the tree up for a month, we moved all the decorations from the bottom and for the most part he stayed away from it. For the most part. He has been a walking little man for a few months now and he is only getting better and faster! Victor's hotel hosted a Holiday party for their employees so we had a fancy night out and left the kiddo's at home with Auntie Crystal. It was such a nice night! The people he works with are really great, and the hotel spears no cost to put on a great party. Dinner, dancing, casino, drinks, photo booth, all kinds of fun stuff to do! This was the only picture I took all night. Lame I know! I wore lipstick and my Grandma's pearls and this is the only picture I have to show for it!

Christmas eve is always spent at Grandma's house eating tamales, playing games and then opening presents with all the kids. It's something I look forward to every year since I met Victor.

There was a very serious game of domino's going on and Alana was keeping score for the first round. She decided she wanted to play the second round and won the first two games. Playing with experts with years of experience. She is awesome! She loves to play games and does really well at them!

We exchanged gifts and then headed home to put together Jack's bike and pull out all of the stuff from Santa! This year Alana really wanted a Barbie that rides the horse. We decided to get Jack this cute Radio Flyer bike that we can push him in and then he can ride on his own when he learns. Finally about 1am Victor and I were done and headed to bed!

The sun came out and no sign of Alana! Finally about 8am she woke up... at her age we were up before the sun to see what Santa brought us and then we would have to wait for the sun to come up before we could go wake my parents up! Some of her favorite presents of the morning were from Aunt Ashley and Amy, and Auntie Crystal! This crazy kitty cat that she wanted had been wrapped and meowing all week long every time you turned on and off the kitchen light. We tried hard to play it off like we didn't hear it. Alana swore there was a cat in the kitchen, after a few days she even put two and two together and realized it was the one she had seen and wanted at the store before. I played it off like dad wrapped all the presents so I didn't know. HA! She is a smart girl though!

After the kids were done opening it was my turn! We got Victor a nice Angels watch and new Angels Leather wallet! He loved it! But then it was my turn. I had two boxes, the first I opened and it looked like a Camel back for hiking. I was happy about it, I thought it might be a good chance to get out and start hiking! Victor saw the look of confusion on my face and said it was a new diaper bag. Hmmmm... Then I flipped over the tag and it said camera bag! OH BUDDY! Bring on the camera! I couldn't wait to get it in my hot little hands! I couldn't believe that after millions of years of wanting a professional camera I had one! Victor has always been a great gift giver (well before we had kids) but this year takes the cake for sure! Thank you my love! I always borrow my sisters and now I have one of my own! Don't get me wrong, my little 5 year old point and shot still works, but I've wanted a Cannon for awhile now! They just take the best quality pictures! Can't wait to post some pics I've taken with it!

The rest of the morning we headed out to Corona to do Christmas with my side of the family. We had the best breakfast ever that my sester made, we exchanged gifts, played a few rounds of Apples to Apples and then headed back home. I love Christmas morning with my sisters and dad. We are just missing my mom to make it complete. It always seems like something is missing, we all know what it is... but I know she is there with us.

Victor had to work Christmas evening so me and the kids visited our Garcia family for awhile before we turned in for the night! It was a beautiful day, 80 degrees, you really couldn't have asked for a more beautiful Christmas day! So thankful to everyone in our family on both sides for making this a great Christmas for the kids! I saw a friend post the other day on FB saying that she thought she loved Christmas so much as a child. Then he had children and it's even better! It's so totally true for me! They make my morning! Watching them open gifts and get so excited about them, it's beautiful! Alana is working on her thank you letters. It's a great way to practice her spelling and writing that she is so good at, while on break from school!

Alana and I had a girls movie day with Crystal and went to see Frozen! Such a great movie, can't wait for that to come out on Blu-ray!

The Greats!

I am totally ashamed to say that Jack was 11 months old before he meet his Great Grandparents for the first time! What a horrible grand daughter I am! We tried to head out to see them a few months back and it just didn't work out. Victor and I both had a day off and decided we were just going to drive out there! So we did, finally! Jack got to meet his Great Grandparents! It was so nice to see them, and I will make sure that another year doesn't pass by before we see them again!

Love this picture of Jack just looking up at his Great Grandpa Andy!

The babes with Great Grandma

And Great Granpa

One of my favorite parts of visiting has always been the lake! The deck and the dock that sits on the lake. Hopefully sometime this summer we will get out on a boat ride with the kids.

Breakfast with Santa

This year, like last we got to have Breakfast with Santa at Victor's hotel on the beach! It was fun to get the kids dressed up and put them on Santa's lap! Alana told Santa she wants a barbie house and the Barbie with a horse... Looks like it's going to be a barbie Christmas this year! I was a bit nervous about Jack. Although Alana never did it, I have seen tons of kids scream their heads off on Santa's lap. We sent Alana up first so she could talk to him in peace and then I dropped Jack off on his lap next to Alana and he looked up at him, and just stared. He look at us calling his name and never cracked a smile but never was scared either! Worked out perfectly for his first time on Santa's lap. (Ok, well second time, but it doesn't count if Grandma takes you and doesn't even tell me.. Not so happy about that)

He is a serious man! But my babes did look adorable all dressed up! They enjoyed the pancakes and the drive to Daddy's hotel. Always enjoyable! Adult party next week which was pretty awesome last year, so I'm expecting it to be just as awesome this year. (Plus I won't be "about to pop" as I was last year).

My handsome boys!

Me and my sweet Christmas babes!

Santa by the beach!

Happy boy! 11 Months old

Rosie Posey!

Smart Girl

Alana received an award this week at school! Kindergarten has been pretty easy for her so far, she is doing really good in her class. Victor goes once a week to volunteer in her class and with a quick change of plans last week, I got to go in his place for that day! It was so interesting to see the different levels of kids in her class. From the kid that can barely spell "and", to the kid that needed no help to spell "hospital". Crazy! Out of about the 15 kids that were there, I was very happy to see Alana in the top 5 of those 15. She is a smart girl and loves to "play that game". It's really me asking her how to spell things and what sounds letters make. She loves to play it!
I left work and ran home to see her get her award, we had no idea what it was for. Every quarter the teacher picks out a few of the kids and they have an awards assembly. Alana received an award for Outstanding Academic Achievement in Language Arts! She was very proud and so happy we all came to cheer her on! She took a picture with the principal (which is fun for her at this age). So happy she is doing so well and I pray she always loves school this much!

Alana and her friend Hayden

Proud girl

Some cute on-lookers

O' Christmas tree

Needless to say, Jack didn't understand why we were picking out a tree for Christmas. He had pretty much zero interest in it this year. He stood and looked around as to say, what are we doing here? It was a really chilly night but we picked out Alana's favorite tree! She couldn't wait to get home and decorate it! Her favorite part is putting on the tree topper. She keeps saying "putting up the star" but our tree topper is Mickey and Minnie. Although we may just let her pick out her favorite star this year to buy! Good ole Home Depot has the best trees at such a great price, so instead of going to one of those Christmas tree farms, which is fun, but expensive, we head over to Home Depot to pick out a great tree! Hopefully next year Jack will be more into picking the "one" out.

Taking out all of the ornaments and placing them on the tree was less fun this year. Jack can pretty much reach the bottom foot of the tree and wants to pull everything off. So I decided that I was not going to put anything no the tree that could be broken. I have a lot of glass ornaments that I don't want to fall off the tree and break, so I just didn't put them up. Although I am pretty good at watching Jack around the tree, I am not there 100% of the time, so this year I skipped all of my breakables!

What are we doing here mom?

No, seriously, what is up with all of these trees?

My happy place!

18 years!

Gosh time flies! I know this first hand with my kids, but to know that my first baby niece turned 18 this month really puts time into perspective! I was 15 when she was born. She lived with us at home so it was pretty awesome to get to be part of her first years! She will be graduating high school this year which will for sure bring me to tears! Her boyfriend wanted to throw her a party for her birthday so we jumped on it and threw her a party! We decorated Mat's backyard, brought in some food and music and she had fun with a small group of friends! She seemed to have a lot of fun! Happy 18th birthday Hailey! You will still always be my dork! I love you!

My awesome banner I made!

18 Years old!

Nothing too fancy, just done Harp style

Kids these days :)

My beautiful baby niece!

So grown up now with a boyfriend and all.