January Fun!

January started with the Ducks and the Rose Bowl! It was an amazing game with the Ducks beating up on Florida State with a 59-20 win! With these cute fans cheering on the Ducks how could they lose? 

That Saturday Alex and Jake headed down to San Antonio with friends from the Georgia group for the US Army All American Bowl. This was Jake's first live football game and he loved it. He loved watching the game, hanging with Daddy and with good buddy Stacy, meeting the players and the snacks!

While the boys were away Allie and I had lunch with friends and then Allie had her good friend Penelope over to play. The girls were having so much fun and having a great time dressing up. After the playdate we went to Penelope's for some more playtime and a glass of wine for me and Penny's mom!

I was shocked at how emotional I was when we gifted our glider to our good friends Gordon & Melissa ahead of Baby Kennedy's arrival. When they were taking it out I got all teary thinking of rocking each little one. We're so happy for them and hope it serves them well in the late and sleepless nights ahead! 

Allie and I headed out on a super rainy Sunday to the Thinkery (the Austin Children's Museum) to celebrate friend's Millie & Sophie's 3rd birthdays!

Making party hats!

With Eli

Sweet birthday girls!

After nap Allie joined me for Melissa's shower for Baby Kennedy! She was so excited to be there to celebrate. She did ask a couple of times "where's the shower?" which it took me a few minutes to figure out what she was talking about! We were too busy during the shower for pictures but this was Allie as soon as we got home! So exhausted she couldn't even take her coat off or find her bed!

On January 12th we dropped the littles off at school (after a little photoshoot) and Alex and I were off to Dallas for the first College Football National Championship game! When the Ducks made it and I knew the game was in Dallas I couldn't resist trying to get tickets to go. And when an old DC Duck friend gave me a connection to tickets I had to get them!

Jerry-world!

So fun to see some of the old school DC Ducks crew!

As you can see from the pictures it was COLD! Somehow Alex managed to get us into the stadium almost an hour early! It was very cool being in here with almost no one else and being warm! 

Thanks to Facebook I ran into Brian Oxman who was one of my Young Judaea advisors and a friend. I hadn't seen him since 1992 or 1993 when we were both in Israel. Crazy!

We also ran into a few famous folks too. Lou Dobbs was super nice and is married to a Duck like Alex. His wife and I agreed they were smart men! 

Alex also met MLB's Shane Victorino who was there to cheer on fellow Hawaiian, Oregon QB Marcus Mariotta. 

My favorite famous person was sighting was when I noticed Kenny Wheaton, former UO and NFL player, sitting right across the aisle from us. Kenny Wheaton is famous for a play against Washington in 1994, "The Pick"!  

Sigh. So the game didn't go the way that I would have liked but I'm glad that we had the chance to go to the National Championship game and have the experience. Alex and I had the whole day together without the kids, saw old friends AND I got to cheer on the team I love. It was an amazing season. Go Ducks Forever!

Poor Jakey. We had him allergy tested and he's allergic to Austin. For your benefit this picture was taken right after the test, the other pictures were WAY worse! Thankfully, he's now on allergy drops and hopefully it will help.

Miss Allie started gymnastics and she loves it. I mean this is just too cute!

For once we had a quiet weekend and we had our first family movie date. It was Allie's first time at the movie theater and she loved it. We saw Paddington and it was adorable. 

The next week I was in San Antonio and then Houston for work and got lucky enough to have dinner with this guy and his lovely wife. I was honored when Ken came to the door and he was wearing his Oregon sweatshirt that Alex sent to him (along with a Georgia sweatshirt too). The bonus that night was that Aunt Cindy (Brott) was in town and joined us as did Scott (Toppell), Alex's cousin, joined us for dinner too. 

This picture of Allie is a favorite! Even though she wasn't posing but watching her favorite thing and obsession, My Little Pony. 

This blog might have more of me and Alex then ever before. To start 40 off right we headed to Las Vegas to celebrate Alex's birthday! We met up with our friends Joanie & Cary Frieden and Jason and Leigh Anne Mann for a very fun weekend.

We met up with Joanie and Cary at The Wynn and then headed to see the perfect show for Alex's birthday weekend, "40 is not the new 20" It was very funny!

At the Bellagio. Always a favorite!

At Serendipity 3, the originals are in NYC, enjoying a frozen hot chocolate. We couldn't resist getting a photo for Melissa Grossman who always makes sure we know when the movie Serendipity is on TV! 

Jason and Alex made a few morning bets on Georgia basketball. They not only got to see there team win but they won money too!

Joanie & Cary playing the tables. I personally was very happy with the slot machines. I won a total of $22.32 and I was thrilled!

Saturday night we had a great steak dinner to celebrate Alex's birthday, saw a forgettable comic and then hit the casinos. Fun night and a very fun trip!

With the Leigh Anne and Jason!

The birthday celebrations continued with family birthday dinner on his actual birthday and a very fun party Saturday night. We had a great time celebrating both of our 40th birthdays but I'm glad we don't have to think about any milestone birthdays for quite a while now!

Although this was a big birthday for Alex we have to send birthday love to Uncle Phillip from his favorite little people. 

Our basketball star may or may not have a future in the NBA but he seems to love the game!

I still love getting pictures from the Donkey class. Here are a few favorites from the month:

Talking about doctors and nurses!

Allie said that she was so lucky that her Bubba comes to Shabbat even when it isn't Grandparents Shabbat!

The same day as grandparent shabbat Allie got to go to the Frozen party at Kim's Gym! It was very cute and they did a good job but it was by far the worst Elsa I've seen yet! I guess not everyone can pull off Princess. We know Allie doesn't have that problem! 

We've had a great start to 2015 and can't wait to see what the rest of the year brings!

Delightful December

December started in a wonderful way with the Ducks winning the Pac-12 championship! Not a bad way to start the month!

We had fun on South Congress and had a little photoshoot as well!

On a lazy Saturday, Allie found Jake's old costumes....crazy monkeys actually crazy lions and Pikachus. 

The Tutu really ads something to the outfit!

I love that Jake is reading now but him reading to Allie is just about the sweetest thing ever!

Jake's class had a fun field trip to the Austin Nature Center!

Birthday party Saturday! Allie had parties for her friend Mila W. and then her old boyfriend, Josh. Meanwhile Jake was at a party for his buddy Avi! Mila's party was with the guys from Little Wing Music (they did Allie's 2nd birthday party) and she was rockin' it.

This is the best I could do in my attempt to capture Allie and Josh together.

I was very excited for Hanukkah this year. I was prepared more than in previous years and that alone was a Hanukkah miracle!

We had a great first night with Bubba making latkes and Matzah Ball soup and complete with a little driedel.

Hanukkah also brought a visit from Uncle Phillip! Both kids (but especially Jake) were super excited for his visit! 

Loving their Bathrobes from Great! 

I went with Bubba and the kids to see the "Mutt-cracker (Sweet)" at the Vortex Theater. Jake and Bubba went last year and Allie and I tagged along this year. It's put on by "Circus Chickendog" an Austin-based troupe that has more dogs than humans. It was...interesting but the kids loved it of course and it was fun to do something different!

Meeting the cast!

We did the 5th night of Hanukkah with the Gray's and were happy to introduce Hanukkah to Hailey and Ryan.

Jake was so sweet with Ryan!

Thanks to the Grey Family for introducing burnt orange into their wardrobe! 

It had been awhile since we had had a mani-pedi date so we invited our friend Penelope and her mom, Clara to join us for some girly fun!

Jake's creation! This is what you do when you're home from school for two-weeks. 

The last night of Hanukkah! Eight days is great but it's a long time!

This is the first year that Jake and Allie picked out gifts for each other! I remember doing this with my sister so I loved every second of it. 

We had a lovely day on Christmas Eve day of just hanging out the four of us! But on Christmas we had 10 adults, 10 kids and a whole bunch of booze! We had a great time and clearly the kiddos were in need of getting some energy out. I think the parents needed it too!

The girls having a tea party was just darling!

Followed by a movie for Allie and Livy!

While the boys played...

The next morning we left for Houston. Our first stop was to visit Alex's grandma, Berte. She was so happy to see her great-grandchildren and couldn't get over them, especially how Allie worked an iPhone!

Then we met Lisa and her boys for lunch. The boys were so excited to see Jake, it was very sweet! Alex got Allie to take a bit of a nap while Lisa and I got to catch up a bit while the noisy boys played. Eventually we went out for a walk and to the park. We met this guy along the way and stopped for a photo!

Sunday morning we headed over to see Aunt Noonie & Uncle Papa. We got to have Ken's famous waffles and a very nice morning together. Noonie hit a home run with some very sweet Hanukkah presents! It was a perfect last stop for our quick trip to Houston. 

Back to Austin for time with the BFF! Hailey got a stroller for Christmas and couldn't wait to show Allie. They thought it was so cool they both had strollers for their babies!

Georgia played the Louisville Cardinals in the Belk Bowl on December 30 and after work I met Alex and the kiddos at The Tavern to cheer on our Dawgs! Happily the Dawgs destroyed Louisville and a great time was had by all!

 Our biggest Dawg fan with his biggest fan!

We spent New Years with the kiddos and some good friends which was really fun! Not everyone made it to midnight but amazingly we all did! Allie loved being with her friends Mila and Livy. Livy's big brother, Ben, followed Jake around and he loved having someone who actually listened to him (read not Allie) and having another boy around to play with.  

Allie's plays us into the New Year! Happy New Year and here's to an amazing 2015 for all of us!