Decked

I finally finished decking our halls with Christmas decor. I anxiously counted down the minutes until Thanksgiving was over so I could pull out our holiday decorations with an giddy smile on my face began putting everything up the day after Thanksgiving. 

I tried my best to wait until December 1st but that didn't work out. 

However- we did wait until December to get our tree. 

 D wanted a picture of the tree. It's a LOT heavier than I expected.

 Why would D help when he could take pictures of me struggling to hold it up? (While laughing)

2010's Christmas tree is a lot taller and fatter than 2009's. I had to buy two extra strands of lights! (I really should have purchased at least one more. I cheated to save $6.99) 

The tree sat with just lights only for about a week. I was too tired to put the ornaments on after getting it set up. 

 Ta-da! Our fatty tree complete with lights and ornaments 

(Flash is on)

 Ta-da! Again... but my flash is off this time. 

I love our house when it's decorated for Christmas. This year we added a lot more since (1) we can afford to, and (2) because we have family coming. Some snapshots... 

 Our living room

 Entry way

Front door 

Can't forget pictures of our Christmas lights. Total, we have approximately 34 boxes (strands) of lights. Over 22 of those are on our garage alone. D and friend did the garage and our little tree. Today I braved the elements (including, but not limited to: rain, 25 mph winds, cold, and electricution) to finish the top of our house and the backyard fence. 

The backyard fence looks better in person. Blue lights on one side and multi-colored on the other. 

Now if I could only finish my handmade gifts and Christmas shopping... 

The Weekend of Thanks

D had to work on Thanksgiving. We planned on attending the station's luncheon but D was called to a search-and-rescue case. Unfortunately I wasn't able to see him on Thanksgiving. That night I spent dinner with my neighbors and their two kiddos. We both cooked half of the dinner which was probably the best food ever. 
The weekend after Thanksgiving we spent most of our time with our other family, M & E. E and I decided to cook Thanksgiving dinner for D and M since we felt terrible they didn't have a proper holiday meal. 

 D waiting for me to put down the camera so we can eat.

 Our festive table

 E and D diggin' in.

 M dishing up 

The day before we had dinner all four of us drove to south to check out the Seaside Aquarium. Apparently it's the oldest aquarium and one of the first to breed a specific seal in captivity. 

What we didn't know is that it's expensive, tiny, freezing cold, and, on a whole, not that great. It does have a couple cool things: feeding the seals and an octopus. 

 D is excited to feed the seals

M + D + E

 Each seal has a name, their own personality, and does tricks to gain attention. We found one named Wyatt!

 Most of the tanks were similar to this one.

 An ugly little feller

 An octopus!

 Checking out the touch pools.

You'd Be Right

Winter is approaching. Fast. With the lack of sun and pretty constant rain we have to take our dogs out to play whenever we can. Even if that means we're freezing and/or soaked by the end. 

On this day we jetted over to nearby Benson to tire out the dogs while the rain let up. I brought the camera just in case but made the mistake of letting D hold it most of the time... hence the abundance of wifey-only pictures.

(I'm mainly posting these in response to a complaint inquiry as to why I don't post more pictures of myself. This should last you for awhile.)

 For every good picture that I post of the dogs there are about 5 of the above. They're too dang fast.

 My hair is long enough for buns. Go me!

 Of course- when I finally get the camera from D he doesn't pay attention to me telling him to look at me. Sigh. 

If you think it looks pretty dang cold... you'd be right. 

McKenzie & Benson

Pictures from a recent hike up the McKenzie Head trail. We topped our morning off with a quick jot to Benson Beach. 

 We found a bunker!

A creepy bunker at that

We couldn't find Ruca for a few minutes. Then she turned up on the roof of the bunker!

They looove to explore

I cannot begin to describe how hard it is to get both of them to sit near each other and look in our general direction for a picture

Bird!

Found a creepier bigger bunker

Benson Beach- watching the ASTs do their cliff side training.

 ---

 Pictures from a (different) rare sunny day at Benson Beach.

Ruca-roo

Boags

She kills me. She'll run like crazy and then suddenly plop down.

I love this picture

Birds!

Love watching the leaves change colors