Christmas Eve

Spent Christmas Eve at Oma's house - and had the traditional night of carols, Christmas stories, and of course, the gift exchange...

Levi is so photogenic! He must get lots of practice from his dad always snapping his pics...

Little Bernie even made a special appearance - love the Christmas outfit B

Edith tries to read the Christmas story without any glasses. Love you Edi! ;)

Chrissy gives her best Christmas seduction pose. Hot mama!

Oma poses with her great and grandchildren - she always takes a fabulous picture!

Emme and posse

Merry Christmas from Guinness

Cristen, Megan and Michael sent a nice Christmas package to us here in Ak, and sent a lovely little Christmas outfit for Guinness. I tied it on and it fits perfectly! Although Chris is not a fan of dressing up the dog, I think it's very festive!

Here he's giving me the evil eye - "get this thing off me..."

and now - maybe it's not so bad. I think I'll take a nap...

Bisbee

Just blogging a few more photos from our Az. trip. We spent a day in Bisbee, which is where my dad lived when his dad was stationed at Fort Huachuca. He was pretty little then, but I always remember him telling the story of how he and his friend started a brush fire in some tumbleweed that almost burned down a few homes. Like I said - he was little, not even in school yet, but still - scary!!

So here are a couple fun pics of old-town in Bisbee.

Gretchen's B-Day

Sunday Bernie and Kathe had everyone over to the Kale home to celebrate Gretchen's 28th birthday. We had a yummy ice cream cake and everyone enjoyed catching up after the Thanksgiving holiday.

Thanksgiving

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving at Tom and Carol's in Sierra Vista, Az. Uncle Dirk and Aunt Edith came over from Sonoita to join us and we enjoyed the beautiful weather by eating our turkey on the patio. The food was all wonderful, and we had a great time visiting.

Tom carves the organic turkey (it was yummy!)



Edith and Dirk relax on the patio

Chris knows the best part of the meal - dessert! And don't forget the extra whip...

Cowboy Dirk and Chris enjoy the last of the evening sun after the big meal

Is that Christian washing dishing? Yes - he and Tom did the cleaning up. Good job boys ;)

After dinner, Christian and Tom got the chiminea going - they had quite the fire (as you can see from the flames shooting out the top)

Christian and Barb enjoying the fire

Dinner with Dirk and Edith

We went over to Dirk and Edith's for dinner one night while in Arizona - and it was great! Edith made us yummy Dijon Chicken and we had a great time relaxing, and playing with Liezel (thier min pin).

Leizel especially enjoyed playing with Chris. While she make look vicious in these pictures, Chris assured us that she was just gumming his hands - not biting.

Naco, Az

Visiting Tom & Carol in Arizona - along with Chris and Barbara. Today we headed to Bisbee, but on the way stopped in Naco, a border town along the way. It was really cool - there were old abandoned Army baracks here (we were only on the U.S. side) and they were pretty run down, but made for some fun pictures...

There was a recent article in the Sierra Vista Herald, sent to us by Tom and Carol, so I thought I'd provide a link - gives a little history about the place: Camp Naco

Cocktail Party

Saturday night we hosted a cocktail party - because "nobody has cocktail parties anymore!" It was a lot fun, even though we had WAY to much food - and probably a few to many cocktails as well... but everyone got dressed up and the favorite drink of the night was definitely the "Stiletto" - a twist on a Manhattan with muddled oranges and cherries. Yum!

Chris hard at work, prepping for the party...

Garnish


Brushetta -one of about 5 trays... Thanks to Sara for all her help on these

Gretch and Phil


Dori and Renee

Chris after a few cocktails...

Hair Cut

Today, Halloween, Guinness got his winter hair cut. He hates going to the groomers, but he was really getting pretty shaggy.

The real miracle though, when I went to pick him up, I asked if he had bitten anyone (only half joking - I'm so afraid he is going to do that one day) and they said no - he was really well behaved. I thought - huuh, that's funny. Guinness is never really well behaved... So I paid the girl and she went to get Guinness. She brought him back with a toy and a couple greenies - gifts from the groomer, who said that Guinness was the best Scottie she'd ever groomed! Wonders never cease... They also put a cute little pumpkin bandana on him. I guess he got a costume for Halloween after all...

Before - so shaggy you can barely see his eyes

After - I think he's saying "Why'd you do this to me?!"
The new toy - a squeeky star

Youth Halloween Party

Friday the 26th we had our youth group Halloween party. It was a big hit. I made all sorts of treats for the kids, including Tacos - which are apparently the new pizza.
We had a costume contest, and "Jimi Hendrix" was our winner. Sam got really into it, and painted his whole face, neck and hands. Luckily when I saw him again Sunday it had all washed off...

Dani (on the right) won second place for her costume. you can't see in the picture, but she even had wings!
The caramel apples were also a big hit, although a bit messy to eat...

And we played the mummy toilet paper game. For some reason the kids all started with wrapping their mummy's faces...
I love this spooky halloween like photo - Dave isn't really this pale, I just spookified the pic in photoshop.

1st Snow - October 7th

I don't think we set any records - but it sure feels like an early snow... Woke this morning to about 1/2 inch of fresh powder! It's pretty, and really not that cold out, so it's nice. Chris got 2 calls on his sled today too - coincidence? I think not...




Guinnes loves the snow - he likes to eat it, and rub his face in it, and roll around in it... He was putting on quite the show for us today, running around in the snow. He loves winter. If we all had thick fur coats like him, we'd probably love it more too... Although when I first got up to let him out this morning, he growled at the window- I guess he didn't recognize what it was until he got out there in it.

Fall Colors

It's fall in Alaska - and when it's not raining, it's really quite pretty. Of course, it's a short season here, so we have to enjoy it. The snow will be here so soon... It's already creeping down the mountains! But here are a few shots I took of some of our lovely colors. I love the bright yellow against the blue sky!