Christmas Letter 2005

It is as Merry as it can be around here. How approproate that I should blog our Christmas letter. Makes sense in this wild world of the busiest time of the year. Doesn't it? We lie in bed at night laughing about our kids, crying about our kids, happy for our kids, and worried about our kids. Then I fall asleep and she gets mad at me. "Oops, no, honey, you aren't boring, your voice is very, um, soothing to me. I find myself relaxed by it. It induces catatonic stasis. I dig it. I'm concerned too. I love them too. I love you too. So does this mean no...OUCH!" Sometimes pillows can hurt. Especially if you get a full-face shot with your eyes still open and your head bounces off the headboard. I hate that.

Our big news is that we got to go with all the cousins, aunts, uncles, grammies, and poppies to the 4 Disney parks and 1 Disney Wonder Cruise ship. Seven fun-filled days and nights with all the cousins. I have included all 306 digital pictures I took from this event in your envelop. Oh, wait, this is a blog, so I don't have anywhere to put the pictures. I'm not posting all of them so you will just have to use your imagination as I narrate our event.

Picture 1 - This is all of us as we were getting on the boat. I tried talking the girl into taking another picture because I wasn't ready and had my finger up my nose. I wasn't picking, I was scratching. Deeply.

Picture 2 - This is all of us at Epcot. No, Mark hadn't given blood, he is actually giving the friendly 'up yours' to one of the pesky Disney characters that was passing by. I think it was Micky and Minie's illigimate son 'Junkie'. He doesn't usually have a tail...

Picture 3 - This is us waiting in line. Because we went during the holidays the crowds were a larger than Nancy Reagan's head (proportionally).

Picture 4 - While waiting in line, the girls came up with several patty-cake-type hand games to pass the time.

Picture 5 - This is the patty-cake police kindly but sternly requesting that the girls stop playing these kind of games.

Picture 6 - This is Trent. Weird how his whole head is red but he was pretty mad at those patty-cake police guys. Something about 'jurisdiction' and 'injunctions' and 'speed-bag your face'. I really didn't catch much of the conversation. I couldn't hear over the patty-cake crowd that gathered in the background. Disney-5-0 my butt.

Picture 7 - This is a picture of my pocket. I kept the camera with me always and must have bumped up against something that set the camera off. For the record, I did not know my pocket had a whole in it.

Picture 8 - This is the blister that I opened up on my foot on, yes, the first day. I wish I had taken a picture of the blister that formed under this blister the second day. Incidentally, when I got home, I had to use my Dremel to grind the dead skin off. I wish I had a picture of that mound of flesh. Oh well.

Picture 9-19 - I let Caitie borrow the camera so these next pictures are of the mid-pubescent, pimple-headed, brain-free, testosterone-laiden pukes she hung around with. And that was just my family. I kid. No, I can't wait until she brings her first date home. "Hello young man, care to help me clean my home-amputation kit? I soiled it a bit on Caitie's last date...Yes, that is a rather nice trophy, isn't it. I preserved it with fermaldihide. I tried to get him to sign it but he was too busy screaming..."

Picture 20-30 - This is Abby. Each night we dressed up to go to dinner. On this occasion, I wanted to capture the moment so I took a picture of everyone with the dinner-wear on. Since Abby changed clothing, I had to take another picture. And another. And another. And another.

Picture 31 - This is a picture of all of us in our dinner-wear. I think if you look behind Abby you will see that she is holding another outfit she was unable to put on before I dragged her out. I kinda messed up her hair a little bit.

Picture 32 - Here is Max with his Gameboy. I was unaware of this but aparently it is far more fun to play a video game on a very expensive boat in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean than do anything else. Who knew?

Picture 33 - This is a picture of all of us out on the beach at Nassau. I'm fairly sure that those are not shark fins out there but I asked Max to swim out to the bouy and find out. Turns out they weren't sharks but rather swim-area-bouy police. Fortunately Max was coming off a great swim season where he went to state in the 200-freestyle so they were not able to catch the boy.

Picture 34 - This is me on the Nassau beach. No, I didn't get in the water. The locals called me the 'boss' which is a euphamism for someone who comes to the beach fully clothed never intending to take a dip. In the water, that is. When my blister's blister filled with sand, I filled with a longing for my quad.

Picture 35 - This is Debi in the photo gallery.

Picture 36 - The only picture of our kids that tells the whole story - Epcot ball in the background, cute pic of all 4 and suitable for display to all friends.