Thanksgiving

Happy day-after-Thanksgiving to all! We had a wonderful first married-and-in-the-same-geographic-location Thanksgiving together. We celebrated with our friends the Lubbens and had enough food for the four of us to feed 12... Or four for the next week, which is more likely. Here are some pictures of how the festivities progressed:

I made the pies on Wednesday to save oven-space:


The boys on Thursday, waiting...


And waiting...


And waiting...


Our very fancy (Walmart card) table:


The bird (a la Kassie):


The full spread:


And a bonus- Gangsta Claus (as Kyle calls him) after dinner:

We are grateful for home and family, good food and good friends, and to be surrounded by great examples of Christianity and goodwill toward men in our lives. We are grateful to have found each other, to enjoy a loving marriage, and to have a beautiful, happy, cheerful son who gives light to our lives.

Birthday Cake? What's that?

Damien had his first birthday cake on Wednesday. It took him a while, and some help, to figure out what the point of cake was, besides painting with the frosting, but once he got the hang of it he was pretty pleased.

Here was the masterpiece in one piece:



He wondered what to do with it for a while:



He decided to turn it over:



He got some assistance getting started:



He inhaled it:



And then he got going:







The finished product:



And then he got a mischeivous look in his eye...



...and took off on a sugar-induced rampage that lasted until 1:00 in the morning. He ran around the house (literally ran, something he had not previously attempted) picking up and throwing toys; each time he threw one he would look me in the eye and YELL. Not words, just AAAAAAAAUGGGGH!!!

Awesome.

A year in pictures

Ok, I know it's been a while. A long while. But SOME PEOPLE decided to get rid of all their networking sites, so now I have to update here too! I wish everyone I loved would pick one site and stick to it, so I didn't have to update MySpace, Facebook and a blog, but life is tough and I'll get over it. :D

Anyhow, today is 19 November, and it's Damien's birthday! One year and eight hours ago he was surgically removed from my womb, and it's been an awesome year. I'll throw down some pics for ya! :) In the last year,

Damien was born:



Kyle came home from training to meet his son:



We took our long trek across the western US and moved into our storage shed... er... house... here in Seaside:



Damien learned to crawl:



We had our first wedding anniversary:



And our first Air Force Ball (Damien didn't go, but he wanted to be in the pictures):



Damien had his first Halloween costume:



And learned to walk:



Today, Damien is a year old, and we have a year to go here in Seaside!



Many things have happened in Damien's first year. He is the happiest baby that ever was, and we are so grateful to have him. Our lives are wonderful; we couldn't ask for anything more at this stage in our marriage. We are blissfully content.