12.27.2008: Christmas Cookies & Party Prep

On Saturday, the guys (Dad, Brent, Kenny, and Matt) woke up early to go play paintball with the cousins and some friends. Sounds like fun at first, but when they came back with welts all over their body, lumps on their head from getting hit, and looking like they just rolled around in gallons of rainbow paint....not so much! Yes, they came home looking like a million bucks...and feeling like it too, I am sure!! Either way, sounds like they had a great time!

The kids and girls...and Vince...stayed home to get ready for the party, cook the food, decorate the Christmas cookies, naps for the kids, etc. If you know ANYTHING about Durbins, you will know that it is not Christmas unless you have a Christmas cookie decorating event! This year the kids did it outside (since the weather was gorgeous!!) in the morning before the party. They took this task VERY seriously! We had to beg for smiles for the camera. After decorating as many as they could, and eating as many as we let them, the kids and Yukon played in the yard chasing Vince around. While the kids napped (Vince helped them), we cooked and got ready for the party....little did we know what a party it would be! Here are some pics from the day:

12.26.2008: Christmas #3 and A Day to Recover

On Friday, the 26th, Vince got up early in the morning and flew back to AZ to pick up Drake and bring him to Riverside. We spent the morning relaxing, doing a little shopping, going to visit Gramma & Papa, etc. Vince came back with Drake around noon, just in time for an Albertos lunch. YUMMO! (For those of you that do not know, Albertos is an absolute must-have for us when we all come into Riverside!! :) The simple things in life that make us happy!) That evening Kenny, Nicole & Matthew arrived...with June & Cash (their puppies). We had a nice dinner and spent the evening opening more presents. This was our 2nd, 3rd, 4th, ??? (lost count of how many) Christmas! Again, all getting wonderful gifts and just in general having fun opening presents!!

Side note - Vicki (Nicole's Mom) made us all these pictures of the kids that are amazing!! I took a pic of the ones of Drake, Andrew and Brianna (see below). They are sooooo cute!!! She did a great job and those are something we will always keep & cherish! I really want to learn how to do these! THANK YOU!

So, after the kiddos went to bed, we broke out some of the games we all got. It started with a little Twister. Yes, that is right.....good, old fashioned Twister! Has anyone actually played that recently?! It was not only hilarious, but also not that easy! Guess we aren't as limber as we used to be!!! Needless to say, it was fun and made for good laughs and good pictures (some that will not be published!)!!! After Twister we tried out Alisa's new Dance, Dance Revolution. Matt was the only one that tried this one. Not as fun as Twister, but still interesting. Then of course, we had to break out the karaoke machine. Due to lack of karaoke cd's (and not enough alcohol consumption....which we made up for the next night), we didn't get many people up there singing! Vince (surprise, surprise) did, and so did Matt....who sang a Beatles song and was very good!

Since it was late, and we went thru all our new games, we decided to hit the hay and get ready for another long day of Christmas activities!!!

All the Christmas Pics are on my Kodak Gallery here: Christmas 2008 Pics

Oh, and did I forget to comment on the picture of the boys playing Twister....Brent & Kenny in the dual ready position....looks like the beginning of a new NKOTB or NYSNC routine!! NICE!!!

12.25.2008: Christmas Day

Christmas morning the kiddos woke up unusually early...but that is normal, right?? Didn't we all do the same when we were kids?? So, we all got up, and went out in the living room to see if Santa came & what Santa brought. Actually Andrew ran out there, right past his presents to see if Santa ate the cookies he left for him. He did! Then after being reminded of the whole presents thing, they actually recognized that there were presents there as well. Andrew got a cute "Cars" themed workbench. Pre-assembled and everything!! Brianna got a cute drawing/painting easel. Also pre-assembled! That Santa is GOOD! ;)

So, we spent the morning doing what else but opening the millions of presents under the tree. Oh, and the rest of us all had stocking full of Santa goodies! Anyways, it took quite a while to get thru them all. We actually took a break about half way thru because the kids were overwhelmed with all the stuff and just wanted to play. SO, we waited until Alan & Annette came over a little later to finish opening the gifts. I think we are all very thankful for all the wonderful gifts we recieved. Oh, that last picture of Mom was her opening a ring from Dad. It was a 1.5 carat diamond ring! WOW!! It is gorgeous! And well deserved! I think their gift budget for each other was $20....if you need tips on how to buy a real diamond ring on a $20 budget....just ask Dad! (Then tell me!!)

We enjoyed a delicious breakfast, and relaxed for as long as we could. Brent, Alisa, the kids, Alan and Annette headed to San Clemente to spend the afternoon with Brechbill's Gramma Katie and Uncle Sean. I know they really appreciated them all coming out for the day and it was so nice they got to do that! Mom, Dad, Vince and I hung out for the day, watching sports, relaxing, cleaning, and cooking! We made a nice dinner and watched a movie before the crew all came back. Dad even sat thru the whole movie!! That was a first! :)

It was a WONDERFUL Christmas Day!! We just wished Kenny & Nicole could be there as well. However they got to spend the day with Nicole's family up in Flagstaff and had a wonderful (snowy) day with them as well. They would be headed down the next morning to spend the weekend in Riverside.

I hope everyone got to spend a nice day with their family and friends, and had a wonderful Christmas as well. We feel really lucky and really blessed to have been able to spend this time with all our families!!

12.24.2008: Christmas Eve

On Christmas Eve, Vince, Kaizen and I headed to Riverside for a weekend of fun Christmas activities!! This was Kaizen's first very long road trip, and her first trip to Cali. She was looking forward to it all week and was such a good girl for the drive!!

So we got to Riverside early in the morning...ok, well 11am, which was early for us! Brent, Alisa, Yukon and the kids showed up not too long after us. That evening we went to Gramma & Papa's house for dinner and gifts with the Riedman crew. It was a lot of fun and everyone had a really good time! We did the white elephant gift exchange, which no one seemed in the trading kind of mood...except Shelly who was pretty determined to get a mp3 player that Alisa ended up with!!! She lost it early and tried to get it back one way or another all night! The kids all got lots of fun toy gifts and we all got fun big gifts! Thanks Gramma & Papa for having another wonderful Christmas for us all!!

After a full night there we left and headed back to the house. Alan & Annette came over for some post-Christmas Eve fun. They were in the middle of their cross-country move/road trip and scheduled themselves to be in Riverside for Christmas....which we all loved and appreciated!! We stayed up a bit, drank some wine, put the kids to bed, and waited to see if Santa was going to come! We didn't last too long waiting cuz we all had a early morning and were tired. So, we hit the sack!!