Mel's Thoughts and Ramblings: 2011

Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Hanging at Verve

Okay, so the past few weeks we've obviously gone to Verve Coffee a lot! We took Andrew one morning just to hang out and have our coffee/tea and he got to play with the iPad (always a treat). It cracked me up how much he looked like a little hipster, so I had to snap some shots without him noticing.

After coffee we walked around downtown and had some lunch. I always try to get Andrew to pose with this barber but he won't, so Randy tackled him and I got the pic.

Sunday, December 25, 2011

Christmas Day

Christmas morning the grandparents came over bright and early to celebrate with us. We opened presents, ate a delicious breakfast and then visited and played with Andrew's new goodies. Later in the afternoon the three of us went and saw "The Chipmunks 3: Chipwrecked", as part of our newer tradition of seeing a movie on Christmas day. It was a busy day, but definitely one filled with lots of love and fun.

Andrew leaping with excitement!

Gram had run out of wrapping paper so she used grocery bags - the ultimate in recycling ;)

Lola was very festive

Me reading Jingle's book to Andrew

Grammy got Lola a present

The sunset Christmas Eve, can you believe how gorgeous it was?

Saturday, December 24, 2011

Christmas lights

After returning home from Walnut Creek we stopped at Verve (of course) for hot chocolate and coffee before we went and checked out the Christmas lights around Santa Cruz. It's a tradition Randy & I started before we were even married, and continued to do once Andrew was born. It's definitely a family favorite!

Downtown Santa Cruz

Decorations inside of Verve Coffee

A GREAT house a friend told us about on the West Side

Hereeeeeeeeee's Andrew!

Merry Christmas!

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve we went up to Walnut Creek to visit my grandparents. It was really great to see them and to have Andrew hang out with his great grandparents. My grandma definitely seemed to get a kick out of Andrew's energy and zeal for life, which was such an awesome thing to see.

Andrew showing the great grandparents games on the iPad

G.G. was really concentrating!

Their cute little tree

Grandpa opening the calendar we made for them

G.G. opening her chocolates

Andrew helping out

Thursday, December 22, 2011

Rob's Wedding

Randy's older brother Rob got married on December 22nd in Carmel. It was a gorgeous, intimate wedding and Andrew was asked to be a ring bearer again! The ceremony was at a little boutique hotel that is part owned by Doris Day, and just included immediate family. We were blessed to be able to join in this special day and wish Rob and Michelle lots of love and blessings for many years!

(Sadly our camera died right before the ceremony, so these are all shots from the iPhone)

Getting ready for the ceremony

I make this look gooooood

Kiddo cocktail before the ceremony

Mom putting the boutonniere on the groom

Uncle Rob talking with Andrew about the rings.

I adore this shot

Rob & Michelle

Andrew took his job very seriously, including prayer time

Mr & Mrs Boose!

Menu for dinner

Our cohorts at the "kid" table - Ronnie (Randy's oldest brother) and Melanie

Andrew blowing off a little steam. He did such an amazing job that day/night, it can't be easy to be the ONLY kid with all those adults and he definitely held his own

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Baking Day!

Some of my fondest memories are baking and decorating cookies at Christmas time with my mom and Grandma. We would gather everything we needed to try different recipes and decorate sugar cookies. I wanted to try to create some of those memories for Andrew with his grandmas and cousin so we invited them over for a baking day.

Each person picked a recipe they wanted to try and the results were delicious! We had cowboy cookies, peanut butter with hershey kisses, chocolatey meringue cookies, reindeer marshmallow pops and of course sugar cookies. We made a plate for our neighbors and it was so much fun to bless them with the goodies.