Christmas Eve and morn...

I love Christmas Eve. Carly and Ashley made sure Ryker and Em were included in setting out goodies for Santa. I was happy to have found some really special Reindeer food. It was the magical kind and guaranteed to bring Rudolf and his team racing our way. I described the store I'd found it at in great detail (a unique little store specializing in all things Christmas) and Ryker hung on every word. Carly glanced at the tag, rolled her eyes and said, "Yeah. Like Pier One."



Well, what do you know? Santa found the place. And after three trips and hours spent unloading gifts, I'd guess he knows this home as well as his own.



Strange as it seems, Santa's elves can make kittens. They're exceptionally life like! Santa brought Ryker a Wii. He wanted to know what it did. Em first opened a gift of candy and it was all over for her. I noticed that my cousins got an awful lot of socks. What is that?!? I remember when Santa starting bringing me socks and for lack of a better word, it sucked. :) We had fun!!! Love, hugs and kisses to Grandpa and Grandma Good. We love celebrating in your home.

Because I'm not digging sitting in front of the computer for more than a few minutes at a time these days, our holiday fun is going to have to be posted over the course of the next several weeks. That, and I have big plans this month to do as little as possible so I won't have anything else to post anyway.



Mount Baker provides a beautiful backdrop for skiing. The lifts however, are painfully slow. How is it possible that a ski hill with 8 lifts not have even one high speed quad? Regardless, skiing with the cousins was a treat. I've always known cousin Amy is as frugal as our grandmother (Yes YOU, Aim!) but not stopping for lunch just to squeeze every minute out of a lift ticket is beyond frugal! :)



Would you know that in a few years Dad gets to ski for free? I guess they don't expect many 65 year-olds to be hittin' the slopes. Dad points his skis down the hill and stops for nothing...and nobody! His ski adventures usually end with a bang (or crash) and this one was no different. He made it until two, when he pulled up covered in white and announced he'd slipped on a little patch of ice. That can really hurt at age 59 and as many miles per hour! He sipped hot chocolate at the lodge for the remaining two hours. Does anyone know where I can purchase a governor for skis? Dad's never going to make it to 65 otherwise. Tee hee.





I'd like to take this moment to gloat, I mean apologize, to these fine people for thoroughly schooling them in Balderdash. It was inconsiderate of me. I am sorry. Next time I will attempt not to win by such an embarrassing margin. :) Thanks Aunt Sue! Your enchiladas are exceptionally good.

Boo hoo...

We've not had nearly enough snow this season. So far there's been no sledding, fort building or snowman making. But each dusting of snow has the kids begging to jump on the trampoline. Don't let appearances fool you. These two are no angels. ;)

 Do you remember our Uncle Tom? He's the one who always appears on this blog asleep in an easy chair. He recently managed to procure a boat load of tickets to a WSU basketball double header hosted right here in our very own arena. It was fun to spend time with some of the extended Tippett family. Unfortunately we have exactly one picture of the weekend and it's this one, taken by Ryan's mother. Ordinarily an MIL would object to her DIL kissing men other than her son. But it was Butch and if Marlene could have made her way over, she'd have planted a kiss on his mug herself. I'm fairly certain that Butch uses Downy fabric softener as conditioner or bubble bath or something. Bet you didn't know that. Thanks Tom, for all your hard work. And we're keeping our fingers crossed that the event will take place again next year.

The best day ever!

Sometime after dinner yesterday, Ryker announced that it had been the best day ever! We inquired as to why, of course. "Because I've been in my undies all day long!" It's true. We ate breakfast, lunch and dinner in our pajamas. And after all the holiday fun, it really was a great way to spend a Saturday.

Today was not a good day for Ryker. He was pretty bent out of shape about having to watch a "stupid girlie princess" movie with his sister. We drug him to Princess and the Frog anyway. He giggled a lot and occasionally laughed out loud. But when the movie was over he sighed an exceedingly loud sigh and exclaimed, "That was even worse than I thought!"

Happy 2010 everybody! I'll post pictures of our holiday antics before the year is out. Promise. I just need to recover from several ulcer-inducing card games, a sore ankle (dance revolution?), an aching shoulder (wii boxing), Buck Buck (don't ask!) and a little family Fear Factor. Caramel onions, anyone? :)

hAppY BirThDAy, GraNdpA sTeVe!

If you haven't visited Santa at the Country Mercantile, you should. They'll let you decorate cookies and ride the train all the way to the North Pole. Very cute. I thought if Emerson saw me sitting on Santa's lap, she'd realize there was no harm in it. Unless of course, you're Santa. You should have seen the look of horror on Santa's face when I suggested it. He clearly was trying to remember his contractual obligations and whether he'd agreed to offer his lap to middle aged women. And because Trevor, I mean Santa, was very uncomfortable with the thought of his former teacher and mother's colleague sitting on his lap, I sat on the arm of his chair instead. ;) Neither Emerson nor Ryker bought it. And so this is the only picture we have of Santa. Regardless, it was nice of Trevor, I mean Santa, to come all this way and give us a candy cane! And dear sweet Vixen is on his last legs. In fact, I'd go so far as to say, he won't make it to Christmas. Poor Vixen!

A Tippett Family Vacation

Cancun, Quintana Roo



The Westin Lagunamar Ocean Resort has three continuous infinity pools. Most days, we arrived shortly after 9:00 and stayed until 4:00ish. Even then, we had to drag the kids away. It was rough. Em couldn't get enough of the water slide and Ryker was pretty impressed with lunch and refreshments at the swim-up pool bar. The final wall of the infinity pool is visible in the photo below and if you look really close, you'll see Ryan and Ryker waiting their turn at the top of the slide.








And as usual, Ryker got a kick out of being thoroughly abused by that Uncle Todd. ;)




We decided to visit Isla Mujeres, per my father's recommendation, and loved it. Everything about this excursion was just our style. Upon disembarking the ferry, we grabbed a map, rented a couple of golf carts and set out to see what we could see. Now I'm the first to admit I'd rather sight see than navigate and am pretty miserable at doing them simultaneously but there were only a couple of minor navigational errors. ;) Isla Mujeres is five miles long and barely 100 yards across in some areas. It is so rich in color. I love color!

We found a beautiful beach complete with free (yes, I said FREE) beach chairs and a convenient grass hut grill with breakfast tacos AND hotcakes on the menu. We enjoyed the tranquil surf of Playa Norte for a while and then meandered on to a turtle sanctuary. We later enjoyed grilled Amberjack tacos, called tikinshik, at a little beach cafe on the opposite end of the island. They were so good! Eat your heart out Lane W. :)

The Mayan ruins of Tulum are beautiful. Dates lifted from these ruins are from as early as 550 AD. Tulum's heyday was much later though, around 1200-1550 AD when Spaniard's set out to conquer the Yucatan Peninsula. The job was made easy due to their bringing of old world diseases which decimated the Mayan population. And so this city, like so many before it, was abandoned to the elements during the mid 1200s. We later enjoyed Xel-ha's Eco-park, which is the largest outdoor aquarium in the world. It offers a myriad of activites and ecological features. We especially enjoyed tubing through a mangrove forest and swimming in a small cenote. Shame on us all for failing to purchase a great picture of Marlene cliff jumping. Rosalyn and I didn't quite make it to the floating bridge on our snorkeling adventure and I'm glad for it. The fish there (Amberjack, I heard) were huge and I can say for certain, I prefer them grilled! My only regret is not taking more pictures at Xel-ha. But it was really wet.






Not twenty feet below the infinity pool at Lagunamar, lie a beautiful stretch of beach. We especially enjoyed watching the sun go down and the waves roll in during early evening. A big thanks to Rosalyn for finding this place!







So much to be thankful for this Thanksgiving and always - Especially for FAITH and HEALTH both of which without we'd be unable to enjoy our many blessings! We hope your Thanksgiving was also wonderful and enriched with family and fellowship.