Zoo Lights - 2008

After the snow had settled down a little, we took the kids - with Mick and Simone - to the "Zoo Lights" at the Oregon Zoo. It was a nice display, some of the animals were around to look at, we rode on the train (not pictured below) - and had a great time. You can see that by the picture of Molly below eating popcorn!

 

 

 

 

Christmas 2008

 

Well, albeit a little later than anticipated, here are some pictures of our Christmas here in the USA in 2008. We had a lovely day, as you can see by the pictures the kids got a good number of gifts, and we even had some snow (check Tara standing out in it to prove it!)

The bottom picture was to show you a combination of the snow out of the window, and Tara and Jessie enjoying watching the Wii being played. 

 

 

Best wishes to everyone for Christmas 2008

For everyone who regularly visits our blog to catch up with what we are doing, we wanted to wish you all a Merry Christmas, and all the best for 2009. It does look like we will have a white Christmas here, which will be our first at our home - so we are looking forward to it. 

What a night - snow, ice, ice then snow again...

Well, over 1 week after it started, the snow and ice is still coming. The amount of snow that came last night was around 7 inches (depending on the news service, and where you measured it). When we went out of the house today, we found that there was a layer of around 1/8th of an inch of ice on top of the snow. 

Cynfor, Jessie and myself wandered out for a walk (very crunchy) - looking around the area for how things had survived the night with the cold. (It got to a low of around -6C) 

This afternoon it started raining again (what they call ice rain - which is basically small water drops that have turned to ice before they hit the ground.) It did not take long before it started snowing again. We look to have had approximately another inch, and they are predicting more again tonight and tomorrow. 

Tara's work have closed for tomorrow due to the conditions. Lucky for Jessie, Cynfor and myself - we are already on our holidays. So looks like another family day at home. 

There are more pictures that we have added to the album from the note we posted yesterday. I have put a couple of pictures here of Cynfor and Jessie and their ice. 

 

And the snow continues...

Well, what a week it has been. The kids have missed school all week, as they were closed, the office closed early on Wednesday due to the weather - and today the snow has been here ALL DAY and is still here (at 8.20pm the time I am writing this.)

It is amazing to see, and it does look beautiful - BUT you get a little bored of it, and it shows you only how much TV you can watch, and other things to do inside the house. It is funny, it is like you hate being caught in the house when you must be, only keen to get out - but otherwise (when you are not caught) you want to stay!

Anyhow, check out our pictures. Our only want is to have the snow stay until Christmas, which is when it is more than welcome to start heading away. We are expecting frozen rain after mid-night tonight (not quite sure what that is, but it will be interesting) - then it is supposed to start getting warmer.

First snow for Winter 2008

UPDATE: More pictures from later in the day. The wind is picking up - our outdoor Christmas tree light fell over in the wind. The wind has forced us to take Santa off the door, as he was being blown all over the place. See our pictures below.

Today is the first day of the 2008 Winter where we have seen snow at home. If this keeps up maybe (just maybe) we could have some white stuff on Xmas!

Anyhow, it is just a light dusting for now, they say there is more to come, but here is a picture of Jessie enjoying her time standing outside the house. It is still coming down albeit lightly, so if there is more, we will post more pictures.

Check out our dance!

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Our present to ourselves...

Tara and I decided to pool the money we received from family together with our own money to buy for ourselves a new computer. We had used a loaned one from work previously in the kitchen, which was very convenient, so we decided to get another laptop to replace it. 

Below are the pictures of the "unboxing" - so you can see what it looked like when it came out of the box. It is nice to have the computer back in the kitchen again, so we can talk to family and friends through Skype, as well as do updates to our blog easily. 

Trip to Bald Peak

It was a nice day today, so we decided to head out for a drive to a park called "Bald Peak" - the photograph above is actually about five photographs put together to make one panorama. The view was very nice from the park. Unfortunately we did not get a chance to take a picture from the other side, which was also an amazing view of Mount Hood and Mount Saint Helens.

After we finished at the park, we headed down to watch Madagascar II at the cinema. Nice day out and about relaxing.

Kids versus Parents!

This year Cynfor's soccer team parents felt it would be worth the effort to have a game with the kids. Although the game was all in fun, I think the parents were worse for wear afterwards. One of the parents had been injured on the Monday night trial game, so Friday's game was a couple of parents short.

I attempted to get out, although the other parents did most of the work, we all had a great time. I think if the team stays together - it may become a regular event!

Christmas 2008 House Lights

So, now that Thanksgiving 2008 is over, we have decorated the house for Christmas, which is just around the corner. Below are some pictures of the house after this years effort. We have added a couple of items to the group this year, it does help when the houses are lit up for the spirit.

Cynfor's Soccer Final

What is there to say, other than we watched Cynfor and his team win their tournament. It was amazing to watch. The kids played extremely well, and applied pressure through the whole game. It was a fun filled weekend, and we are all proud of what all the kids did.


Below are some pictures of the day - started cold and foggy, but when the sun came out, turned out to be a lovely morning.


All those early weekend wakeups are all worth it when your team wins!

Getting ready for Halloween

Only two weeks left until Halloween, so we figured it was time for us to ensure that we got into the swing. We already had our pumpkins sitting near the front door, so it was time to get some spooky spiders webs up and happening, just to scare off those who want to trick or treat!

Anyhow - here is our albeit simple attempt at putting up some spiders webs. Cynfor appears to be scared ...