Happy New Year!!

Well we just had a wonderful Christmas and New Year. For New Years Eve, I had to work (bummer), but when I got off, Andy, Steve, and Louise were there to pick me up and we headed off to Tory and Suni's for the night. We watched Oscar play around with his socks and watched Nana hold little Spencer. Aren't Grandma's always the biggest baby hogs? Ha ha! We were all hungry so we decided to order in some Chinese instead of trying to face the crowds of busy Seattle. After dinner, we played Monopoly. It ruled!! Ha ha! No one had played it in such a long time (because we all know how long it can take...) But this time for some reason it didn't take very long...probably because Andy and I kicked butt and wiped everybody out. Ha ha! It was awesome. A & K all the way!! We make such a great team. :) We got home at about 11:30 and stayed up to watch the fireworks shoot off of the Space Needle. That was pretty cool since I am not used to seeing many fireworks on New Years Eve. Maybe one year we can actually go down to the Seattle Center and watch them in person...I know Andy would love that...

And then of course, I had my birthday. For some reason it didn't feel like my birthday, and I thought it was just going to be a regular old day. But my sweet husband made is so special for me. Well, I should back up. Andy really wanted a Play Station 3 and wasn't sure how he could get it for his birthday, so I told the parents to just combine mine and Andy's birthday's. So on Thursday night, they gave that to us. Thank You!! Andy has enjoyed it a ton, and I, well, I enjoy watching Blu-ray. :) So then on Thursday morning, I had received a package from the family so I opened it before work and it was filled with wonderful things, the number one thing being a beautiful, hand-made scarf from my brother Rich. I love it!! Thank You, Rich, again!! He is so amazing! I have the best family, and I miss them so much! So I went to work, and the girls had decorated my desk with some of my favorite things. Cinderella birthday banner, Garden Salsa Sun Chips, White Cheddar Cheez-it's, and beautiful pink lily's. It was so cute! At first I thought it was just a coincidence, but I guess that they emailed Andy and he gave them a whole list of my favorite things! I was so impressed. He's the best. So after that, I got a phone call from reception before lunch saying that my husband is here! What a wonderful surprise. He brought me single rose in a beautiful vase, a funny card, and stayed and visited for a while. It just made my day!

I told Andy that I just wanted us to go out on my birthday, because it seems like that hasn't happened for a while (not complaining, but you all know what I mean, couples need their alone time). So we went to Old Spaghetti Factory and then he took me shopping for a new pair of jeans (that's all I wanted for my present, well and to spend time with him, of course), but we had a lot of fun together. And he was even happy while waiting for me to try on 50 pairs of jeans. :) So we got home and the parents were there waiting with a beautiful cake. They didn't sing Happy Birthday, they must've been too excited for the cake. So we just went straight to eating the cupcakes (the cake was too pretty to cut right away).





So overall, it was a wonderful birthday. Nothing I expected at all!! Everybody was so sweet and wonderful. Thank you so much for all of the birthday wishes! I love you all and can't wait until I can see you again! Oh and I almost forgot... I was telling Mom how Andy has been growing out his beard since Thanksgiving, and she really wanted to see it, so here you go Mama. I hope you can tell how beastly it is. Love you!!