Tell You [a] Little Story

We had a great time in Hawaii. It's good to be back with the kids. Tomorrow, it's back to snow and ice, and I must admit, I'm a little nervous about that part. I intended to do a year-end review, but here it is 10:30 on the 31st of December {happy birthday to you, Michelle ! Sorry I forgot to email you today} and it's almost time to look forward and not back. I mean, it's already 2008 in New York and Anderson Cooper is heading home. So, I'm doing a very scaled-back Year in Review with a theme: awesome dining experiences in 07, aka the year of gourmet pizza and chopped salads. Feel free to add your own favorite places in the comments. Here we go. Feast -- Tucson, AZ Grazie -- Scottsdale, AZ Sauce -- Scottsdale, AZ Club 33 -- Disneyland, CA Yasu Sushi Bistro -- Phoenix, AZ Postino -- Phoenix, AZ La Grande Orange -- Phoenix, AZ Zinn Bistro -- Salt Lake City, UT Asia de Cuba -- Scottsdale, AZ Haleiwa Eats -- Haleiwa, HI Zupas -- Draper, UT Gurus -- Provo, UT Pizzeri

hi from oahu. wish you were here, wearing a swimsuit in december!

There was a lovely package waiting for us today after a long day of: emissions (re-retest)/car registration/dollar store sibling gifts for Isaac/doctor appointment/Target pharmacy/gingerbread houses at Aaron's class party. (Also known as: errands.) The gift was a box of The Best Cookies in the world from my favorite older brother and his favorite wife. They are delicious! Thank you, Ryan and Jessica. That was very thoughtful and very appreciated. I'm going to eat several before I mention to the kids that we have them. See you soon. I love getting packages. Anybody else want to send me something?

Every December 14th growing up, my mom would tuck me in and say, "This is the last time you will ever be {my age}." I do that with my own kids now on their birthday eves. It's 8 o'clock on Friday night, December 14th, and I'm tired. I have my pajamas on, I'm going to wash my face, take my contacts out, brush and floss, and curl up in bed with a book that Diana gave me for my birthday: Eat, Pray, Love . Tomorrow I will wake up and Steve and the boys will be very sweet and give me a couple of presents. Ryan will be the first person to email me birthday greetings, although all my siblings will make contact throughout the day. I will accept homemade birthday cards from anyone and everyone. I will spend the gift card that my mother gave me. We will take the kids to see a movie, probably Enchanted. It will be a nice day. Goodbye to thirty-one.

{credit to Brent for the link}

Dear Elliot, Aaron, Isaac and Norah, Your father and I have been married now for over ten years. Isn't that amazing? We love each other very much and we love you! As you know, we decided to leave you with Nana and Papa for a week so that we could go on a trip to celebrate our tenth anniversary. We decided to be adventurous and quirky and to have a computer randomizer pick a location for us to travel to, out of more than a hundred options around the world. Would it be Johannesburg? Mexico City? Vernal? The randomizer very randomly picked the place where everyone goes for their tenth anniversary: Hawaii. So, off to Hawaii we go! Please don't resent us for leaving you on Christmas Day, because tickets were cheaper then (though ridiculously high, still). You know we love to keep the budget happy when we travel! Well, please also don't be mad that Mommy was not very expeditious in arranging for hotels, so by the time I got around to it, everyone else in the free world had alrea

All I want is ONE day of no vomit and very minimal interaction with poop. Thank you.

Carly and Kacy (I'm too lazy to link, but see previous post for Carly, and go to kasm.blogspot.com for Kacy) started a really fun discussion on the book The History of Love . Read it, then come participate. Here.

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