R&BKing

We had to make sure the tree and house were secured while visiting family for Christmas. Ryan called out to  his soldiers. Can you spot the one soldier in the tree? Do you see the soldier protecting baby Jesus in our manger? p.s. there were lots more than these 4!

We're going on a Christmas Tree Hunt, going to cut down a big one! Must jump over the stream. Has to be Blue Spruce. Search the fields. Mark the ones you like. Find the perfect tree. Drag it down the hill and get it wrapped. Strap the tree to the roof. And enjoy time with the family!

We drove over 3,000 miles and are FINALLY in New York. We had a bit of a slow start, the moving truck broke down before we even left Fort Irwin. We drove through 13 states--California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Tennessee, North Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania and New York. Here's a few highlights of our trip: 1. Stopping to see Jared, Etta, Olive & Curtiss. Of course we took a trip to the Children's Museum. 2. Visiting Matt & Vicki in Tivoli and discovering the old toys (Ryan still has his building skills). 3. Going to the Boston Temple. 4. Getting out the winter coats and having to shovel snow. 5. Meeting out newest nephew, Robert (Ryan has a nickname for him..."fire head"). 6. Making a nativity set for Christmas Eve.

In 7 days we'll begin our journey across the country.  We've decided to take the southern route. We'll be going through Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Tennessee, with stops in North Carolina and Virginia, then north all the way to New York. 

Do you remember the songs you sang when you were little? Ryan and I had a conversation about this the other day.  Ben had a great song, "Trees are trees, people are people."  My song was "Roller skating, ah ah". Ryan's song was "In that house? Oh no!"

Since Fort Irwin is intensely boring and we're now counting down our days till our move, we have been occupying hours of our time solving crimes with Adrian Monk. We've been learning a lot from him, I am now tempted to touch light poles and Ryan fixes my socks to make sure they're even. We're almost to the last season, perfect timing because we only have a week and a half left here.

Our Halloween celebrating began with carving the pumpkin. We then waited for trick or treaters. We waited all night and still not one came. Ryan said, "we must live in the bad part of town!" Next was the branch Halloween party. You can image how a large number of primary kids loaded up on candy acted!  We contributed to the cupcake walk with our tombstones. Of course it wouldn't be Halloween without dressing up.  We were the Kings!