2014 Year in review

Inspired by Spike and because it's fun to revisit our year, this is our year in review. It was a year of big changes for our family.

January: This month was spent having a lot of fun around San Diego. There were hikes, zoo visits, playing at the playground and just having fun, enjoying the San Diego (non) winter. We sure love San Diego.

February: This month's highlight was a visit by Papa & Kari. We had a lot of fun with them. The kids all got to go horseback riding for their first time with them - Aaron included! We golfed, went to the Wild Animal Park, had great food and enjoyed having them here.

March: This was an awesome month. First, Aaron turned 2. While we determined in February that we were going to be moving to Raleigh, North Carolina this summer, we decided that we had to make the most of our remaining time in California. During the kids' spring break at the end of March / beginning of April, we decided to drive up the coast to San Francisco and enjoy California. We started in San Diego and made stops in Paso Robles, Cayucos, Monterey, San Francisco and Napa. On the way home, the kids and I (Jeff flew home after a few extra days in SF with friends) stopped in Modesto and Irvine. This drive along the coast only reinforced just how much I love living in California. It is a gorgeous state and the coast is amazing. It just feels like home for me. 

April: Continuing our farewell to the west coast tour, Jeff and I celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary in Maui, where we spent our honeymoon. Grandma came to town to watch the kids and visit with us. We played hookie from school after we returned to have a beach day with Grandma as well. 

May: Ian & Judy visited us from Australia; Josh, Stephanie, Ben & David stopped by San Diego to visit us while they were on our coast visiting their grandparents. Mike, Mary, Mason & Max also visited us for a Cubs game against the Padres. Aaron and Alice spent loads of time together as well. And we kicked off summer early with a lot of beach days spent boogie boarding and surfing with friends.

June: Kyle and Emily finished 2nd grade, we went to Chicago, Jeff and I visited Raleigh, Aaron spent a lot of time with Alice and Kyle took 2nd place in his Little Mo tennis tournament.

July: Kyle and Emily turned 8 this month. We have all been soaking in our last bits of San Diego as our move nears. We got an offer on our house at the end of the month, scheduling our move for August. We went ice skating, go-karting, to the beach, biking, took the trolley downtown, went to Seaport Village and just had a great time with those that we love here in San Diego - Haiden, Simon, Alice and their families. 

August: This was our last month in San Diego. It was hectic and hard. There was a lot to get done before moving, but we had a lot of experiences left to have in San Diego. And we got to spend time with our friends who had become family to us. 

September: We were officially in Raleigh. Jeff and I had birthdays. Moving was miserable. It was hot and humid. We lived in a hotel for 2 weeks. We couldn't get the kids into a good school so we rented a tiny apartment for 4 weeks before our house was ready. We were all desperately missing the familiarity of San Diego and being surrounded by our friends and routines. But we found some rainbows to lift us up from the pits that we were in: we made fast friends with a family that Kari knew from Illinois who had just moved to NC, we found the Marbles Children's Museum and some fun parks and we went to a Duke football game. And most of all, we were all together.

October: We moved into our new house and our stuff arrived from San Diego. Kyle played tennis, Emily started gymnastics, Aaron played marbles and we all celebrated Halloween with our new neighbors.

November: Aaron started a preschool program at Marbles, Kyle played and won 2 tennis tournaments, we drove home to the midwest for Thanksgiving and the kids were off school for most of the month.

 

December: This month should be about the holidays, but instead it was more about our drive home from Chicago. Kyle got super sick and landed himself in hospitals in 3 states - Ohio ER, West Virginia admitted for 3 days and North Carolina ER. Thankfully, he tested negative for some potentially really awful diagnoses and recovered after about a week. On the bright side of the month, Papa & Kari came to visit us, and we had a wonderful first holiday season in our new house. 

 

2013 year in review

Back by popular demand (read: Jeff reminded me how much he liked this post last year and asked for it for 2013) is the 2013 year in review. Here it goes!

January: It was a busy start to the new year. Kyle and Emily were 6.5 years old and Aaron 9 months old. Kyle and Emily played basketball on the same team and had fun with it. Kyle got his yellow belt in karate and then started playing even more tennis with full time competitive tennis program. Emily did a lot of gymnastics and conquered the "shooting star". Aaron started to stand up and use his baby walker to move around. He might have said his first word too, "ball". I think the highlight of the month was going to Jamaica with Jeff's family. It was a nice get-away. 

February: Many more milestone developments for Aaron this month. He got into many more things, ate his first Lucha Libre burrito, started standing on his own, got his first real haircut at the military barber and was very cute with his brother and sister. Kyle and Emily finished their basketball season and started baseball and softball. For President's weekend (aka ski weekend in southern CA), we went to LA to see the space shuttle Endeavor and the Ronald Reagan museum. 

March: Aaron turned 1 this month! We celebrated by going skiing. Yes, I know, it was more a gift for the rest of the family than Aaron, but he enjoyed his time with Mason in Park City. Jon visited us for Easter and we had a great time with him between hiking, brunch and beach time. 

April: Baseball and softball were in full swing. Aaron started walking. Karen, Pete & Ethan came for a visit. We went to Arizona during spring break to visit Grandma Edith. Camelback was closed so we hiked a new mountain on an insanely hot day.

 

May: More baseball, softball and hiking. Emily earned her yellow belt in karate. Aaron learned how to get himself water from the fridge. 

June: Emil got her ears pierced!! Kyle & Emily finished first grade, we attended Fairy Fest and Aaron enjoyed some Mommy & Daddy time while Kyle & Emily had activities.

July: Summer fun was in full swing. We hit the driving range, played tennis, did gymnastics, went to Boomers, played games with Tony Hawk, went hiking and celebrated Kyle & Emily's 7th birthday! And Kyle & Emily learned to boogie board, 

August: More summer fun at the beach, trampoline park jumping, a visit up to Anaheim to see Ben, David, Josh & Stephanie at Stephanie's parent's house, and a long trip to Chicago to celebrate my mom's 65th birthday, retirement, moving and new house and see family. 

September: Kyle & Emily started 2nd grade, Jeff & I had our birthdays and Kyle played in a tennis tournament where he received an amazing compliment from a teammate (he told Kyle that he thought he could win Wimbledon some day). 

October: Kyle played a lot more tennis, we took surfing lessons and dressed up as wizards (Dumbledore, McGonangal, Harry Potter, Hermione & Hedwig) for Halloween.

November: We had amazing times surfing more, Kyle played even more tennis and we went to Chicago for Thanksgiving. 

December: We had a busy holiday season. We picked out a real tree (at Home Depot), I went skiing with Spike in Mammoth, Aaron spent the day with his girlfriend, Emily started swim lessons, Kyle played a lot of tennis, the kids all had a sleepover at Simon's and we enjoyed the holidays together.