A Silent White Christmas

We had a very quiet Christmas this year. Besides hosting a couple of homestay students on Christmas Eve and Day, we just ate and ate and ate, and I didn't even have to cook! On Christmas Eve, my mom hosted. While on Christmas Day, Erika and Dan hosted in Tsawwassen. To top off the much-needed relaxing time spent with Ray and K & T, we had a white Christmas which was great until we had to drive!

From our family to yours, we hope you had a wonderful Christmas!

Here's our Japanese homestay students:

Here's Ray and I chowing down my mom's homecooked meal:

Here's four generations of the Cruz clan:

Here we are in Tsawwassen:

This was the view from our house after the snow storm:

Here's our house on Christmas Day. It snowed during Christmas Eve. Check out our snow bank. It was twice Karch's height!

Until next year!

Happy Birthday to all the December Birthday Celebrants!

Julia, Matthew, Tita Christie, Nathalie, Mike, and Leslie, we hope you all enjoyed your birthdays!

xoxo RJKT

Let the Christmas celebrations begin...

Since I have self-diagnosed myself with cabin fever (it's snowing yet again here!), I might as well reminisce on the times this month when we were able to actuallty go out and celebrate good times with wonderful friends. Here are some pictures from this holiday season's festive get-togethers:

Here we are at High Tea with the Unicorns (my high school friends; we were Sweet Valley High inspired, so we decided to call ourselves that in high school!)

We had Christmas dinner at a Mexican Restaurant; here's Senorito Karchy.

Here's T waiting for our annual Christmas dinner with Jeff, Mon, Lor, and Mike. (You guys should all be proud-Ray and I prepared a turkey dinner right after my last day of work. But remind me not to do that again!):

Here we are with Jeff, Mon, Lor, and Mike:

Here we are at the Motovaselans:

The Dadas:

The Mamas:

And our get-together at the Rivases (Here I am with the hostess, Charina, and Tre, our friend Sandra's adorable son.):

Merry Christmas Eve, everyone!

Snowed In

At last, Christmas vacation has officially started, and we're snowed in. This means that it's time to catch up on blogging, reading (The Time Traveler's Wife) , and maybe even folding laundry and wrapping gifts!

So here are some pictures and videos of our week in the snow:

Here's Karch making a snow angel:

Here's my mom had to take a snow day this week because of the snow:

Tessa is scared of the snow since it kept landing on her eyelashes:

Meanwhile, her big brother, K, loves the snow:

Here's the only thing the kids and I can do: walk to my mom's place:

And today, we have blizzard-like conditions (at least it feels like it), so while K was out with Ray shoveling and playing,

T was staying in and dancing to the music!

Thank goodness, Ray starts work late. At least, he might be able to drive me around tomorrow, so we can do some last minute shopping and so we can get out of the house.

4th picture--3D glasses required

Okay, I'm not really sure if I understand this correctly. I was tagged by my cousin, Hoolie, to put the 4th picture in my 4th picture folder in my computer, so here it is my extremely out of the blue blog picture--A very blurry picture of my mom and Karch during Tessa's baptism. Once again, I don't know many people that blog. So, I'm afraid I won't be tagging anyone.

K & T Go to the Dentist

Karch and Tessa (just as support for her brother) went to the dentist with me while I had my appointment this week. It is sad to say that Karch has cavities and will now need to see a Pediatric Dentist to get an x-ray of what's going on in that mouth of his and do restorative work. I just made an appointment for the Pediatric Dentist right before Christmas. Poor Karchy...

Prelude to Christmas

Ray got his dream Christmas tree from his family home this past week, and we decided to put it up right on/after Erika's birthday (according to Bueno tradition). And now we decided to have our own tradition to have K & T put up the star on top of the tree.

Here they are in action:

A Flashback from 2006: Here's K and I putting up the star. I would have posted a picture of us putting up the star last year, but I guess we were too busy with K & T and Ray's many jobs!

While the parents are away, the kids will play...

My mom kindly took the K & T for the day (which is a first, so we're all proud of her!), so Ray and I could go Thanksgiving shopping across the border on our own. It has been so long since Ray and I were able to shop on our own that it was a wonderful treat for us, but not so good for our pockets. It is crazy how much we can spend without the kids rushing us to just get our shopping done! Oh well, it was our first shopping date in a long while, so I guess it was all worth it. 24 days til' Christmas, and we're almost done shopping!


K & T relaxing in the morning:



My mom's makeshift gate:



Tessa making a mess eating spaghetti: