Santa gives books? "Pooh!" says 3-year old

Saw this clip today - HILARIOUS! Just wanted to share. When things settle down I'll be posting about the wedding, the 5 - yes 5 major things that broke this week, having the whole family here, and Christmas. But that will all have to wait for the house to clear out - until then Merry Christmas!

It's the BIG birthday - Landon is 16 today!

It's hard to believe but our youngest is now officially 16! We celebrated with a family party a few days ago - because teenagers have such busy schedules that school, Basketball practice, and the Football game today all had him tied up from 6 am - 10 pm. So for our family party we had his favorite meal and then opened a few gifts -

Landon was pretty excited about his Dad taking him to a Monday night 49'ers game.

Then the 5 of us (John, me, Landon, Tanner & Josie) went to see this movie at the Lesher theatre for his birthday party (this is an easy kid)

It's hard to believe we've gone from this:

to this

to this . . .

to this . . .

Landon's always been the baby of the family -

Now he is taller than all of his sisters, his Mom & Dad, and closing in fast on his older brother.

He's always been loved and adored by his parents and his siblings because he's always been

so cute and so sweet. What's not to love?

Other facts about Landon that make him so extraordinary . . . .

He has ALWAYS been pretty much a happy easy going kid. The teen age years didn't even mess that up like I was afraid they might. He's still happy, pleasant, and easy to get along with. I told you this is an extraordinary guy.

He's got a funny sense of humor. Pretty quiet - but he takes everything in and then makes observations and comes up with some hilarious insights on what's going on. He cracks us up.

(Of course his Napoleon Dynamite impersonation is one of my favorites)

He is so obedient - when you say take out the trash please - he just gets up and takes out the trash. That may seem like a little thing - but he is like that with everything. He never kicks back or tries to get out of things - he just does what we ask. Another our-of character thing for a teenager that I truly appreciate about Landon.

He is the most appreciative kid ever. I can't count how may times he said Thank You for helping him with his Eagle Project. But a couple of days ago he asked me if I would make him some chocolate chip cookie dough. I did - and then he thanked me - and thanked me again - and again. I counted - he thanked me 6 separate times over the course of the afternoon and evening. He's been like this since he was little - but I still can't get over it. It's amazing to me every time that he is good about expressing his appreciation. I'll make cookie dough for him any time!

He's always chose great friends - pretty smart of him :)

He's a great uncle - his nieces and nephews adore him.

See what I mean . . .

You're the BEST Landon. We love you!!!! Happy 16th Birthday :)

Our Double Date . . .

It's sort of a family tradition to take out our children and their fiancee's for a special double date in order to get to know them better. We had a lot more time with Josie then we've had with any of our future son-in-laws that lived out of state but we thought it was a great tradition to keep going anyway - so it was more of a celebration of their engagement than a get-to-know-you. So Saturday afternoon we headed out.

We decided to take them to see Beach Blanket Babylon in San Francisco.

We wanted to do something with them they had never done before. The show - which is a musical spoof on the days current events didn't disappoint - it was hilarious.

The costumes and songs were outrageously funny.

and guess where we sat? On the front row! I've never sat on the front row of anything before - it was cool.

And of course they are famous for their unbelievably big hats. It was great fun!

Then after the show we went and had a memorable dinner at Boulevard - we got the best table in the house - and they brought out Tanner and Josie's desserts with little Congratulations signs on them - made out of chocolate of course.

Don't they make a cute couple! We're so happy for both of them.

Welcome to the family Josie :)

I love a view!

I LOVE a view . . . .

This was our view on Friday afternoon and Saturday. We went into San Francisco to celebrate our anniversary. John has a golf buddy that has offered for years to let him come stay at his condo in San Francisco since he flies home on the weekend.

This is the view from his place. AWESOME! I could have just stared out the window all weekend. We almost did. We relaxed, walked, talked, read and stared out at the bay a lot.

the morning fog . . .

I entertained the fantasy of retiring in a high rise in San Francisco.

Then I imagined living the gypsy life and living in a cool city for a year and then moving to the next cool city for the next year . . . I figure our kids and grandkids would come to visit us if we always lived somewhere cool. What do you think?

It was nice to have 24 hrs of total down time - no TV (even though there was one), lots of walking, talking, and being spoiled at a really great greek restaurant just across the street from where we stayed.

A very memorable 31st anniversary! Thanks John.

The romance continues . . .

I got these flowers delivered to me today. Big surprise! And seriously the biggest bouquet I've ever seen. They are gorgeous - the pictures don't do it justice at all.

5 white roses to represent our 5 children, 6 yellow roses to represent our 6 grandchildren.

31 roses in all to represent 31 years of marriage.

Life is good! Especially when you're married to an incredibly thoughtful, generous and romantic guy. It's a very Happy Anniversary :) Thanks John - I love you!

The Mississippi River

Paul arranged for us to take a little scenic cruise down the Mississippi River. We were right at the mouth of where the river starts - so it was smaller than I would have imagined - bt very pretty and we couldn't have gotten any luckier for great weather.

The river along downtown Minneapolis -

We had to go thru the locks to go up the river. We dropped down about 20 feet or so. It was amazing that they could control all that water - here's how it looked as we just started to go down.

Paul, Summer, Alex and Avery

What a wonderful day!

Mall of America Rides

We spent Saturday at the Mall of America where there is a big amusement park in the middle of the mall. Noah was tall enough to go on all the fast scary rides - and he did them all! He loved every minute of it.

Alex went with us girls to do the kiddie rides. She was so funny on them. Wish you could have seen her on this mini drop zone ride - BIG EYES as it lifted her up and then laughing hysterically as it dropped her down - repeated 5 times. Hilarious!

She loved the bumper cars too.

Look at her squeal on the log ride with her Mom.

This was just the fun we had in the morning - I'll tell you more about the afternoon in another post.