Epcot

At Epcot now they have added a whole interactive game for kids with a 'Kim Possible' theme to make the countries more kid-friendly. Actually it's very cool - there's a whole adventure with clues, and the kids can make robots appear and make water flow and all kinds of stuff using a cell phone! Maddy thought it was OK and Mike loved it :).

Here's me and Maddy in "England"...
 

Mike getting romantic in Italy...

Me and Maddy in China...

Mike and Maddy at the ball...

Me and Mike!

Waiting for the fireworks...

Me and Maddy...

Long Run at the Ranch

Great 5K yesterday! Mike won a trophy for 3rd in his category (23:14) and I improved my October time by 8 mins! (31:51)

Before.... The proof...

After and sweaty...

Thanksgiving, Miley, Christmas and more!

It's been another crazy busy holiday season! We started out the season with a wonderful Thanksgiving at Jen and Rich's. Here are Maddy, Mya, Eileen and Nana...


Me and Mike...

At the beginning of December we took Maddy to see Miley Cyrus. It was a great show but our ears were ringing for days from all of the screaming girls! Here's Miley getting a little racy for our liking...

Eileen had her bridal shower in December. Here she is wearing the hat made from gift decorations. She said she "felt like a bee keeper" :)

Mya and Maddy had a special night together since Mya was going to New York for Christmas. Here are the girls showing off some of their new gifts...

The next day we went to Liz and Matt's for our family Christmas party. The girls were so excited to get to play with Shamus for the day!

After a threatened airline strike and concerns over weather, Gail still managed to arrive on Christmas Eve just as planned after all! We went to PF Changs for evening dinner and opened gifts in the morning. Here's Cookie Early with her new Christmas "cake" and pen. She was so nervous about leaving her cage she stuffed her cheeks with tons of nuts before venturing out!

After the gifts and a run, Mike grilled seafood and we ate our Christmas dinner in the lanai.

I was able to get a hold of traditional English Christmas crackers with rubbish toys, silly hats, lame jokes and all!

Gail and I had a great time over the next week shopping, crafting, going to the gymn, visiting Big Cat Rescue, the Hard Rock casino, the Dallas Bull(!), doing really rubbish fireworks on New Year's, going to see Avatar 3D(which was awesome) and eating out. We finished her busy trip with a relaxing lunch in the meditation garden at the temple. Here's Gail and Maddy at the mall...

It poured with rain on New Year's Day when we went to Big Cat Rescue. Since tigers love the rain apparently, we were actually able get to see lots more activity than usual! We were also the only people there and got our very own private tour. It was amazing! Here's TJ the tiger who is over 6 feet tall when he stands on his hind legs...

We got to see the white tiger and lion (Zabu and Cameron) who were rescued from a zoo and still live together since they were raised together from birth.

By the end of the tour the rain had stopped so the other cats were out and about too. We couldn't have gotten any luckier!

2009 has been one of the happiest years of our lives! We have been very lucky and hope to have another wonderful year in 2010. Happy New Year to all of our wonderful friends and family - thank you all for being in our lives:)

Happy Halloween!

It was the hottest Halloween on record yesterday so we have bags of melted candy but we still had a great time! Maddy and Mya looked perfect in their costumes, Mike did a fine job on his pumpkin seeds, and I was very proud of my pumpkin carving and decorating...Happy Halloween!

Clare's Race

I did my first 5K! It was about 80 degrees so it nearly killed me but it's done. One more thing crossed off the list for 2009! Here's me looking and feeling like hell on the way home...