Matt and Suzanne

This Christmas, my brother and his wife Suzanne hosted all of us on Christmas Day, and I stayed with my brother and his wife while I was out there. They did such a wonderful job of making us all feel welcome and cared for! I was proud of them both. This picture is from their wedding day about two years ago. They were married at the San Diego Wild Animal Park and I think they look beautiful and happy in this photo!

One of the strangest things about my little brother is that he actually loves the Chicago Cubs baseball team! Now, he's never lived in Chicago and the team isn't exactly especially victorious (I have to be very careful about what I say or he might disown me) but he's still loyal. The rest of us love the Dodgers, as any true baseball fan should, so I don't know where he got his weird adoration from!

Matt and Suzanne have an annual pass to Sea World; in fact Matt proposed to Suzanne there! They were able to participate in a dolphin experience and really loved it! I did something similar once when I went to Hawaii and it was AMAZING!!! I highly recommend it for anyone who's never tried it before!

Daniel and David

Whenever I go to California, I visit my good friend Annette. She has two adorable sons, the younger son, David is a little over a year, and her older son Daniel turned four in November. They're great fun to play with and I always have a wonderful time with them. Daniel just began pre-school so he's learning a lot of new things and working very hard!

David, is a better climber than a monkey! He can get himself on top of anything and turn on/off Annette's computer, play his own DVD's, and reach for anything off the tall counter above him. He's so cute!!!

Family pictures Christmas 2007

Here are the five of us, cousins...we take a picture together once a year and my grandmother has a wall in her house with each year's picture since the year I (the first grandchild) was born. It's the greatest thing to look at!!! We are (from top to bottom): me, Valerie (the blond, elder daughter who is most artistic), Tiffanie (the brunette, youngest of us all and very athletic), Matt (my brother, the entertainer, and manager of Pechanga Resort and hotel), and Michael (the fireman and middle of his family).

This is ADORABLE Iris! She is a little over a year old, funny, smart, brave, and the apple of all of our eyes! Oh, and she's Valerie and Rick's daughter.

Katie and Michael are expecting their first, and Valerie and Rick are expecting their second child this year so we thought this would be a cute picture!

My dad

Hi!
I hope everyone is having a good new year. I know it's been awhile since I blogged so I wanted to post. I'm especially excited about my dad, so I thought I'd share the story.

A few years ago we had a real scare with my dad's health. During a routine physical, they discovered he was anemic and after tests discovered cancer in his stomach was causing the problem. During surgery, the doctors found that it was more extensive than they originally thought and they had to remove three quarters of his stomach. He had a fabulous doctor though and with follow up and care recovered well. He was fine! He goes in for check ups frequently to make sure it didn't spread and nothing else came up. It was a trying time and my poor dad went through a lot but it all came out fine in the end.

Recently however, his check up revealed anemia again. Of course we were all very frightened. He had more tests and they really are very uncomfortable kinds of tests so I felt bad for poor daddy. His cancer doctor no longer worked with his insurance so it was also scary to have new people working with him.

After a rough month of tests and waiting, he got his test results back this week (just in time for his and my mom's birthday!) and everything was fine. Apparently there was irritation in what was left of his stomach...perhaps from the previous work or whatever else...and that was causing the problem. We were still a little concerned because they biopsied a problem area in his intestines (whatever that means...doctors can be so vague!), but that came out clear as well.

So everything's ok and we're very grateful! My mom and dad are incredible people...inspirational really because they have made such a difference in my life! So we're celebrating them and their life this week!