Super Nova

Nova - Merry Christmas 2010

She's a great puppy.  Sleeps through the night, does most of her business outside, almost never barks, is very playful and the kids love her.

Merry Christmas

So far we have had a wonderful holiday season.  Grandma, Kevin, Megan, Makayla, and Danniqa came for a visit and we had a lot of fun.  It is sure nice to be able to have family around for Christmas.  We went to Heritage Park for the "Once Upon a Christmas", where we went for a wagon ride, made crafts, visited the shops and houses, saw the model train sets, and ate cinnamon buns and hot chocolate.  It was cold but we had a good time!

 

 

 

 

 

 

On Sunday, we went to church for a very nice Christmas program (one of my very favorite Sundays of the year) and then that evening, Christmas arrived early at the Sorenson home in the way of a puppy!  The kids were so excited and love her to pieces.  She is an eight and a half week old beagle named Nova with a very good temperment and she has quickly made herself a part of the family.

 

 

The rest of the week with the cousins consisted of games, playing, cookie decorating, swimming at the wave pool, live Nativity pagent at Heritage Park and gift exchange among the cousins.

 

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Christmas Eve, we had diner with Brad family at our house, a nice roast beef diner and then Christmas morning came.  Mexico and the puppy were supposed to be Christmas but some how, the kid still all ended up with lots of presents (oops, my fault).  It was a great Christmas and we look forward to a very happy and exciting new year!

 

 

Black Belts

It's been a lot of hard work, perseverance, dedication, and a long time coming.  On Saturday, both Billy and Adam achieved their black belts in tae kwon do and they were both thrilled.  What an accomplishment!!  We are so proud of you Billy and Adam!

Getting ready to test

Adam doing one of his patterns

Billy doing one of his patterns

Adam preparing to break his board

Billy getting ready to break his board

He did it

So did Adam

Flying side kick to break the board

Look at that height and distance

Master James Yu, Billy, Adam and Grand Master Yu

Day Six

Today we went to Tulum to take a tour and check out the ruins.  It was actually quite interesting.  We asked for a Mormon guide and he did a really good job.  His name was Limhi and he gave each of the kids a necklace with the depiction of the tree of life on it - one to Billy for saying the first article of faith and one to each of the others cause, well, they really wanted one.  It was really hot that day but very beautiful.



Limhi, our guide





The Tree of Life

Our family

Limhi borrowed a cigarette from someone to show us how they made different colors with the flowers...

...and then fed the flower to this guy

 

 

The Temple - kind of reminds me of the Alberta temple

 

 

 

Waiting at the bus stop

Waiting at the bus stop

That night we ate at the Mexican restaurant and then they had a Caribbean show in the theater.

I may add more pictures later but for now I need to move on or I'll get so far behind

 

 

 

Time to finish our Mexico Trip

So I got to day four and had a bit of a lag so I decided today was the day I was going to finish it off.  I could go out in the -23 (feels like -31) weather shopping for some necessities, but I'd much rather look at my Mexico pictures.  They make me feel warmer.  The necessities can wait.

On the Wednesday, we just hung around the resort as Amy was still recovering from not feeling very well.  But by mid afternoon, she was fine and so we went out to eat and then the show that night at the hotel was an Elvis impersonator.  He was actually pretty good but I didn't care for his act between numbers considering there were children in the audience.

 

Dreams Puerto Aventuras

I thought I would just do a post with some of the pictures I took of our resort, the flowers, the trees and the ocean.  I took quite a few so we could remember what it was like.  Here's just a few:

View from our room on the ground floor



 

Our room on the third floor

Our room on the third floor

Looking at the bathroom - the couch folds out to a bed where the girls slept

View from our room

Hurricane on the horizon

The waves didn't get too much bigger than this

El Patio Restaurant - the Mexican restaurant

Inside El Patio Restaurant

Inside El Patio Restaurant

The Seaside Grill

Portofino Restaurant - the Italian/Mediterranean restaurant

The hotel from the beach

The wedding gazabo

The World Cafe - the buffet restaurant and above it was the Sushi Bar

Our room is the window just above the trees above the brown door in the middle

The pool and the hot tub off to the left

A meeting area

The front lobby

In the front lobby

The adult only side

The adult only side - swim up bar

The Oceana restaurant on the left

Our room on the first floor

Toward the marina