The main event over the holidays: Sam's Homecoming

 The Airport Welcome
(Thanks to Ashley for taking all these pictures for us!)

And Sam and Anson got to meet for the first time - yay!

Temple Trip followed by ice-cream at Fenton's

Celebrating with Chibas!

Christmas and New Year's Eve in pictures...

The kids weren't short of attention or love this holiday. :)

New Year's Eve hair cut!

Making & eating Japanese food with my siblings is one of my favorite things to do.  This night:  Gyoza and Spicy Tuna rolls.

This is how we celebrated New Year's Eve.

Actually, THIS is how we celebrated.  Food.  Board games.  Family.

Getting ready for Christmas...

"Dear Santa  My Little Pet Shop"

Everything under Christmas tree lights is more magical.

Jiichan made mochi with some Japanese clients and brought us some.  We had to watch Claire - she always starts eating these before the rest of us can get to them...

Claire doesn't take naps everyday, but this one will stay in my memory for a long time.

My cousin Amanda helped us decorate sugar cookies to give to neighbors & friends.  Guess who decorated the abominable snowman...

Claire wanted to make reindeer candy canes to give to her class.  We used hot glue.  She got her first glue-gun "burn".

Once a year I get to dress up for the PwC holiday party.

The Christmas party at Church had lots of music performances by various groups.  Anson liked conducting all of them from his seat.

Dress up was optional for the party.  We dressed up, of course!

Before another holiday sing-a-long we found a free piano.

PwC's Santa was adorable and so great with the kids.  He even told Claire which room and which shelf at his workshop in the North Pole held her toy.  Too bad Anson has such separation anxiety right now...

Thanksgiving 2011

Sorry I don't have time to write about everything, but at least the pictures are up!

To prepare for the holiday we had a Family Home Evening lesson on gratitude based on "For the Strength of Youth", created a Thankful Tree, and had persimmon bars for dessert.

This is how I make pie crusts: roll between plastic wrap, keep the wrap folded in, unfold inside the pan, then remove the wrap.

Sometimes she's actually helpful when she helps!

Claire dressed herself in unparelled style for Thanksgiving dinner.

And, of course, here's our Thanksgiving Menu:

Ham, because some people don't like turkey.

Potatoes from Finland, we call them "Cinnamon Potatoes".  Serious yummy.

Sweet Potatoes with pecans and sage

Every festive meal at Mom's has deviled eggs.

Hawaiian sweet bread

Our low-key dinner party (well, maybe the kids were a little more rowdy...).