Christmas Letter 2012

Hello Everyone,

Merry Christmas!!! I am always glad to make myself write these Christmas letters because it makes me take a step back and remember the year and attempt to chronicle it. Someday, I can look back and read though all the things we did that I have forgotten about!!! Hopefully you enjoy reading it as well.

In 2011, we had a wonderful Christmas and New Years, which we were able to celebrate with some extended family. We got together and made our homemade raviolis ahead of time for Christmas dinner. It is something that we have always done as part of my Italian heritage and I’m glad we can continue it with our kids. My Aunt Jeanie and Uncle Jim and their families came over for New Years and we played games and goofed around with cousins until midnight. It was tons of fun and a great way to start off the year!!

Shawn helping out with raviolis

My niece Eliza

Aunt Jeanie, Monica and Mishael

Leftover dough made into homemade pasta!! yume

Eric: Making christmas cookies

Shawn loves helping

Happy New Year! Cheers

My mom and two siblings

We had a special treat in January to go up to Fernie, BC, which is only about an hour and half away from us. It is a beautiful ski town with majestic protruding mountain peaks that seem to go on forever!! We stayed in one of their condos and took turns skiing and snowboarding. We also took a tour of their chocolate factory where they actually make the chocolate right there out of the coco beans. There apparently are very few places that actually make their own chocolate. It was pretty special!

Out to eat on the mountain

John and Gina

Shawn and my Mom

My sister Monica and Eric

My little brother James and I

In March, despite being in a very busy part of tax season, I took a short trip to California by myself to visit my grandparents and attend my cousin’s wedding. It was the first time I had left Shawn overnight which was a little hard for me. But the kids were in very capable hands with Joe and my sister Monica to help when he was at work. It was a really nice break for me and I felt like I got sleep I hadn’t gotten in years!! I was able to have some quality time with my grandparents who are both 90 and my aunt and uncle who I rarely get to see.  It felt so good to get some sunshine and have a break from the gloomy winter skies here. My cousin’s wedding was on the ocean and was gorgeous!! I was able to visit with many relatives that I had never met or seen last as a small child. I love hearing stories about my family’s heritage!

At my cousin's wedding on the ocean.

In June, after Eric got out of school, we took a family road trip with our camper down along the Pacific Northwest coast. My mom and three youngest siblings came along and we had a really special time together. We began by heading to Seattle and Joe’s sister came along for that part of the journey. We camped at a beautiful place near Federal Way right on the water but also in the woods. Joe’s brother Ted and his wife Kellie live fairly close and Kellie made the trek over to hang with out us several times. When Ted and Joe’s sister Tiffany were able to come, we all met up with Joe’s Grandma and Grandpa and has some wonderful family time at a lovely restaurant on the water.

Campfire meditation

Nature's slide

My brother Mark being silly

My brother James, Eric and I.

Mark, James and my Mom

Joe's sisters: Jennica and Tiffany

Joe, Eric and I

Out to eat with the grandparents

My sister Monica and my beautiful Mom

From there we headed to Cascade locks near Portland, OR. On the way down we stopped at Mount Saint Helens and that was really incredible. Eric got to learn about volcanoes and then they gave him a badge and promoted him to Jr. Geologist. He was so thrilled and said “I’m the first one in my family to be a Jr. Geologist”! Cascade Locks is about 45 minutes from Portland and it’s a gorgeous valley right in the Columbia River Gorge and part of the Lewis and Clark trail. We got to visit Klamath Falls (the location of our photo on the Christmas card), which was breathtaking, and made many trips into Portland to shop and try out some great new places to eat. Some of the places included Pok Pok, a very unique Southeast Asian restaurant, Otto’s Sausage where they hand-make all kinds of sausages and hot dogs, perfect for our camping trip, and Arleta Library and Café where we wanted to eat the homemade strawberry jam straight from the jar.

Eric and his Jr. Geologist award he got from Mt. Saint Helens.

Columbia River Gorge

Our Traveling Clan

Klamath Falls

Next we followed the Cascade mountain range down to Bend, Oregon where we got to see my sister Maria, her girls and our friend Sarah. It is beautiful there and we had a great experience floating down the river on air mattresses!! Then we took my two nieces and they went with us the rest of our trip. We took off down to the Oregon coast and Joe, Eric, my two brothers and I had a great time taking ATVs on the sand dunes, after we visited some cool lighthouses. On our way home we got to stop and see my cousin in Portland and then we were homeward bound! We wished we had more time to spend in each spot but did pretty good smashing a lot of sightseeing and visiting into two weeks and ended up with lot of wonderful memories. One of my favorite things was getting glimpses of all the majestic volcanoes: Mt. Rainer, Mt. Hood, Mt. St. Helens and the beautiful ranges in Bend.

Niece Kendra and smokey air!!

One of the beautiful mountains in Bend. 

Niece Lynette.

Mark and his niece Kendra:-)

One of the Oregon lighthouses on the coast.

Crazy fun in the rain.

We had a fun filled rest of the summer: boating and some camping. Joe’s brother Ted and wife Kellie came out from Seattle for a nice visit and the kids had a great time playing with their cousins. We went to a church camp with my mom and siblings and got to raft down the Clark Fork River and have fun at a family talent show. Joe built the boys a swing set and finished his huge tree house project. The boys have a great yard to play in and they really enjoy it. 

Me and my bunny

Eric and his cousin Will

Ted and Kellie

Hanging out on Whitefish Lake

Shawn and his shades.

Joe's treehouse

Joe and his helpers.

In the fall we welcomed a new addition to our family when my sister Gina had her first baby: little Wesley John. My mom is a midwife and Gina had a lovely home birth with all of her sisters there. It was pretty special!

Here is a little bit about each one of us:

Eric finished an awesome year in first grade and after two years of T-ball, played his first year in the Rookie League baseball. He really enjoyed it and we made it a family event every game. We unfortunately had a rainy spring so he didn’t have as many games as usual. He had a great 7^th birthday, a firefighter theme. I got him an authentic fireman suit; we took a tour of the fire station and came back to the house for homemade pizza and a “burning building” cake. Eric loves camping, helping Joe with projects, boating, riding bike, swimming and reading. He has started 2^nd grade and is doing really well. School is one of his favorite things and he actually gets a little sad when he has holiday breaks! He is doing very well in all of his subjects: especially reading, spelling and vocabulary and is even learning some Spanish this year. He is reading about 4th grade level, reads about 125 wpm and has passed all the goals for spelling and reading for the second grade already. He is also in advanced group for math. He’s a very social guy and has a lot of friends at school. We are very proud of him but most of all, are glad he is enjoying learning. Eric is my big helper around the house and with Shawn. He is growing up so fast! Some of his jobs around the house are doing his own laundry, cleaning his bathroom, emptying the dishwasher and taking out the garbage. He loves reading and coloring and I often have to say “Eric, stop reading and go to bed”!

My birthday boy!

My attempt at a burning building cake. 

Fireman Eric

Concentration!!

Frist day of second grade. 

Ready for Cub Scouts

Working together on a project

Shawn has changed a lot this year. While he is still fairly easy going, he started wanting to do everything himself and knowing exactly what he wants! He had a lot of first this year: is totally potty trained, sleeps in a toddler bed, stopped taking naps and had his first trip to dentist. Shawn turned 3 in September and had a Curious George birthday party complete with a yellow hat cake! He has a huge imagination and is very artistic. He describes flowers as “beautiful” and told my friend her house was so “homey”. He talks very well and uses big words that surprise me. Once when he was still getting the potty thing down, I hear him say “I went potty, Mom. Outstanding”!! He always likes to come up with new excuses to get out of bed and his new clever one was “Mom, I’m hungry or something”! The best he could think of I guess. He is a great little helper and gets himself dressed, helps brush his teeth, and puts away the clean silverware. He has been learning some sign language, knows all his sounds to all his letters and recently just started writing some letters!! I am doing preschool with him at home this year and we have been having lots of fun! He is a very happy boy but still has his toddler mood swings as you can see in our main photo.

Shawn and his letter H he drew all by himself

Curious George Piñata

Learning to fish

Joe completed his first year as CEO of Montanasky and has accomplished a lot in the company. He did some big projects that not only affect the company but the community as well including partnering with the medical community for a fiber line to be installed across a large area of Montana. This enables the small rural towns to be able to transmit health results quickly to larger hospitals for consults etc. He also worked most of the winter implementing a wireless path that he designed connecting several large towers on the mountains in Libby, Troy and Kalispell to boost Internet speed. Doing this however turned out to be very dangerous as they had to snowmobile up the mountain, climb the ice and snow encrusted tower and snowmobile back down. During this time, they had no cell service, only emergency transmitters. On one of his trips down mountain, due to low visibility, Joe went off a large embankment going fairly fast and flew about 100 feet, flipping the snowmobile and landing first on his handlebars and then on the hard snow. He ended up in the hospital with a bruised wrist, some internal bleeding, badly bruised liver, kidney and adrenal gland. It was very scary for all of us but he has recovered completely with no apparent permanent damage!! We are very thankful to God for protecting him, as it could’ve been much worse! Joe was just featured for the third time in our local paper and we are so proud of him. Besides work, he has been taking really enjoyed camping and boating this year and now this fall is involved in Eric’s cub scouts den. He also spends a lot of time with my brothers and nephews, working on building projects together.

Helping Eric with cub scouts

Silly man

Joe and Eric on Eric's first roller coaster

I have had a wonderful year, enjoying my kids and family. I especially enjoy volunteering in Eric’s classroom and going on his field trips with him. This year I made a trip down to Libby about once a month to attend/assist in my mom’s monthly classes that she has for her birth center. It was tons of fun especially when I get to teach! 

A bunch of babies my mom delivered at one of her recent classes. 

One of the highlights of my year was throwing a baby shower for my sister, Gina. I made my first belly cake, had mustaches everywhere to go with our “Little Man” theme and we had a great turn out and wonderful weather. I love doing parties!

My mom and all my sisters

 I was very active this summer, taking a walk or bike ride almost every night and it served as mommy alone time as well. I also enjoyed taking the kids with me sometimes and they love it! 

Fishing trip with Joe's brother David...the boys love learning to fish.

Splashing through the water on Echo Lake

My tax business has been doing well and this year I have been doing some continuing education classes and preparing for the federal test they are requiring of all tax preparers. These new requirements are good changes but are requiring quite a lot more time and money for me. But it’s worth it as I really do enjoy doing it and learning more about the subject.

Now as we get ready for Christmas, I am looking out at the snow and my beautiful house and the mountains, I am so thankful for everything we have. The things that are most important to me in this coming year is to spend time with each other and make sure to show love to the people that mean the most to us.

I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas, New Year and wonderful 2013.

Love you all,

Moriah, Joe, Eric and Shawn