The Holiday's

The holiday's for Kirby and I are always a fun time of the year as we get to spend extra time with our families.  Seeing that we don't have any children we seem to do all the running while it is a little tiring it is well worth it.  We spent Thanksgiving with the Melchi family (my parents and my sisters family) at my parents house and Kirby's parents joined us there, it was nice to be all together for the holiday.  Kirby and I are so thankful to have such a wonderful family which includes both sides. 

The day after Thanksgiving we did our annual Christmas Tree hunt with the Bird family.  We first met for breakfast then it is off to Fairview Tree Farm to get our tree.  The owner lets my dad driver the tractor and the rest of us pile on the wagon and off we go into the field.  It was very cold and windy this year so Sam the littlest of the group rode in the nice warm truck with his dad.  We had a great time finding our trees, I believe we ended up with five for the group this year.  It is such a lovely holiday tradition.

To bring some holiday spirit to our holiday season we attended Andrew's holiday band concert and Sydney's choir concert.  It is great to see them both taking part in the arts and enjoying it.  Kirby and I also went to my parents one Saturday night and made Christmas cookies.  It is a tradition in the Melchi family to make Christmas cookies.  We have been doing it since I was a young girl.  I can remember having my friends over when I was younger to help out.  We would end up with the sugar cookie dough on the bottom of our socks and the dough everywhere.  I'm not sure how my mom did not get mad at us but we sure did have fun.  Over the years there have been a lot of people that have taken part in this tradition but this year it was Kirby, My Mom, My Dad and I.  Mainly my dad and I did it while Kirby and my mom told us how to do it :) we had a good time though.  Plus the cookies turned out very well.

On Christmas Eve we had my parents and Kirby's parents over for some appetizers and merriment.  Then it was off to church for a lovely Christmas service.  On Christmas day we went to Kirby's parent's for Christmas lunch, his brother's family was there as well.  It was so fun to see the kids open their presents and be excited about what they received. The adults also enjoyed their presents but not as much as the kids I don't think :).  Then Christmas evening we went to my parent house and celebrated the holiday with my parents and my sister's family.  We had a lovely evening and the little ones got some fun presents. 

All and all it was a very merry holiday season spent with all the people in our lives we love so much!

Autum Activities

Our fall was full of fun activities.  We attended the county fair and ate all sort of things that are not good for us like fries and elephant ears.  Celebrated Jack's third birthday where he got Hot Wheel cars and a carrier for them from Auntie E and Uncle K.  He loved his cars and the carrier so much that he took it to bed with him that night.  We took in a few of Sydney's soccer games and attended Andrew's Boy Scot meeting where he was awarded some medals.  Spent some quality time with the Rozema kids.  Had a hot dog roast where Kirby built one heck of a fire.  It was so big and hot that at times we had a hard time roasting our hot dogs.  We spent Halloween evening with some very cute goblins.  It was a very fun filled fall!!! 

NYC/US Open

Back the early part of September, Kirby and I took our annual trip to New York City.  Well it used to be annual but then we took a couple years off because we got married one year then the next year a friend of ours got married.  But last winter Kirby and I decided we were going to start making the trip again.  Our main reason for going is to attend the US Open Tennis Tournament.  See both Kirby and I played tennis growing up and have a love for the game.  Then when we were dating we got talking about things we would like to do before we die (like you do when you are dating, telling the other person all your hopes and dream :)) and it turned out that we both had attending the US Open on our "bucket list".  So that first year of dating off to the US Open we went and had a great time. 

Now fast forward to September 2012 (five years later).  As I said our main reason for going is to attend the US Open but while we are there we take in the sights of New York City.  This year besides seeing great tennis and great tennis players we also went to the 911 Memorial and Museum, saw the Enterprise shuttle which is now located on the USS Intreprid and did a lot of walking around.  I think one of the highlights of the trip for us was that we got to see Andy Roddick play as this was the last tournament he played in.  We had a very nice trip and enjoyed our time in "The Big Apple".  Here are some of the pictures from our trip!

Summer FUN!!!

So I'm behind on my blogging but here is a little slice of summer to brighten up the day.  We had a busy end of the summer that included outdoor concerts, Cubs games, nephew's birthday parties, dinner parties and Kirby's 40.5 birthday/movie party in our side yard.  It was a very busy but fun end of the summer.  Only a few more months and we will be back to that warm summer weather.  Enjoy the picture slide show. 

The Fitch's come for a visit

Back the first part of July the Fitch's (Waren, Jill, Sam, Ty, Alli and Evan) came to spend the day with Kirby and I at the lake while they were in Michigan for a visit.  We had a lovely day with them.  We went to the middle of the lake and went swimming or at least most of us did.  Evan took a nap on the boat while everyone else went swimming.  After swimming we had a cook out and made S'mores.  We had a great time and hope they come back soon to spend more time with us. 

Fourth of July

We celebrated the 4th of July on Klinger Lake with our family.  We had a lovely cook out with both sides of our family.  The day included swimming, playing in the water, a 4th of July boat parade, eating and fireworks.  It is always nice when we all can get together.  Enjoy the photos from our 4th of July get together. 

Sydney came for a visit

This summer Sydney came to visit us for a weekend and stayed for a week.  She was with us over the 4th of July so that was nice.  I had to work  that week but Kirby was off of work so they spent a lot of time together.  Luckily for us Sydney and Uncle K get along great.  We did a lot of fun things while she was with us.  Went out for dinner, cooked out on our patio, went for boat rides, swam in the middle of the lake, bike rides, went to the pool at the country club, shopping for fireworks and we took her tubing a lot.  A friend that she made last summer when she was at our house happened to be at her grandparents house so the girls spent time together hanging out, swimming and tubing.  We had a great time with her and we were sad to see her leave but she will be back soon.  Enjoy some pictures from our week with her!