Rob's family

"I love the smell of a real Christmas tree" I thought to myself a couple weeks back.  I mentioned it to Tracey while she was making dressing for the Thanksgiving bird.  No doubt, she had flash backs to our first couple years of marriage where (without fail) we drove out to a Christmas tree lot on the coldest night of the year and bought a Scotch Pine already dry and losing its needles. "No, no."  I assured her, "We'll cut down our own.  It'll be romantic and Norman Rockwell-esque." I wrote down the directions before we left the house, "Head out to our Apple Orchard, turn right at the cow pasture."  We of course got lost.  Not too bad though, we found the farm while the sun was still high in the sky. We got a quick run down on the tree types and how the farm worked (cut down,drag out) and in we went.  The trees started immediately.  The weather was brisk but sunny.  Really, I'd say it was about ideal.  We had a dusting of snow Frida...

I'm not too worried about the what the fat man does. In Chicago, he brings either one big thing for two girls - last year - play station 2 - several years back our best present ever - jumbo tumbos, 8 velcoing gym mat shapes that make a plane or a house, or a mountain. They were $200, but they still get used today. or he brings about three things per kid (which is where we are this year). Tracey and I were off to our second round of gift buying last week (Santa was done) and we were having a difficult time finding anything we wanted to buy. We wound up frustrated, but basically rationalizing that we weren't going to buy just to buy. We bought nothing. Two days later, she found the last gift for Melinda (the game Stratego (perhaps my siblings recall not playing that with me (I'm certain Susan does ("PLEASE play Stratego with me!"))). We purchased our final gift yesterday - 40 new born diapers that we're going to stock in a diaper bag and give to Gretchen f...

Christmas Picture '05 Originally uploaded by robert_h_coleman . This was our Christmas picture for 2005.

DSCN2901 Originally uploaded by robert_h_coleman . Our homeowners association tried a new event this year. We arranged for Santa to come visit. Led by a police car with lights flashing, he rode in the back of a pickup. Great event, we followed behind and ended at the grade school. 50-70 people, hot chocolate and cookies for all. Gretchen asked if we could do this every year. "As long as you want to keep coming out..." I replied. We sang a couple Christmas carols at the end. I really enjoyed myself.

Gretchen's Star Originally uploaded by robert_h_coleman . This is the star that Gretchen made to put on our tree. She was very put out when I told her that we had purchased a new bigger tree. We wound up putting out little (3') in the hallway upstairs so she could put this star on it.

DSCN2877 copy Originally uploaded by robert_h_coleman . This is Melinda putting her angel on our tree this year.

We always put out the Christmas decorations on the Friday after Thanksgiving. Always. Except for this year. We were having guests in the evening and it just didn't seem to make sense to put all that stuff out until we had some time we could devote to it. You would have thought that we said, "No dessert for a week!" Both girls moped around and reminded us that "We always put out Christmas decorations on the Friday after Thankgiving." To make matters worse, we didn't do it on Saturday either. Four Colemans woke up cranky so that didn't seem a good time to do it either. Instead, we packed up lunch (Turkey sandwiches of course) and went to the Zoo. Finally this morning we put up the decorations. Wow, what a difference a year makes. The girls did a great job helping. We've got a tree for just their ornaments and they did a nice job putting on the ornaments and working together. We have a Play Mobile Nativity scene and they played with that for ...