CHRISTMAS DAY

Last year Christmas day was rather quiet and strange as it was our first one in California away from all the family. This time round we were somewhat prepared for the silence and the less busy day and so we actually really enjoyed our day. 

We had all the usual Christmas traditions; stockings, present opening, a HUGE Christmas dinner, a walk after lunch, some games and of course the Queen's speech. We did manage to Skype a lot of family which was great fun too. Here are a few snaps from our Christmas day!

It definitely was a good Christmas day, especially as we ate SO much! I was practically in a coma by the end of the day. Why is Christmas food just so good?! Its not fair.

H 

SAYONARA 2015

I am rather behind on our blog posts as its already January 6th and I've not even updated you on things we did over Christmas, or said goodbye to 2015. I apologise. For a start we took a trip over New Year which put us all out of sync but then we launched back into the regular rhythms of life and haven't had a chance to catch our breath. But I'm on it, I promise!

Starting with our round up post from 2015. It certainly was a busy year. I feel like we visited a lot of places, had some visitors and generally achieved a lot. It was also a pretty big year for a certain husband of mine too. 

So here's our top ten events of 2015:

1. Having Andrew's family come over to visit us. 
2. Travelling up to Seattle by train and seeing the beauty of the West coast.
3. Watching a couple of American Football games, particularly the Seattle Seahawks. 
4. Our friend Tim's visit and seeing Yosemite and other great places with him. 
5. A certain someone turning 30!
6. The amazing Alaskan cruise. 
7. Meeting Mr James Corden himself. 
8. Going home to see all the family, especially Mr Elisha after turning 1!
9. Seeing the band Muse perform, and watching Andrew's face as the drones flew round. 
10. The stay at the beautiful cabin in Lake Tahoe (more to come on that later). 


As you can see its been a pretty busy 2015 and unsurprisingly 2016 is shaping up to be just as crazy. We have a visit or two lined up with family members and then in the middle of the year we are going to be celebrating my brother getting married which means a trip back to England! Yay! There's also the scary event of me turning 30, but we won't mention that again. Ever. 

We are so grateful to God for all the things that happened in 2015, even some of the tougher things which have allowed us to grow, especially as a couple. We look forward to facing 2016. As ever, updates will be on the blog so you can feel somewhat involved. 

Happy new year everyone!
A&H xx

ITS THE MOST WONDERFUL TIME OF THE YEAR!

It's Christmas!! 

To be fair the Christmas excitement has been filling our household since early November, perhaps even October for some of us. We had watched some Christmas movies and Michael Bublé was already playing. But as soon as thanksgiving was over we went straight to hunt for our tree and yes it is another huge one.

We managed to get another 9 foot tree, although I suspect its a little bit taller than that. Andrew is very pleased with himself as it was one of the biggest trees there. We did look at another tree but when the guy held it up it was just too large. It would have filled our living room.

Putting the tree up in our house is always fun. Poor old Macintosh always gets a bit scared and worried. He doesn't like this giant green thing that's invading his space. The size of the tree means I always end up standing on something trying to help balance it and keep it straight whilst Andrew's fixing it into the base. Eventually its done and then suddenly Macintosh remembers he likes giant green trees. They provide him with an additional water bowl and he can also crawl around underneath it whilst it strokes his back. Silly dog!

So anyway, we kept the cardboard houses Andrew made last year and just added some new pieces that we bought. I tried to keep the natural look going with lots of natural textures and red and white as accent colours. Its not quite Pinterest worthy but I love it.

Coming in through the front door, the first thing you'll see is our wreath. Its the same twig wreath that I just keep adapting to fit the occasion. So far its been completely worth its money! 

There is our giant tree. Complete with crooked top section and Macintosh asleep on "his" sofa. The tree rather dominates the room but it makes the place feel Christmassy quite easily!

The stockings are pinned up on the sideboard in the absence of a fireplace. (Macintosh has his by his bed!) The advent candle is on the sideboard too so we remember to burn it. We also got this amazing red and white patterned candle on sale last year and I've been waiting excitedly to burn it ever since. The logs were scrounged from the desert around us and hauled back by Macintosh and Andrew after their long walks. 

The other sides and surfaces have little touches of Christmas, from garlands to cardboard houses or other bits. It helps spread the Christmas feeling around the room. Our open plan living space can feel quite large so with a giant tree and lots of Christmas bits scattered around it makes it feel cosier. 

But the dinning table is my favourite part by far. On one of Andrew's walks he found a long log that he adapted into this amazing centrepiece for the dining table. 

That bit might actually be Pinterest worthy as I stole the idea from there in the first place. Andrew drilled some holes in the logs for the candles and voila a centrepiece. Can't wait to start eating meals at the big table. 

So there you have it, our Christmas decor for 2015. As many of you won't get to see us over the holiday season I hope you can picture us having Christmas over here a bit more now. 
H

LET'S GO SEAHAWKS!

Our trip down to San Diego was partly to relax and have some time sans Mr Macintosh, but it was also a lot to do with our first NFL experience. For those of you who are English and have no idea what I'm talking about, we went to see an American football game. To be more precise we went to see the San Diego Chargers take on the Seattle Seahawks in one of their pre-season games.

My experience of American football up until this point was very limited, and mostly revolved around watching the Super Bowl, so I wasn't expecting to understand very much but thankfully we were sat next to two very nice Seahawks fans who were happy to explain anything that was a little beyond us. So basically we constantly badgered them to explain what was happening!

Now the world of American football is very different to any sport back in the UK. This is such a big franchise. The teams have so many players. There are tons of support staff and coaches. There is so much going on its insane. This match was no different, despite being a pre-season game, because it was military appreciation weekend. So there was a little more pomp and circumstance to the game. 

When we first arrived we were completely blown away by the sheer size of the Qualcomm stadium. It is insanely big and holds so many fans. Yet despite the size you still manage to get a really good view of the pitch because the tiers go up so steeply. It really didn't feel like we were in the nosebleed seats! 

Before the real action got underway the players came onto the pitch to warm up. The seats were still pretty empty at this point but I wanted to see everything so we were there throughout! I couldn't believe how many players they have though. Below is a picture of the team huddle and then the Seattle Seahawks warming up. They take up half the pitch!!

Both teams went back to their changing rooms whilst the Marine band came and did some of their repertoire. They were pretty impressive. Then following in the military theme we had some ex-military guys parachute into the stadium. Was pretty impressive to be honest. 

Then it was time for the football to begin. The San Diego Chargers came out through a tunnel, with real flames and walked through a path lined with their cheerleaders. There was a lot of cheering for them being the home team. The Seahawks had appeared earlier with a smaller amount of noise. 

Obviously the national anthem was sung, whilst a giant United States shaped flag was unfurled. They really do go all out in America! 

I won't be able to tell you much about what happened in the game, except that the Seahawks were doing really well until about the third quarter when the Chargers started to come back. We were down to the last minute of playing time and the Seahawks needed something spectacular to win. I think it was in the last 30 seconds that they managed to score a field goal meaning they won 16-15. Close but still a win. Have to say that Andrew and I were screaming our heads off and cheering so loudly, despite being in a predominantly Chargers area. Nothing kicked off though, at least football over here doesn;t equate to fans fighting...

It was a crazy experience and both us of came away saying we'd happily go to another game. So anyone want to come visit and see a game with us? 
H

AV FAIR

This post is a little overdue (sorry about that). We've had a rather busy couple of weeks and the weekend was busy with our mini trip to San Diego so I didn't get round to writing this post.

Anyway, a couple of weekends ago Andrew and I took a trip to the AV fair with our good friends Christian and Nicole. They have a dog too called Penny (Mac's girlfriend) so we left Macintosh with her and went out for a night of fun and food.

The fair was similar to a UK one in most respects. There were rides, animals, food, stalls etc but it was on a much bigger scale. In fact there were so many food stalls covering just about everything you wanted to eat and even things you didn't want too! The boys also spent a little while looking at some steam machinery. Obviously Nicole and I were thrilled...

After we'd done a quick lap of the whole fair and scoped out what we wanted to do we decided to have something savoury to eat. The hope was that it would balance out anything that was consumed after that! So Andrew and I selected some tasty BBQ and a beer. It really was yum. America does BBQ so well!

Food was hastily consumed because by then it was time for the All Alaskan Pig Race. This was HILARIOUS! They had several heat rounds to determine which pigs would be in the final race. All the pigs were introduced and they had hilarious names. In fact Andrew's favourite pig was called 'Sloppy Joe' which was great. He did pretty well actually, got into the final but lost as he belly flopped on the last hurdle. Yes that's right they jumped hurdles too! It was so good. I think the four of us cheered louder than all the kids around us. 

After the pig racing the ferris wheel was the next thing on the agenda. The sun had set so it was all lit up and it looked good. Nicole and I had both forgotten how much we didn't really like ferris wheels until we were sat on it. By that point it was obviously too late! Christian made the carriage rock a tiny bit which set us both on edge. We are so alike! Note in the photo below how I'm gripping onto the edge of the carriage and how un-relaxed I look! 

Once we'd survived that ordeal and done some more looking at the animals on display it was time for my favourite part.....the fried food! I was so keen to taste it because I'd hear so much about how Americans fry anything apparently! Sure enough they do. There was fried snickers bars, red velvet cake, cheesecake and oreos. Andrew had a fried snickers and I had fried oreos. At the time they were pretty delicious. Afterwards I may have regretted the choice. Deep fried food is not good in big quantities! Still it was worth trying. 

It was then time to head home to the pooches. The fair was a success and we loved spending time with Nicole and Christian as always. Until next year AV fair...
H

MACINTOSH MONDAY

Macintosh has been mostly well behaved for the last two weeks. I've not had to photo document anything where he's been too badly behaved. Although he did attempt to climb into a friend's dishwasher last week but I was too occupied trying to get him out of it to bother taking a photo. If it had been our dishwasher I'm sure it would have been a different story! So instead of a story, here is a round up of his past two weeks. Photo style!

As you can see, being cute has been his theme. As always!
H