December Birthdays and Celebrations

What a December!  First we welcomed new granddaughter Dorothy Lee Voss (Dottie) into our family on December 17!  She has a family name:  My grandmother, my mother's middle name, and MY middle name!  So she is extra special!

Then, we welcomed another granddaughter, Alison Brooke Johnson, into our family on December 21!  I was the one to cut her umbilical cord! So she is extra special!

They look like they will be best friends!

We have several other birthdays in December, which we celebrated:

Our "Irish twins", Nate and Karyn, celebrated separately.  For Nathan's, we went to the zoo, and toured the old farm house located there

For Karyn's, we joined the Johnson's for a home celebration,

Hailey celebrated her 5th birthday (which is now shared with Dottie!) with a ballerina party,

and David Jakob celebrated his first birthday in his new playroom.....

And Paul was honored with Nate's and Karyn's families joining us for dinner before we left.

We still had time before  the babies came to celebrate Christmas by continuing with some of our longtime traditions including:
Gingerbread houses

Christmas concert this year at the Cathedral of the Conception Catholic Church, part of which was premiering in the US.

And a weekend getaway, this year to Pigeon Forge

 to see a couple of great shows, one at night, and one a breakfast show.

Both celebrated our Lord and Savior, the true meaning of Christmas!

In December, we saw the end of an  era, with the end of hostess twinkies.......we passed several of these icon trucks on the way back from Pigeon Forge

And to celebrate our son-in-law, Andy's, new venture, Run Franklin (a store with running related items), we joined him at a 5k run/WALK to support arthritis research.  Check it out if you are in the Franklin area!

We are now in Texas, working on a MMAP project, and will be reporting on what we are up to in the near future.  For now,  a happy new year to all!!