A Very Merry Christmas

Look at my little reindeer! Isn't she cute? She took it off right after that picture, but at least we were able to capture this one and send it over to Malu overseas! Thanks to my family, I was able to have one of the best Christmases ever. I knew that it would be difficult not having Malu here, but it was impossible to be sulky and down with everyone being so cheerful and fun. We had a party at my house and TONS of food. Any of my friends out there who has ever been to one of our parties knows that we never go light on food! Everything was fantastic. We had everything from beef bourguignon, to pulled pork, mom's famous sinigang (Filipino soup), and all the trimmings, and dessert! It was crazy. We all managed to get through our traditional gift card exchange unscathed. I ended up with a Target gift card, which I intend to use on today's sales! We also played games, like Catch Phrase and Battle of the Sexes. The way we play (all loud and stuff), it's a miracle no one walked out of there with a black eye :) Anyway, all the families got together for pictures. Here's my happy family!

Thanks to them and everyone else who made this Christmas without Malu better than I imagined it could be. I can't even express how lucky I am to have them and I'm truly going to miss everyone when I leave for Texas. Merry Christmas everyone!

Wordless Wednesday: Doggie Winter Wonderland

Fil-Am Christmas Party

Every year, the Filipino-American Community of Southern Colorado gets together for some Christmas fun. The community is actually quite large, which makes every event merrier! As a matter of fact, my mom is being inducted as the President on New Year's Eve. Would you believe this is going to be her third term? My dad was once the President for two terms years back. I'm so proud of the both of them and can say that they both share a deep love for the community and are truly committed to fostering unity among Filipinos in the Colorado Springs area. Go mom and dad!

Anyway, this year's Christmas celebration was tons of fun. All the kids (and us ladies) crowded around Santa like he was totally going out of style. We received nice gifts in the process, not to mention we ate ourselves into comas. I'm hosting a party at our house on Christmas day, so the excitement will continue. Our closest family and friends always do a gift card exchange and I'm anxious to see how chaotic it's going to be. There's easily over 3o of us and every year gets more crazy. I think we feed off and look forward to the craziness. After all, it wouldn't be right if Christmas was quiet!

Around This Time....Back Then

Four years ago, around this time, my unit--the 18th Aviation Brigade out of Fort Bragg, NC--had been on ground in Balad, Iraq for about two weeks. Around this time my boss, who was the brigade commander, insisted on a group photo to attach to our family Christmas cards. So we gathered the majority of the soldiers at the nearby basketball court for it, and this picture taken. I just remember how excited and nervous I was to be on my first combat tour. I only have good memories of the deployment. I worked with the best, lived with my best friend Chrissy, came into contact with some of the most extraordinary people from all over our country, and met my husband. Wow...four years ago. I feel like it's time to go on another deployment. Yet, I'm thankful that I'm not and continue to be thankful for those that are serving in harm's way in my stead. I pray that the families of these special soldiers, airmen and marines are blessed this holiday season and while they wait for their loved ones to return. God bless you all!

Lucy at the Park

This is what the house looked like this morning, when I decided to wake up and take Lucy to the park. It was so cold I almost decided not to go, but I didn't have the heart to bring Lucy back into the house. She was already half covered in snow by then.

Malu taught Lucy to catch softballs and now it's her favorite thing to do in the park. I brought the bat out there and thought that she'd have a hard time seeing the softballs in the snow, but she's a pro! She had a blast. Lucy hates the camera. I think the flash reminds her of lightning, which she is deathly afraid of. So now, whenever I pull the camera out, she makes a run for it. That's what she's doing here. She even knows that cell phones have cameras in them. So if you whip your cell phone out and look in her direction, she bolts into another room. Crazy dog!

Here, we're getting into the car and heading to Walmart to pick up the Christmas greeting cards I ordered. Speaking of which, I was able to get all my cards done today, along with a few Christmas packages. I'll be heading to the post office tomorrow to get all that out of the way. Not only that, Anna and I went through my walk-in closet today and set aside a ton of clothes to donate to Goodwill. What a productive day!

As promised (and totally off on a tangent), here are two scarf and hat sets that I finished not too long ago. Not bad for cheater knitting--as Misty calls it :) Hey, it's fun!

On another note, the transportation folks from Fort Carson came over today to do a walk-through and assess how many days will be needed to pack and load all my stuff for my big move. It'll take a total of three days--two to pack and one to load. Everything will be done on the 29th, 30th and 31st. I tried not to have people working on New Year's Eve but was told they'd be working anyway. Let's just hope they get done in time for me to party up the New Year with my family!

So my one big task for the rest of the week is to clean and organize my basement. There's a butt-load of junk down there just waiting to be sifted through. Oh yeah, let's not forget the one closet I have in one of our guest rooms. I call it the "chaos" closet. It literally has all kinds of crap in it that I, (1): didn't feel like sorting through or (2): quickly tossed in so that guests wouldn't see them lying around. Argh! Wish me luck!

Answered Prayers

I'm such a bad blogger. I just haven't been in the blogging mood lately (so much going on!), but I got the itch to do it tonight, despite how tired I am. We had snow this weekend, which was a nice surprise. I hate driving in it, but I love seeing it at this time of year. And it's even more beautiful at night with all the houses lit for the holidays. Lucy loves it too. Whenever it snows, she wakes me up extra early in the morning just to make sure she's the first to get her paws in the fresh snow. She literally went berzerk around our cul-de-sac this morning and practically sent me diving down our driveway. She is so cute like that. I'll have to take some pictures and post them for you guys sometime.

As many of you know, I'm gearing up for my move to El Paso. I have so much to praise God for. The house has been on rental market for a few days and my property manager has been getting a lot of inquiries. I actually have a few prospects of my own and someone is coming to see the house in a few weeks. I honestly wasn't expecting too large a response so soon, but it is a relief just knowing that I could possibly have this place rented out before I leave. Another praise--a few weeks ago when I visited El Paso, I came back discouraged about the fact that I didn't see any promising places to live, nor was I able to find a place that allowed pets Lucy's size. Well it turns out that my friend Vickie (whose also in the Army) had a friend who was stationed at El Paso before and recommended a nice place to me that had no weight or breed restrictions on pets. To my relief, I was able to find the place online, saw that it was more than ideal, and was able to secure one for the second week of January (which is when I planned on getting down there). So now I get to have Lucy with me while I'm stationed down there (I was totally prepared to leave her here in Colorado with my parents). So thank God for all the blessings he's bestowed upon me. I'm now actually somewhat excited to go to Texas.

Don't you just love the holidays? As stressful as it can be, I really do enjoy it--especially since I have so much family around. The only thing that I miss is having Malu here. But that's okay. I'm making the most of it. I've got pretty much all my shopping done and presents wrapped. I don't have too much going on in the decorations department, but I honestly didn't feel like putting them up, only to take them down to be packed just a few days after Christmas. Every weekend so far has been jam-packed with get-togethers within our beloved Filipino community. As a matter of fact, close family friends of ours had an ornament exchange last weekend. I've grown up with these people for years and it has become a tradition that we all look forward to each year. I also had the task of making dessert that evening, which is shown here.

I made a macadamia nut pie (that I also made for Thanksgiving and was asked to make again), a pumpkin pecan ice cream pie, and a delicious coconut cake. I'll be posting all the recipes on my cooking blog sometime soon, so check it out! Here are some other pictures that were taken that night. It was such a blast! Here I am with my brother, Jon, and sister, Roz.

The party was held at Charisse's house. You can't even tell she's a few months pregnant here. We actually found out yesterday that she will be having a baby boy! She's due in May. Here she is with her big sis, Antonette.

Here are my cousins--Ray, Naomi, and Ryan (the three clustered together) with Jack to the far left. They're enjoying some of the good food!

Anna and Roz were my dates for the evening since everyone was paired up with their significant others. Here's a great group picture of all the ladies.

This is by no means the end of the holiday fun. There are two big parties this weekend as well as one at our house on Christmas day. No wonder none of us can't seem to lose any weight!

I must also say that I've picked up knitting lately. Well, it's knitting with the Knifty Knitter. It's this cool and easy way of making scarves, hats, and other great stuff on mini looms. I actually meant to start learning how to crochet, but I wanted something quick and simple to make as gifts for Christmas. It's been so much fun. Here are some pictures of my first project--a simple hat. I've made scarf and hat sets, which I'll post pictures of some other time.

On another note, Malu is doing well. He's definitely staying busy and frequently visits with local Iraqi citizens. As you can see here, he enjoys spending time with the children, who have now (and for whatever reason) call him Jackie Chan. He said he spent one afternoon playing basketball with the kids--in all that gear you see him wearing. He's always been crazy like that. We're both still waiting to hear whether or not he'll be able to come home for R&R in a few weeks. He requested to come in December since I'll be spending all of it here on leave until I report to my new unit. If he does come home, he'll be on the road with me for part of it. Not ideal, but it's better than him coming in the spring and me possibly being in the field or not knowing what my unit could be up to at the time. Please continue to keep him in your thoughts and prayers!

Whew! That was a mouthful. Serves me right for slacking! Now I can go to bed! I hope everyone has a blessed week! Ciao for now!

Not-So-Wordless Wednesday

Yes, it's been forever! Forgive me. Since my last post, I entertained tons of family and friends for Thanksgiving and now I'm at the tail end of finals week while fighting what I think is the flu. I mean, it has to be the flu. It's pretty bad. Whatever. After tomorrow, I'll be done with finals and grad school. I'll officially have my MBA. Yay! And the reward? I get to go back to my Army life. Ahh...it's been a good run. Anyway, I don't want to have to go back and tell you how great my Thanksgiving weekend was. I had tons of family and friends over and it was a grand old time. Here is a great photo of the Ioapo-Rosete clan after having one of our great family pow-wows where my grandma gathers us together to reflect on, well, whatever it is she wants us to reflect on at that moment. That night, she had EVERYONE talk about what Thanksgiving means to us. Gotta love it! Can you believe there were people missing from the picture? It's a big family and we all had a wonderful time catching up. I swear, we ate for five days straight. It was a blast. Well, until next time...