The Miller Family Blog: Through the End of 2010

We seem to have left off about this same time last year! It is now the end of July in 2011 and I have once again fallen behind on my blog updates. To be honest, both Heidi and I have been using Facebook fairly regularly so that has kind of satisfied my itch to inform… probably to the point where I now have a scar. But this blog does serve as a nice journal of what we have been doing as a family.

In this posting I’ll finish out 2010 – through our ski trip to Park City. Then I’ll add a post for the first 7 months of 2011.

Maggie

The biggest change for us was Heidi’s birthday present. A new family member: Maggie. She is a Jack Russell Terrier mix of questionable heritage, but of unquestionable heart and love. I personally have never been a fan of small dogs but Maggie has won me over. She is a great companion and fairly well mannered. And most importantly, she is a very good friend to Moe.


She has a lot of character in that tiny tiny head	She is always on guard with Moe to make sure those baby bunny rabbits don’t attack our front yard.

Favorite pastime: sitting in the grass with Moe having at a new bone.	Not a lot of fur. So when we went Christmas Tree hunting, she needed a jacket.

Luau at the PetsHotel!	The boys are really enjoying Maggie

They love to play fight with each other, and Moe usually starts off by wining but in the end…	… Moe rolls over and let’s Maggie have the throat.

Also, while we are dwelling on small critters, we would like everyone to meet Harvey, Ben’s Guiney pig.

Cabin Time

We have been trying to make it to a cabin in the woods for a weekend almost every year with the Oishi’s. This year we went back to our preferred cabin outside Prescott – good size and location. The kids love it. And the adults really get a chance to relax and cool off.


There was WiFi so the kids didn’t suffocate.	Moly got hold of the camera and took some great shots. This is Ben and Andrew actually smiling together.

One of those Ben and Shanae shots… holding hands? They say no. Cracks me up how comfortable they are together.	Catching some hammock time is the number one activity on a weekend like this.

I love these shots of Ben and Andrew that Molly took	The sun and trees are perfect in them.

Even Moe got to go. He liked the bed a lot after all the walking we did	Doesn’t he look majestic?

Birthdays

The kids of course had birthday celebrations in there. Ben’s 12th birthday was spread out over several events since we had so many traveling activities in the summer of 2010.

	Ben got his family party at the beach house in San Diego. Lots of funny cards and such.
	Then in August his “friend party” at one of those trampoline places in Chandler. A good group of friends – good kids all.
Happy Birthday to Ben!	Somehow the kids get less cute each year during the singing. By the time he gets to 17 it will be “Happy Birthday to you, happy birth… whatever” Moly can be hardly bothered to stop fanning herself with her plate to sing.

Then in November, it was Andrew’s turn. Yikes, he turned 8. No more little kids Sad smile .

	Always the one to grab attention… not… Andrew hid under his Happy Birthday Hat. But he did have a great time jumping and playing dodge ball.
	I could never get the kids to gather for a group picture, they are squirmy at 8. So this is the best I could do to get them all. Again, a good group of friends. Good kids.
Happy Birthday to Andrew	Andrew’s friends enjoyed singing the traditional song, with the extra Cha Cha Cha for effect.

Halloween

Halloween is always a special time at the Miller house. It is the one holiday where we actually invite other people outside of family over! This year the costumes were great. Even Mrs. Miller wore one. The kids did well on their hunt for candy, and fun was had by all.


Andrew was a very convincing hot dog. Everyone got hungry looking at him. He really wanted us to cook hotdogs for dinner so he could be a cannibal.	Ben had the best costume. John Lennon. Most of the kids couldn’t figure out who he was but the parents handing out candy loved it.

Garret, Andrew, Moly and Shanae. I’m not sure what Garret and Molly were supposed to be. Just weird. Shanae was a candy corn witch.	And sometime around 8:00 PM Peg Bundy and Pocahontas came by to say hello. Sexy mamas.
	And at the end of it all, we had the annual candy exchange where all the kids trade what they don’t like for what they like. Not sure what we are going to do for 2011 – we now have a coffee table and white couches in there?!?!?!

Thanksgiving

For 2010 we had Thanksgiving with Nana and Grandpa in Sedona. We went to the Poco Diablo resort for their Thanksgiving feast… much easier and good food. The boys had a great time and enjoyed the unlimited supply of food.

	With the Grandparents. A rare picture with both children smile. And it never hurts to have some red rocks behind you to jazz up the picture.
	Ben. Happy and content after about ten trips to the buffet line.
	It was actually kind of cold and a fountain outside the restaurant was spraying mist onto some roses. Pretty cool how they froze in layers.

Christmas, 2010

We had a pretty good Christmas. We stayed in Phoenix and did everything pretty traditional. The whole process starts at the beginning of December and goes till Christmas day.

	First we had to get all the decorations out of the garage for the house. Andrew helped this year. Unfortunately I forgot to actually take a picture of the finished product. Bummer. It looked very nice. Deer, Snow Man, Lights, wreath. Very festive.
	The next step was to venture up to the Mogollon rim and hunt for a tree. After some driving and then some walking we found these two perfect trees. We took the one on the right. We didn’t get a picture but when we cut it down it almost killed Maggie, 2 weeks after we got her. She crawled out unscathed though.
	Dead tree on the Traverse, and ready to head down to Phoenix.
	The tree all decorated and ready for Christmas morning. One of our nicer looking trees.
	Andrew got a chance to talk with Santa at one of his Pack meetings. Santa really liked Andrew’s hat.
	We have decided to make Lasagna our official Christmas Eve meal. So Andrew helped me prepare the fillings and put down the layers. It was very yummy. We all slept well that night.
	Christmas morning was fun. Lots of great presents and a few surprises.
	Ben got his very own bass. My 30 year old cheap Japanese knockoff (yes, it is so old that cheap knockoffs were made in Japan then, not China) just wasn’t cutting it. Lessons were included.
	Nana and Grandpa came down to share Christmas with us, as well as Uncle Bruce. Although Bruce and I were taking pictures so you won’t see us…
	And after the orgy of unwrapping, we partook of the traditional peach breakfast: French Toast with butter, brown sugar, and peaches. Yumm.
	After breakfast we went for a hike up a mountain. Moe, Bruce, the boys and me. A perfect day weather wise.
	Then we had Roast Beast for Dinner. Finishing everything off with a nice family meal. A good Christmas even though we all missed Grammy a lot.
	And after all was said and done, the boys played their new video games and Andrew learned the fine art of post-gorging-hands-in-the-pants lounging.

Ski Trip

And to finish the year out, we headed to Park City Utah for a week of skiing between Christmas and New Years. We rented a condo at the bottom of the sloaps, ski-in/ski-out is the way to go. It was the first time for the boys and had been maybe 18 years for Heidi and I. We had a great time. Andrew learned how to snow board and Ben learned how to ski. They both took to it very quickly. It came right back to Heidi and she popped right down the hill with no problems. I didn’t do so well. A bit sloppy and not so graceful. But it really was only my fourth time ever skiing.

The trip was so good that I only took one picture the whole time… or maybe it was so cold that I didn’t want to take my gloves off to use the camera:

Bits and Pieces

The above are the big events of the second half of the year. We had lots of smaller ones summarized by the pictures below:


The Kids had a great semester at school. Andrew had a great summative. Here he is as a salamander – they studied adaptation of animals to their environment. The cup is an eye, the other one fell off.	We took Grandpa to a Diamond Backs game for his birthday. It was the first major league ever game for the boys and me. Good game.

We went to a lot of concerts. But most of them produced blurry and dark images. A few were: Chris Isaak, Natalie Merchant, Elton John, and a few that I can’t remember right now.


We did get pictures from when Heidi took Ben to Trevor Hall. Here he is with the white rasta man himself.	And with his mommy. The bass player liked that necklace… A lot…

We did some shopping, which Ben does not like so much. To save time he tried on all the glasses at once.	Andrew practiced being a husband. Here he is outside the changing room holding Shanae’s purse.

Ben has taken up Fencing as his sport. Not bad at it either. He is just beginning but is picking it up.	Somewhere during the summer I got a new vehicle. A Chevy Traverse. We are really enjoying it.

Andrew is helping more and more with the cooking. He is not quite big enough to kneed the bread, but close.	We made a trip to the Musical Instrument Museum, our new favorite place to go.

Ben also got braces at some point during the second half of 2010. We miss his buck teeth, they were kind of cute. But now when he eats the food stays in his mouth, so an OK trade.	Lots of good food was made. You can look at the pictures on Facebook to see. But one of the most memorable was a batch of Matzo Ball Soup that we made when we all had colds. It hit the spot.