Tuesday, December 25, 2007

Merry Christmas!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

We started off our festivities by spending the weekend in downtown Seattle. We stayed at the Westin, enjoying their "Heavenly" beds, excellent views, and close proximity to Pacific Place and the Pike Place Market. We received a$100 gift card to Pacific Place with our room...which of course was an excuse to do lots of shopping.

We need a bed like this at home...

The Seattle Space Needle from our room.


Our Christmas tradition (2 whole years now) is to eat ourselves silly at the Melting Pot. Last year we ate at the one in Pensacola, and this year, the one on Mercer Street in Seattle. Every course is fondue; and it's excellent: http://www.meltingpot.com/ They have restaurants in most big cities.


Seattle Center was decorated beautifully, including an old-fashioned Christmas Village:



On Christmas Eve we decided that we really needed to find some snow! We drove 2 1/2 hours Northeast to Mt.Baker with some of our friends to go skiing. We found plenty of snow...

The winding road up the mountain

Michael taking a break:

Next year's Christmas picture, I'm sure...


Jen and Kerry (Jen's on the snowboard.)

Our first Christmas in the new house... Stockings belonging to the four-legged furries of the house all stuffed by Santa and ready for the destroying.




We didn't have too many Christmas ornaments, so we just started sticking eveyone's Christmas cards in the tree. It worked out really well, especially since a lot of people sent pictures...our tree was full of our friends and family. (Note to Christmas letter writers...this doesn't work so well with letters...please send pictures next year.)


Maya waiting patiently to see what Santa brought:

Mmmmmmmm....yummy! A huge doggie bone!

Maya will be enjoying this for a while....(she didn't pay much attention to her new collar and doggie shampoo)



The kitties got play cubes...

...and LOTS of catnip toys.

Henry enjoying his cube:


Our friend Terica hand-made excellent Christmas stockings for us. The best part about this was the gifts her and husband Brett gave us WITH the stockings. Brett makes some EXCELLENT smoked salmon, and they gave us season passes to thier tour boat, Deception Pass Tours: www.deceptionpasstours.com (Please note, if you visit anytime this year, you'll most likely be going on the boat with us!)

After the kitties had their fill of catnip, they decided that taking a Christmas nap by the fireplace was in order:

The carnage of too much wrapping paper:

The rest of Christmas will of course include Renee's Papita, some slow roasted prime rib and a movie or two.

Merry Christmas to everyone! We miss you all and look forward to visiting and hosting you over the coming year.










Tuesday, December 11, 2007

Maya and her bad day...

Maya isn't feeling so well. She's sad, hungry and in a lot of pain from being spayed yesterday. Her mom and dad, however, have no sympathy. She's frickin' hilarious in the stupid collar-thingy.

Thanksgiving...Minnesota Style

We spent Thanksgiving in Minnesota with Nikki's family. We got to shoot some guns, and see an Ice-house parade (yes, you can only do that in Minnesota.)

Nikki shooting some sort of gun.

These little girls were dressed as different kinds of fish for the Aitkin Ice House Parade. (For those of who don't know what an Ice-House is, they're the little shack like things people set up on the ice to keep warm as they fish during the winter.)

The Aitkin Fire Department Search and Rescue guys had a "Winter" hot-tub going. They sloshed water all over the street and ruined the candy-getting for all the kids around us.

Nikki really didn't know what this meant until her sister explained it to her. Obviously, we don't ice-fish.

How NOT to take a Christmas picture with your dog...

We tried....but Maya was having none of it.


Saturday, November 10, 2007

Maya...Packers or Vikings????

Tuesday, October 23, 2007

Every Morning at the Craig Household:

Thursday, October 18, 2007

New House! (As decorated by the current owners)

Weeds, anyone?
Backyard for Maya to rip up.
Baby's room...it will of course be repainted before we move in

They have a thing for green and yellow
Master Bath...with all that counter space, we'll be sharing a bathroom for the first time since we were married.
Guest room...green again
Upstairs bath...weird towel folding technique

We have a pantry finally!
Living Room
The Giant Red Wall.
At least we have the same bookshelf

Dining Room-(w/ Weird Wreath thingy) Kitchen (It's just screaming I NEED GRANITE COUNTERS!)
1/2 Bath Downstairs






Sunday, October 14, 2007

Happy Fall 2007!

Happy Fall!

The grass finally turned green, which means it's fall in Western Washington.



We bought a new house! The inspection is tomorrow, and if that goes well, we'll move in right before Thanksgiving. 1221 NW Lola Terrace, Oak Harbor, WA 98277



Maya helping deliver Halloween treats to the neighbors...

(Nice Devil eyes!)


...and scrambling on the fake rocks behind the house.


Henry and the new kitty (Sasha) have finally decided that they like each other:

Tuesday, September 18, 2007

Summer is FINALLY over





Not that we didn't enjoy summer...but its nice to NOT have anything to do...

Prowler Ball









Kelly enjoying the Ice Luge:












Kelly's first visit to Deception Pass Bridge











Maya spent all summer growing into a BIG dog...

Saturday, August 11, 2007

New Kitty!


We brought home a new kitty!

Her name is Sasha, and she's an Egyptian Mau, about 1-2 years old. Sasha came into the WAIF shelter in very bad shape, having been neglected and abused. She was covered in sores from her flea allergy, and really underweight. She's a bit skittish now, but she's a total lover! We're fostering her until we know if she and Henry will become friends.

Her sores are healing, and she's eating lots now. She's a really sweet girl, and loves to purr when Michael pets her. Henry isn't so happy about things, but it's only been half a day, so hopefully he'll warm up soon...