New Year's Eve

We had a wonderful celebration for New Year's Eve. . . at least until 10 o'clock when the party broke up due to old and tired adults.

There was some football scrimmages that broke out in the front room with the Cowboys battling the Steelers reminiscent of the great battles of the 70s.

And the girls, who were outnumbered, were dressed up in their beautiful dresses and took great care of Jenny!

The kids watched a movie, and a massive sleepover took place - so the adults could get wild!  (Ha!)

Nothing quite like the presence of Jason to get Tracy laughing.  And nothing quite like the presence of Tracy's laughter to get Jason rolling with his jokes.

Some crazy games of spoons ensued (deciding plastic spoons would be quieter!) where Jason proved his dominance, but Doug managed to stay in until the finals most times, until he finally got a victory.

Imagination Station

We took advantage of our other Toledo area membership and made a visit to the Imagination Station.  It was fun to remember the bicycle ride, the demonstrations, the tug-of-war, the simulator, the magnet area, and riding a bicycle on a tightrope high above the floor!

Snow!

When we saw that snow was falling, we had a big celebration with lots of jumping up and down!

We had been waiting a week, and finally the weather turned cool enough for some snow!  Horray!

And my, what beautiful sunrises from our balcony!

Uncle Jason Wins!

We had the Christmas tradition of cheering on Uncle Jason as he played for the TCS Alumni championship.  After finally getting knocked off the past two years, the "old guys" triumphed for the championship again this year.

Fun to get to watch some basketball and see Uncle Jason's heroics.

Christmas Morning

 Somehow, Santa sure found his way to our house in Ohio!  Wow!

We thought there were lots of presents the night before, but somehow the haul kept getting more and more for the Woodward family.

Stockings were found - and though Rania has long passed "baby's first Christmas," there were gifts that were put in the stockings at night.

Presents appeared under the tiny tree, and there was lots of fun in the morning.

Reeve was thrilled to get a box (among his other gifts).

Tracy got a photo book with memories of our first half year in Malaysia.

And breakfast was delicious french toast, thanks to mommy's culinary touch.  

Christmas Eve

Christmas only comes once a year - so indeed, it is a ridiculous number of pictures - but what a magical Norman Rockwell house that Carrie had decorated.  We had lots of fun!

A host of presents were passed out and the kids sure enjoyed getting lots of cool stuff, as well as giving hugs and giving thanks to aunts, uncles and grandparents.

 Gabi was thrilled to get some nice new horses - and an American Girl Doll from the money that Grandpa Levi sent her - so she had a great Christmas!

And plenty of cuteness to go around!

Rania had a haul of horses. 

Reeve got a bunch of Hex Bugs, which as pretty cool to see them go around their Hive. We got to see Gabi in a beautiful Christmas dress and was thrilled to dress up with Laura - in their brand new boots.  (Though Doug blew the focus on one of the glamour shots). 

 But the food, family, and wonderful Christmas spirit were definitely the highlights to a wonderful evening.

Christmas Eve Brunch

Wow!  What amazing food.  It seems like night after night, day after day, morning after morning, we are treated to these amazing meals.  No surprise that in the Rhodes/Quinn/Woodward/Sandlin family, there is plenty of talk about meals and food.

My, and don't we enjoy it!  For Christmas Eve, Barrie's son, Brandon and his family, came over and we had a delightful Christmas Eve day.

Brandon and Reeve spent quite a long time figuring out the finer strategies of tic-tac-toe, we all enjoyed delicious food, and Doug was surprised by a clever gift by Barrie.

Somehow Barrie had found the paper from when the Colts were Super Bowl Champions.  It seems like aeons ago, as we are suffering through a 2-13 (and counting) season - with Peyton Manning's career possibly in jeopardy.  It could be a long wilderness of miserable seasons after the fallout of this year.  It was a good ride, but tough to suffer through such ignominy.  Let's just hope the Colts don't go and now blow the #1 pick for Andrew Luck next week!

Gingerbread Houses

Aunt Nicole and Uncle Jason went all out as all of the kids had the chance to decorate Gingerbread Houses.

What a delightful evening with delicious food, fun crafts, games, and lots of fun.  Some of the final creations are shown here as the kids got into decorating their houses -- though when Uncle Jason used construction glue to put the houses together (and smooth the process), we definitely didn't want to test our intestinal fortitude by trying to eat some of the houses!

Zoo Lights!

With the weather unseasonably warm (at least above freezing), we decided to take advantage of a "warmer" winter day and make our visit to the Zoo Lights.  We had gotten a membership to the Zoo last summer, and figured we'd better take advantage of a trip while in town.

And what a trip!  It is amazing the effort and detail about putting all the lights up!  It was definitely beautiful - though even with the "warmer" weather, it was still mighty nippy!  We did spend a long time standing in line for photos with Santa (we'll have to scan those, since they did not want individual pictures - you had to buy them!).

We went on the Zoo train, where the kids had fun seeing some of the lights around the African Savannah - though certainly no animals out at night!

The girls also enjoyed a ride on the carousel - riding tigers and cheetahs and all sorts of animals.





But definitely, the highlight of the evening is the lights - so many of them, and definitely a challenge to get some decent pictures.

Toledo Philharmonic

It was a brave decision to head out on the town for an evening concert of beautiful music in a warm church during Christmas season. . . .on a few days of jetlag.  Tracy did much better than Doug - who struggled to stay awake.

The church was beautifully decorated and it was nice to get some wonderful Christmas music as the final Christmas concert by the Toledo Philharmonic Orchestra.

But how fun/funny to be pulling out sweaters after so 4+ years in Malaysia!

Birthday (Again)

For the birthday season that just never seems to end, Gabi got to celebrate yet another birthday party once we arrived in Ohio.  A good excuse to fight jetlag, the it was cake and presents for the Gabriella.

And how wonderful to be with cousins - but smiles, fun games, and lots of adventures.  And of course, add some horse books or horse toys and it is all happiness!

Part II (continuation of the summer's adventures) was the imagination game that was played for hours in the basement and Michael and Jacob led the other cousins in endless adventures.