Thanks.

Seasons greetings all. It was a quiet but nice Thanksgiving for the Cruz clan. After baking a couple of apple pies, we headed up to Yaya and Papa Ron's to celebrate Thanksgiving with them and Annette and Walt. Here's an action shot of Yaya making gravy.
Oh yeah!

The official turkey cutter in action. Note the sleeves rolled up for the job.

The kids are ready!

After dinner Papa Ron, Mason, and I went out to the shop to look at cars and listen to the juke box. Mason has a number of favorite songs on Papa Ron's juke box - Who Put the Bomp, Runaround Sue, Rock Around the Clock...the kid likes his oldies!

Turns out Mason also likes to open up the hood of the tractor.

And smell the gasoline.

He also demonstrated skills in filling the go-cart tires up with air.

Papa Ron has made some good progress in filling out the family tree on my mom's side of the family, going back to the 1300's on both of her parent's sides of the family. I was excited to see that we were relatives of the Griswold's!

On Friday the kids and I went to see Tangled, which turned out to be a good movie for all of us! We ate popcorn and candy.

Saturday night I had dinner with my good friends Sarah and Laura (aka Bacon and Lettuce). The sandwich is growing with kids getting added to the mix over the years. It's always good to see them.

In a bit of sad news this week, my friend Jill from grade school passed away after battling cancer for the last 7 years. I had known Jill since kindergarten. Her mom was one of our Brownie leaders. We were part of the same group of friends all through grade school where we had countless slumber parties and played at each other's houses.

Jill and I got to be especially close in 6th grade after she had been "dumped" by the so proclaimed popular kids. I suppose I was the next tier down from that group (I never worried much about such things) and she turned to me a bit at that time for friendship. She was so funny and so much fun to be around that I was more than happy to hang around with her more and we became close friends during that year.

During junior high and high school we drifted apart a bit and went in some different circles of friends. I will always consider her a friend and grateful to have known her.

A Happy Serving of Starch!

Random weekend in November. What is there to do but gather with family and eat some kumla! This time the kumla destination was Auntie Jo's house.

Siena found her Yaya.
The kid's table. It should be noted that it was only a couple of years ago that Luis and I, along with our cousins were still at the kid's table.
Mason came back for kumla seconds! We were so proud that the only thing missing was confetti and streamers. Good little Nor-rican.

Mason tested out Jay B's new hip...the giddy-up seems to be back in full form.

Auntie Lou and her frock. This was the picture she didn't know I took.

And the one she did know I took. Apparently this apron has been handed down a couple of generations. I thought she was just making a fashion statement.

Happy 93rd birthday to Grandpa (in a couple of weeks)! No better way to celebrate than with some kumla in your belly!

Yaya's got a birthday coming up in a few days too. Of course her candles had to be in some pumpkin pie. And Siena had to help with candles.

Heidi displaying her cup labeling skills...or rather Dan's who didn't think Heidi's was sufficient.

Miss Rory. We wore her out.

So we ate kumla, celebrated birthdays, and enjoyed hanging out. And of course didn't get home until 9 on a school night. Totally worth it though.

Good luck to Tualatin football this Friday in the state playoffs! Especially good luck to my favorite defensive end #3 (my cuz Travis)!

The Photographic Stylings of Siena

Hi all - It was an normal week in the Cruz household although not particularly one with a lot of photo-ops. After working late for the first week of another quarter end, it was nice to have a laid back weekend. The kids and I went to a holiday bazaar at Mason's school with Yaya. Yaya found her birthday gift and I found my Christmas gift. The kids found some silly bracelets so everyone was happy.

Yaya was kind enough to watch the kids for an hour so I could go for a run on Saturday which I haven't been able to do since Luis started working so that was nice.

Today we hung out at the house and hit Sushiland for dinner - kids request.

Since I didn't take any pictures this weekend, it seemed like a good time to share some of the pictures Siena has taken with the camera she got for her birthday. She is often her own favorite subject.