Marine World

Jack's cousin Avery who is newly potty trained was given the reward of going to Marine World for being done with diapers. And, lucky for Jack(still in diapers):), we were invited to come along, Jack's highlight was going to Thomas town and riding Harold the Helicopter and Thomas the Train. He was in heaven. We spent the rest of our time seeing the animals - Jack's favorite were the penguins. We also saw a sea lion show and a dolphin show.

Celebrating Christmas...

This Christmas we had a lot of fun and activity. One of the most exciting things that happened was the birth of Jack's cousin, Owen David Ahlem. We're sad we can't meet him because he's in Texas but very excited to have a new cousin.
As for Christmas, we headed into Turlock Christmas Eve and spent the evening with my cousins and brother at the Annual Ahlem Christmas Eve. Surprisingly Jack wasn't scared and walked right up to to sit on Santa's lap with cousin Avery (who was a bit less enthusiastic).


We spent Christmas morning with my twin brother Mark, his wife Lindsay, Avery and my grandparents. Here's Jack and Avery in their matching pajamas. That night we had Christmas dinner with my parents who just came in from visiting their new grandson nephew in Texas.

And, although we went to Grandma and Grandpa's for Christmas day, we still felt like we had a somewhat "at home" Christmas the next day opening stockings and Jack opening gifts from Grandpa John and Grandma Christy

Tree Time

We decided because we won't be traveling a long distance this year, it was definitely time to get a tree. So, we headed down to Santa's Tree Farm in Half Moon Bay and cut down our own. It was a lot of fun, although it did take us longer than expected to find the right tree. Jack mostly enjoyed running around the trees, falling in the dirt and directing dad as he sawed down the tree.