Christmas Time!

We've had a little time now to let our Christmas travels settle in and marinade while getting over jet lag and trying to catch up with the pace of life once again. Finally we have a little time to update our blog chronicling our latest greatest adventure. 

It's fitting, I suppose, to begin with this photo since this was the first Christmas that Maya showed any sort of recognition about Santa. Here, as anyone who knows Maya will understand, Maya is quite leary while her sister was all for sitting with Santa.

In the airports she was much more agreeable to the idea of looking for Santa in our explorations and even started looking forward to his visit by the time Christmas Eve arrived.

 To the right we have the best of a series of photos of the two girls posing during Mike and Emily's engagement party at Aunt Barbara's house. What can I say--Maya hates sitting for a picture. We had a great time seeing some fam after such a long trip.

Maya and Naila had a great time with their Grandmas. Nini (Nancy) and Maya spent a whole lot of time together. Here they are putting up some Christmas window decorations.

This was Maya's morning ritual. She loved sitting at the bar and waiting with Rosie as Nini prepared her favorite of the day: Pancakes, oatmeal, juice, cereal etc.

Here are Maya and Nini at dinner--they look like twins don't they?

We had a surprise visit from Burke, Tiff, and Sully, and another one from Joe, Kristen, Tess, and Elsa. We were so happy to see everyone. Maya fell right back into it with both Tess and Sully.

Here is Ranger with his girls. On a couple of nights he was the only one who could calm miss Naila. The became good buddies on this trip.

My new favorite picture of Maya. Her long blonde hair juxtaposes nicely with the bindi to show her worldliness which is then tempered by the superman 's' which I'm sure she intended to demonstrate her selflessness in the pursuit of a better world for humankind.

Once again with Sully in Vancouver (thanks Tio and Tia!). We had such a wonderful ski vacation and the kids had a great time hanging out again.

Sully and Maya loved the cabinet of the TV stand, but we're pretty sure it was Naila who introduced them to it.

Upon discovery, she spent the majority of the rest of the trip hiding from us in there. Every once in a while she invited her sister and Sully in.

Booyah! We had a great day on the slopes topped off by a great time at Merlin's--and some fine Canadian brews too!

Another picture of these two having fun in the water.

When it finally started snowing we were having an adventure walking about Blackcomb Village and decided to make our own little Frosty. What a fun night.

Back in Delhi after a wonderful, inspiring and excting trip. Momma and babe too tired to go to bed.  Enough said.

Merry Christmas from all of us

Decorating the House!

Today Laura and I put up the our tree. Here is my beautiful bride next to our very natural tree, we got a Lodgepole Pine.
No tree farm for us! We got a permit to go out into the woods and cut down a tree in a recently clear cut section of the forest. We help mother nature by thinning out the forest, and she helps us with a beautiful and natural tree.
Here is the house from outside for all of you who were wondering what it looks like. Our address is 3749 Lafayette St. Denver, CO 80205.

Mas! Give me MAS!

Again, we're in reverse!Yo!  Here is Nick overlooking the sun up Bowl at Vail.  BOOYAH!
NEW SKI OUTFIT!
My gangsta cousins were out for New Year's!
Another Cousin with a honey baby.
Here is how we spent our cruise mornings!  They were pure joy!  Laura would want me to tell you all that she did win the aggregate cruise game.  Damn!

Photo Update

This posting is in reverse...the beginning is the end.  Isn't that fun?

Here are Grandpa and Grandma Manker.  They seem to set a great example for us to follow.  (Hint hint, Laura if I get cold, put your arm and coat around me!)
We were happy together even when our ship sank!
This was the great Captain's Cocktail on the cruise.  We snazzed it up and Laura dominated the contest of best looking on the ship!
The grandparents won the dance contest and later gave lessons.  Mom and Dad Manker are in the background strutting their stuff like Prince Henry (my former rooster).
Here is Momsy dominating the slippery, salty, humid, climbing wall.  She was awesome.  She also conquered the iceberg! (yes, we were permitted to climb an iceberg that we encountered).

For all you loyal readers, I apologize, it has been far too long.  Here are the photos I promised.  

Our tour of these United States!

Well, school is back on. We reluctantly returned yesterday to school and found that it is not so bad. We realized that we were incredibly fortunate to have had a brilliant Christmas break and that we can deal with a return to our normal lives. Here is a quick recap:

Laura, Guapa, and I drove to St. Louis the day that school let out and arrived around 1:00A.M. We had a wonderful day with the Hinksons and celebrated a slightly early Christmas chatting exchanging some presents, and playing backgammon. We had a delicious dinner prepared by Nancy. The next afternoon it was off to Tampa Bay to begin the cruise. Of course there was bad weather and both of our flights (yes, two different routes for us) were delayed. I was originally supposed to arrive at around 9:30 and ended up getting in at more like 12:30 in the A.M. Laura had beaten me by about an hour. We went to the hotel and slept.

The next day we greeted the Manker Clan and then jumped on the Grandeaur of the Seas! To sum up the cruise ship I'll use 3 words: Food, Family, Fun. It was great to see everyone. My favorite part was snorkeling in Cozumel. Laura taught me how to clear my ears and go deep so we eventually were able to dive 40 feet down and check out the coral reef! It was spectacular even if we saw a venomous sea snake and yucky eels!

After the cruise we returned to St. Louis for a brief visit again before heading to see Archie and the gang in Michigan. At the old homestead we had another brief but fun visit, and I guess it was inevitable, but Archie grew--a lot since I last saw him! He is much more interesting and alert than I remember.

Leaving Michigan was tough as always but this time we had the added bonus of taking Nick with us. Ol' MJ decided to come for New Year's and a visit in Colorado. We blasted through the whole day and on through the night and completed our journey after 18 hours and 1200 miles. We slept for the evening and then drove to the mountains for some skiing and New Year's festivities. Jess was wonderful in putting us up not only for the night, but about 3 days as we skiied and enjoyed ourselves. We went to Breckenridge and Vail.

Finally on the last day of our winter break we went snowshoeing (kind of) in the mountains near Idaho Springs. It was a lot of fun and I think Guapa loved being outside in her mountains again.

Well, I'll have to add all the pictures that we want to accompany this post later.