Merry Christmas!

I wanted to post this yesterday, of course, but if I did I was afraid I would give something away. The picture was one the girls did for Laura as a Christmas gift. Growing up the girls always liked going to see the same Santa so I asked the girls if they would want to go see him one more time and get a picture done for Laura. They were all very enthusiastic and got all dressed up - suspiciously so as Laura was wondering why they looked so nice that night at dinner. I then went out and had a bigger version of the picture made and we framed it and wrapped that as one of Laura's gifts. She loved it - and the tears showed it.

I guess it is a good holiday when there are lots of tears of joy and we had a few occasions of that yesterday. The girls were excited about all their presents, Laura in particular loved the art work she received, originals from Matthew Johnston and Andrea Moore, and I loved the thoughtfulness of the girls and Laura and our families. Laura got a bit sneaky and made one of my presents. We have been keeping corks from wine bottles ever since we knew each other - and yes there are a few corks. So she decided to sneak out of the bag some of the more significant ones from special bottles we had at very memorable times - a sandwich picnic in Switzerland overlooking Lake Zurich, our first New Years Eve dinner that I cooked and many others and made them into a tray. I loved it - it brings back such fond memories.  I will get some of the pictures up on our Picasa site but to give you a flavour - Martika painted this for Laura.

Outside of presents we had a wonderful Christmas holiday. We got to talk to the Bridger's in Sydney twice, the Moore's in Newfoundland and with everyone of the remaining Bell family in Texas we had an opportunity to talk to all of them. The Girls came over for lunch and after we opened presents we headed out to Mala Tang for lunch. It is a Sichuan Hot Pot restaurant. The food and service was great and every one had fun. The girls then had a big dinner with their Mom and their Uncle Keith, Aunt Lynn and cousin Sidney.

We hope all of our friends and families had an equally wonderful holiday - Merry Christmas and Happy Chanukah

Love Gary & Laura