La felicidad que se encuentra: Kyle, Jenny, Alexa, Tyler, Tad, Liam, Nathan, and Audrey

I wish our Christmas break was another month!  We left at 1am on Wednesday night / Thursday morning the week before Christmas and started the drive to Arizona.  We got there just in time for lunch and naps on Thursday. Honestly, the kids did really well all things considered, but Alexa was awake from 3-5am, and they both obviously woke up earlier than normal.  We stayed with Grandma and Grandpa Swingle until Saturday morning, and it was great to have some one-on-one time with them.  Grandma shared neat family stories with us, Grandpa loved watching TV with Alexa, and we absolutely loved the visit and time to relax in sunny AZ.  We even took the kids swimming in their neighborhood pool.  And a random 80 year-old man offered Kyle his golf cart as we were walking by so that he could take Alexa on a ride down the road.  And then gave Alexa a granola bar. We got to California by dinner on Saturday and began our second Christmas.  The Swingle...

Alexa is really big into the alphabet right now, and she loves all of the "letter J's!" everywhere because of the candy canes.  She is constantly pointing them out to me, and then tells me what sound the letter 'J' makes.  She and Tyler helped me set up the Christmas decorations while Kyle worked the weekend after Thanksgiving (it's becoming an annual tradition that I set it up that weekend while he's working long hours), and she thought it was the best thing in the world.  We turned on the Chipmunks Christmas on Pandora and had a blast.  Her favorite book to read these last few weeks is "Graham Cracker" (Nutcracker).  It doesn't matter how many times I correct her, I'm wrong. We celebrated Christmas on the 18th before we left for California.  Alexa's big present was a toy kitchen, which was a hit for both kids.  Alexa keeps making me cute meals and bringing them to me, and Tyler absolutely loves chewing on all of the h...