Happy New Year - Here's to 2009!

We would like to wish all of our friends and family (and faithful blog readers, whoever you are!) a Happy, Healthy New Year. May 2009 be a great year for all of us, bringing good health, happy times, success in business and school, peace and safety, and a better economy!

I like to spend some time on New Year's Day reflecting about the year we just finished and thinking positively about the year ahead. Our family used to do formal "resolutions" and share them with each other, but they seemed to always be the same ones, so we sort of stopped doing that. So instead of "resolving" today, i'm more "planning" - revising my on-going and never ending list of things to do - it seems as if I can never get that list down to less than 150 or so things. But, I'm re-energized, re-focused and eager to start tackling the "meat" of the Bar Mitzvah planning (I can't believe it's only 3 months away!), quite a few household projects, some exciting work prospects (Patti and I have some good things brewing and I'm still very hopeful about the law school prospects and I definitely want to turn my writing into more of a career this year!), and continued progress and success with my diet and exercise. (I'm so pleased that I'm well on my way with that and will soon be turning my attention to new ways to cook and live our lives healthfully on maintenance!) For us, 2008 was a great year and I feel very blessed at all the good in our lives, and hope that 2009 will be even better!

I have many pictures on my camera that I hope to download later today or tonight, so you may get two posts in one day. But I didn't want to wait for the pics to wish everyone well today and do an update.

Now for a quick update on what we've been up to. We have had a busy, fun-filled week since I last posted. Marlon's parents came into town on Christmas day and we enjoyed spending time with them without it being the time of dance or musical theater shows or other "big events" or with other family around. It was really nice to just do fun things together. We saw a couple of movies (Marley and Me was great and Marlon and his parents and Harrison enjoyed Valkiyre, while Jacob and Michela and I laughed our way through Four Christmases. ) We went to a couple of our Irvine "outdoor entertainment complexes" and walked around and ate. We took Midnight to the dog park. We walked around and explored the Newport Beach back bay ecological preserve. We took the kids ice skaing. They spent a day with the kids bowling and playing miniature golf. We went to temple . We celebrated Hanukkah every evening, lighting the candles, singing songs and all that. (and of course presents) The kids had friends over to play. We had neighbors over for brunch and spent time with my mom. We celebrated marlon's bday! We played with the kids' new ping pong/air hockey table in our bonus room, and we spent several evenings playing poker with our brand new really, really nice set of poker chips and cards and felt poker table top thing. (both were gifts from Patti and Brian, and were HUGE hits and the kids haven't stopped playing with them!) All in all, very fun times!

Enjoy the rest of your New Year's day and weekend and keep in touch! I'll update again soon with pictures.