It's Been Almost Non-Stop!

You'll notice that the date of the entry before this one is the 19th. That's almost 2 weeks ago. Well, things have been pretty non-stop since then for us. I'll give you a small break down of our last two weeks.

12/20: karate class for Duncan, Duncan's birthday party

12/22: Duncan's birthday, Anna's first day of winter break, Christmas shopping, Duncan's birthday Dinner, Jason and Kristi joined us.

12/23: Anna has a meeting with some school district people about Liam, More last minute shopping, wrapping presents till very late.

12/24: McAlister Christmas in the morning, Extended Foutz family Christmas Eve get together.

12/25: Christmas morning, open presents at home, Take family pictures in ElMonte, Spend the day at the Foutz compound, get home late.

12/26: Back to the Foutz compound to visit with Grandpa Letterman and Maggie, get home late.

12/27: Clean and pick up the house, Kevin's family comes over to play, Jason and Kristi come over too to watch the UFC PPV that night.

12/28: Head back to the Foutz compound to let our kids play with Kevin and Dawn's kids before they head back to AZ. Play some Rock Band 2 till late at Kyle's house.

12/30: Spend the day up at the McAlister cabin in Wrightwood playing in the snow.

12/31: Catching the boys up on their "off track" homework, later tonight we're playing board games with some friends from the ward.

As you can see, there hasn't been a whole lot of time for the Bloggy Blog. But we do have TONS of pictures, so I'll be playing catch up with all the things that have been going on over the next week or two.


Hope you've had as good a time as we've had over the past couple weeks.

Friday Flashback 12.19

Today's flashback photo is of Jennan. This was taken in April of 2007. She was a few months shy of her 2nd birthday. That's only a few months more than Tegan is now.

What a cutie face!

Jennan will be turning 4 next summer. Then on to pre-school! She can't wait.

Anniversary Day

Though our actual anniversary was Tuesday the 16th, we celebrated it by going to Disneyland on Thursday the 18th. Anna's mom and dad kept the kids Wednesday night, all through Friday morning.

We stayed at a hotel across the street from Disneyland Wed. night, spent the day at D-land, drove home that night, and I went to pick up the kids this morning (Anna went to work).

After dropping the kids off at Anna's folks' house, we went to Ernie Jr.'s Taco House for $1 tacos. After getting our fill there, we headed on down to Anaheim. After checking in at the Anaheim Plaza Hotel and Suites, we went to the Denny's down the street and had some caramel apple crisp a la mode, and hot chocolate.

The next morning we also went to Denny's for breakfast. It was a very hearty breakfast, and a good start to our day.

I wasn't really going to pose like this, but Anna got me before I put my finger down.

We went into Disneyland first to get some "Happy Anniversary" buttons to wear. We hoped that they would get us a pack of tortillas in Cal. Adv. We had our picture taken in front of the huge Christmas tree at the start of Main St.



We had some time before Ca. Adv. was open, so we went over to Space Mountain. The line was pretty short. But before we could get on the ride, it broke down. Bummer. But we did pretty much walk right on the Buzz Lightyear ride where I blew Anna away with my huge score.


After getting our buttons, got denied at Space Mountain, and did Buzz, we headed over to California Adventure. We went on Soarin' over California, then went over to the Toy Story Midway ride/game. Anna got in line, I got us some fast passes for California Screamin'. The wait was maybe 15 minutes for the Midway. Anna out scored me. The line was still short, so we got back in it. The second time, I outscored Anna by way more than she outscored me the first time. After that, we went over to California Screamin' and got in the regular line. Our fast passes weren't good yet. The wait was probably 30 min. or so. That's a very fun roller coaster. When we were done, our fast passes were good, and we went again.

We headed over to the Mission tortilla factory. Waited, got our free tortilla sample, and that was it. Neither of us were offered a pack of them. We went through again. This time we asked if we get a pack because it's our anniversary? Nope. Packs are only for birthday button people. Bummer. We also went through the bread demonstration.

From there we went to the Bug's Life Theatre to see the 3D show that the kids don't like. It's a fun show.

Anna wanted pictures of us with our bug eyes on.

That picture of me reminds me of those sunglasses I'm wearing. Wednesday was overcast and rainy. I didn't need my sunglasses. Thursday was sunny; but I had no sunglasses. I forgot them! The sun was bothering my eyes enough (I have very sensitive eyes), that I bought a pair in Disneyland in the morning. I was going to maybe return them at the end of the day, but decided to keep them.


After Bug's Life, we headed on over to Disneyland. Our lunch reservations would be soon. We got some fast passes for Big Thunder Mountain and headed on over to the Blue Bayou for lunch. We knew we needed to try the Monte Cristo sandwich (learned that from last year), but we both didn't want to get the same thing, so I ordered the mahi mahi (but we split both meals). The fish was pretty good, but small. It was on a huge bed of greens. We liked the Monte Cristo; me more than Anna. We both agreed that the powdered sugar was distracting, but I liked the berry sauce a lot, and Anna didn't care for it. The prices are outrageous, by the way.

Taken before the discrepancy between price and food was vastly apparent.

Anna being silly.

By far, the best thing at the Blue Bayou is the cookie boat! The cookie is so good and chewy, and the ice cream is nice and creamy. If we ever go again, we'll just be going for that.

After lunch, we went on Big Thunder Mountain (twice), Pirates, Indiana Jones (twice), Space mountain, Honey I shunk the audience (Anna's idea), Matter Horn, Snow White, Pinocchio, Mr Toad's, did a bunch of walking, etc.

In line at Indiana Jones.

As we were walking out to go to Naples restaurant in downtown Disney, the winter/Christmas lights and snow "show" was happening along Main St. Anna wanted a picture of her with the castle and "snow".

We went to Naples, found my cousin Colleen that works there and made a reservation. In the time before we sat, we looked around downtown Disney and walked in and looked in a lot of the shops there.

Once we were back at Naples, we had some really good mozzarella sticks, and a pizza. Italian pizza sure isn't what we're used to. Anna wasn't that hungry to begin with, so she didn't eat much. I was fine, so I ate more than she did. By this time, around 9:45, we were pretty much done. It had been a long day. We walked back to our car, and headed home. It was a really fun time.

A huge thank you to Anna's mom Bonnie, for watching the kids.

Breakfast With Santa

Last Saturday, the primary had a "Breakfast with Santa" activity. There aren't any picture of the breakfast part. There's just too many kids that need something continually, to have the time to take a few pictures. They had pancakes and eggs with milk or orange juice.

But Anna did get pictures of the kids sitting on Santa's lap...

Tegan wanted nothing to do with sitting on Santa's lap.

Now that dad has rescued her...

Pretty pretty Jennan

Liam was happy to talk to Santa.

Duncan's all about the whole Santa, lists, and being good this year.

After sitting on Santa's lap, the primary kids went into a room to make a Christmas craft. They were making a snowflake type thing with beads.

The kids were invited to wear their pajamas to the activity if they wanted to. Only about half did. A few of the leaders did too.

The gift from Santa this year was a pillow case. They were donated by Anna's mom. She made them.

All the kids that went had a good time.

It's How Guys Do Fancy- Update

Carl's Jr. has a new burger. It's called the Charbroiled Steak Sandwich. And with each new burger, there's a new commercial. The commercial for this burger is pretty funny...

...at least I like it. (Great casting!)

There's a coupon for $1 off a new Charbroiled Steak Sandwich HERE. I can't wait to try one.


**Update**
A few days ago, Anna and I split one of these Charbroiled Steak Sandwiches, and I have to say, I was greatly disappointed! Anna didn't care for it either. It had very little flavor. The Ribeye six dollar burger was 100 times better than this is. (But they don't have that anymore.) ::sad face::

Whoppers are way better too. (We had those last night. Happy Anniversary to us!)

Lucky 13

It was thirteen years ago today, that Anna and I got married.


Anna was 19, and I was 23.



We were married and sealed in the Los Angeles temple by James C. Brown, who was also my stake patriarch, and gave me my patriarchal blessing.



It was a very windy day.



Our photographers were friends of Anna's family, and not members of the church. They took great pictures, but the ones of us in front of the temple almost all have the angel Moroni cut off.



We had whopper hamburgers as our entree at our reception. They were only 99 cents each at the time. We also had tator tots, and an ice cream sundae bar.



We didn't have a receiving line at our reception, nor did we have dancing.



My ex-girlfriend, Joyel, caught the bouquet, and Anna's friend Mike caught the garter belt.



I grew my hair out for the wedding. I now consider that a mistake. I think I pretty much knew that I was going to maintain a shaved head hair style, but I guess I thought having hair would be a better idea. Now I wish I hadn't done that. Oh well.



One other thing we would change, would be to get people other than family to run the kitchen and maintain the food. Anna's siblings did most of that, and didn't get a chance to enjoy the reception or mingle or visit with friends and family. We felt horrible about that.



One thing that is for sure, Anna is the best thing that ever happen to me. Words cannot explain my deep feelings for her.



I love you Anna. Happy Anniversary.

This was taken the summer before we were married.

Here we are, eating Whoppers before the reception starts.

This is us now. (Taken last Feb. at my grandfather's wedding reception)

Monday Music 12.15

Other than the holiday music, I haven't listened to any CDs, but I have heard and seen some other music this week.

I keep meaning to rent a documentary on the band Joy Division called "Joy Division", and looked to see if some one had put it on youtube. They had, but it's just no fun to watch anything more than a minute on youtube sometimes, so I haven't seen much of it.

Here's "Digital" by Joy Division (probably my favorite song by them)



I came across an old video tape of mine I made years and years ago this week. This was the song it was on when I popped it in...

The Cure Unplugged, "Caterpillar"



I know there was another time/song I wanted to remember for this post, but nope, I don't remember. Oh well.

Oh Christmas Tree...

Last Friday, we went and bought our Christmas tree. We've gotten our tree from Home Depot the last bunch of years (at least 6), and this year was no different.

On the way there, I drove on the streets instead of the freeway, so we could see Christmas lights on the houses. And of course, we're listening to KOST 103.5, our home for holiday music on the radio.

This is my "which one?" pose.

"Helping" dad pick the tree! (Everyone say cheese!)

Practising for my Mr. Sasquatch photo.

Loading up the tree. The back is big enough, that 95% of the tree fits inside the van, and we just let the tip hang out.

We decorated it Saturday afternoon.

I picked one with a long trunk at the bottom. That makes for plenty of room under the tree. Next week sometime, Anna will put our Christmas train out under the tree. The kids are excited for that.

A Week Ago...

A week ago we went to the Disneyland parks. That Monday, there was some kind of private party at Disneyland, and it was closing at 6pm. I think we got there at about 3 or 4pm, so we went to Disneyland first. California Adventure was open till 9pm, so after Disneyland, we went there. It was a fun evening.

Waiting in line at the It's a Small World ride.

I'm amazed at how nice the new boats are.

We packed in some dinner: pumpkin bread, bananas, grapes, chips, & juice. We're in front of the Talk to Crush building in CA Adv.

In line at the new Toy Story Midway ride/game.

I'm totally schooling Jennan!

Up and down, around and around.




Fun Times.

Friday Flashback 12.12

Today's flashback photo is an old family photo of my side of the family. Keith isn't there so he must be on his mission. Dawn is there, so Anna and I have been married for a few years already at this point.

Kristi doesn't have dreads yet.

Mom didn't drop all that weight yet.

The married siblings were vastly out numbered at this point.

I chose this photo because next week, as my side of the family gets together for Christmas, we will be taking a new family photo. It'll be the first time we're all together in the last few years. We've been looking forward to having that picture taken for some time. I'm sure it will turn out good.

Last Sunday...

... the kids were looking particularly nice in their church clothes, so we took a few pictures.

Liam wasn't in the mood for taking pictures, but stood there anyway. Duncan was pretty happy that we said yes, he could wear the sunglasses in the picture. Tegan is a ham. That's Jennan's new favorite dress she's wearing.

It's How Guys Do Fancy

Carl's Jr. has a new burger. It's called the Charbroiled Steak Sandwich. And with each new burger, there's a new commercial. The commercial for this burger is pretty funny...

...at least I like it. (Great casting!)

There's a coupon for $1 off a new Charbroiled Steak Sandwich HERE. I can't wait to try one.

Putting It Out There

I thought I would put this out there...

We are interested in getting a bulldog.

Do any of you know of anyone who needs to find a new home for their current bulldog? We are open to "rescuing" one.

Do you know of anyone who has a bulldog that has had puppies recently? (though we're not interested in spending a fortune to buy one)

Or maybe you know someone with a bulldog that will be having puppies soon?

We don't have to have a puppy though.


Recently, Duncan's been on a big "I miss Angus/I want Angus to come back" theme. I don't know if it's from recently watching some home video that had Angus in it, or my bulldog calendar, or his own memories, but he's pretty sincere about it. I had a small talk with him yesterday about Angus won't be coming back. He was kind of sad, but accepting of the explanation. (And I can't talk about it for too long, or I get choked up.)

So I figured it might be time to try and network in finding our next bulldog.

Thanks.





There are some other breeds we might be interested in:

Boston Terrier
French Bulldog
Chinese Crested (hairless)
Bull Terrier

Monday Music

I found the Christmas music CDs this week. And we've been listening to those pretty regularly. But before that, I was able to listen to a couple of non holiday CDs.

One was Blink 182; The Mark, Tom, and Travis Show (The Enema Strikes Back). It's a live album, so there's a lot of cheering at the beginning and endings of songs. Fun to hear the music played in a live setting, but those guys are potty mouths.

The other CD I listened to was: Death Cab For Cutie; Plans. (That's in stark contrast to the Blink 182) It had definitely been a while since I listened to that CD. I believe I got it for Anna when it came out. The big mainstream single from the album was "Soul Meets Body". It's probably my favorite song on the CD too.

Soul Meets Body




Summer Skin (live)



Your Heart is an Empty Room




Death Cab can be pretty moody at times. I didn't include any of the dismal songs here. I don't particularly care for those.

So yeah, I don't see listening to much of anything else other than holiday music in the near future, but you never know.

Ice Cream?

Kristi asked what I used to make ice cream the other night, since the boys are on that gluten and casein free diet.

Well, in case you were wondering too...

I use a very simple recipe of a combination of rice and almond milks, sugar and vanilla. That's it.

Sometimes I'll add another extract like mint or rum. Sometimes I'll add some chocolate syrup or a very mashed banana. I've even put in peanut butter.

It's also fun to put in some food coloring. That also helps to keep it from being the same every time.

We use a Cuisinart ice cream freezer. It's either a 1 or 1 1/2 quart size. We keep the freezing cylinder in the freezer, so it's ready to go at anytime. It only takes 15-20 minutes to make the ice cream.


Another thing I've done recently, is make my own GFCF peanut butter cups. I modified a recipe I found, and used GFCF ingredients to make the peanut butter middles; then used Trader Joe's semi-sweet chocolate chips (diary free), for the chocolate coating. They are very good. Duncan likes them a lot.

So those are some of the desserty things we've done on the GFCF diet.

Friday Flashback 12.5

The year is 1986. The month is December. I'm the trombone player on the left. I'm pretty sure this is the El Monte City Christmas Parade. I got to decorate my trombone, as you can see.

In Dec. of 1986, I was a 14 year old freshman. I think that I remember the other trombone player's name in the picture is Eric. He was either a junior or senior; nice guy.

Being in band in High School was such a great experience. I got to do a lot of fun things, and go to a lot of fun places. After trombone, I moved to tuba and drums. Good Times.

It's crazy to think that that was 22 years ago!

Get Your Shop On! Dec. 4-7th

There's a coupon for 25% off of one item at Sports Authority, starting today (Dec. 4th) through Sunday the 7th.

Print your coupon from here.

You're Welcome.

Spaghetti!

We had spaghetti for dinner last night... as you can see!

GFCF FYI: When we have spaghetti, the boys get brown rice spaghetti noodles instead of the regular noodles. That means two pots of noodles, each with their own spoons to prevent cross contamination. We've done it so many times now, that it's almost a "no brainer" process. Not like it was in the beginning. Anyway, just thought I'd give you a glance at our daily type of food prep.

I forgot...

Just when I think I'm getting better at taking pictures of the fun stuff we do together as a family, I forget to take pictures of our family night activity.

It was Liam's turn to conduct. (That means he got to choose who said the prayers, which parent does the scripture story, what our activity or lesson will be [luckily he went with my idea], the tasty treat, etc.

For family home evening we made paper chain advent calendars. Basically a red and green paper chain, that we'll cut a link off of each day till Christmas day (a yellow link). Duncan, Liam, and Jennan each made one.

Our scripture story was Alma teaching about faith, and planting it like a seed in the ground, in our hearts. We've planted seeds together as a family before, so it was very cool to use that experience to teach a gospel principle.

For our tasty treat (refreshments), I made some ice cream. I put in a little rum extract with the vanilla, colored it blue, and called it "bubble-gum" flavored. Maybe next time we have ice cream, I'll make it pink and put in some peppermint extract.

Fun Stuff.

Monday Music 12.1

The only thing I can really recall listening to last week (and it might have been a couple weeks ago now) is Tommy Lee's CD, Never a Dull Moment.

The only song on it I really like is called "Hold Me Down", and the embeding is disabled on youtube; So to hear and see it, you have to go HERE.


Buuuuut, we did start listening to Kost 103.5 fm Friday. They play Christmas music all day every day till the end of December. That's the only music Anna wants to listen to in December. So that pretty much means that's the only music any of us get to listen to.

(We'll see.)

12 days of Christmas- traditional



12 days of Christmas- Hawaiian style

Duncan's Award

On Tuesday, Duncan was one of a handful of students in his class to get an award for the work they've done in school thus far. Duncan's award was for outstanding effort in math. I think some of the others were for writing, and being a "peace builder", etc.

We came to watch him get his award in front of the student's on his track. The next day was the last day of their track before having winter break, which for their track lasts until January 5, 2009. That's like 6 weeks!

With his award was a coupon for a free kid's meal at Claim Jumper. The girls were picked up for a sleep over at grandma and grandpa McAlister's house that afternoon, so Anna and I took the boys to Claim Jumper for dinner. CJ is not a good place for a kid on the GFCF diet. The only kid's menu item he could have was the two mini hamburgers meal. We asked for no bun. The fries are cooked in oil that is shared with coated onion rings, so they couldn't have fries. We opted for fruit side items instead since the boys like fruit. One side was frozen grapes; not as good as they sound, and apple sauce. Except the apple sauce is coarse, and seasoned with cinnamon. Neither of which the boys liked. So they basically had hamburger patties with ketchup and apple juice for dinner that night. Once we got home, I think Anna gave them each a GFCF cookie, and they were content for the night.

We are very happy for Duncan to receive some recognition for his hard work with math. We hope he continues to do well with all of his school work.

Friday Flashback 11.28

We're flashing back a whole 7 months for this one!

In the spirit of being thankful, here are 4 people I'm very thankful for. As you can see, this was taken April 10th of this year. That wasn't that long ago, but so much has changed since then.

Tegan wasn't walking yet. She wasn't even 1 year old yet either.

Jennan was still in diapers in April. She doesn't wear them anymore. Her hair is a lot longer now. In the picture, she is 2; Now she is 3.

Liam's birthday was right around the corner at that time. He was finishing preschool. Now he is in full day kindergarten.

Duncan was close to finishing Kinder, and now he's a top student in his first grade class.

Fun to look back, even for just 7 months, and think about all the growing that's gone on.

Pasadena Rugby Tournament

Last Saturday I took Liam with me to the Pasadena Rugby Tournament. It was held at Azusa H.S. in Azusa. They had 4 fields, 3 for games, and 1 for warming up. There were about 10 teams that showed up to play. It was a lot of fun to be back in the rugby mix for half a day, even if it was just as a spectator.

Here's Liam (sporting his Pasadena Rugby colors), chilling while I watch a game.


Good times.

Monday Music 11.24

Recently I popped in Blink 182's CD "Take Off Your Pants And Jacket". It always puts me in a good mood.

Here are some of my favorites...

Online Songs



First Date



The Rock Show

To see their video for this song, go HERE.



Roller Coaster (fan video)



Everytime I Look For You (fan video)



Please Take Me Home (audio)




Well, that's almost the whole CD's songs. Lucky for you.

Oh, by the way, they like to swear in their songs, so listen with caution I guess.

I think I listened to some other stuff too, but this is the one that I remember listening to the most.

What have you been listening to?

Friday Flashback 11.21

Duncan and Liam enjoying our piano. This was taken when we were in El Monte, so it's pre-April 2005. I think it's actually from 2004. Liam's up and walking, so it's after May or June of 2004. Anyway, it's from right in there some where.

Duncan's doing a finger walk down the piano keys. This used to crack Liam up, so Duncan was more than happy to make Liam laugh.

One of the reasons I like this picture is because of the shirts they're wearing. Duncan's says, "Rock and Roll Pre-School", and Liam's says, "B is for Bob". We still have those shirts, they're now in Jennan and Tegan's drawers. I think their auntie Kristi gave them those shirts.

Fun stuff.

Great to be 8!

This is a picture of Duncan at "Great to be 8!" on Sunday. Hard to believe that he will be old enough to be baptized next year. That's so crazy. But what a great thing for him to look forward to during the year.

If you don't know what "Great to be 8!" is, it's a small program for all the primary kids that will be turning 8 years old the next calendar year. Anna, as the Primary President, puts together a very cool program. They hear a small talk about the importance of baptism, they go to the font and get a "tour", they tell them about wearing white, they talk about proper priesthood authority, etc. Each child also gets a "goody bag". In it are stickers with church things on them, a small journal to write in, a framed picture of Jesus, I think there's a pencil in there too, I don't recall everything, but they all have a purpose. Duncan is also very much looking forward to becoming a cub scout when he turns 8. Fun Stuff.