Marcus' brother and family came out from Washington D.C. for the baptism of their daughter Kasia and Thanksgiving. It was the first time Danelle met the whole family, his wife Amada and Marcus' godson Aleksander. The baptism was beautiful, Mike is the Godfather for Kasia and Mom was standing in for Amada's sister as Godmother. 

Our first Halloween at our new house! We had fun decorating, carving pumpkins and handing out candy to the trick-or-treaters. After living in the city for many years, it was the first time in the long time for us to get any kids. We got a good many, but still have lots of candy left over.

Kingston got into the excitement and dressed up, too; he was a little red devil. He did a good job wearing his cape, but he didn't like to wear the horns.

Introducing the newest member of our family, Kingston! We picked up the little guy on Tuesday and immediately fell for him, he is such a sweetheart. Also a little bit of a terror and a handful, but such a cutie. He's a Vizsla, also known as the Hungarian Pointer, 10-weeks old and weighs about 20lbs.

Marcus and I spent a beautiful vacation in Costa Rica where we also celebrated Amy's wedding. They were days filled taking in some amazing sites from waterfalls to volcanos and tons of nature and wild life. A couple of highlights was a relaxing evening at the hot springs, the exhilarating zip line and a beautiful at the wedding. Here are a few photos from the trip, you can view the full album here.

Wow! What an amazing day!! We are so happy and thrilled to be married, that everything turned out so beautiful and that we start our honeymoon shortly. :-) Thanks so much everyone for making it come out so perfect! Even if there was a second or two that Marcus was wondering if he was left at that altar. We hope everyone had a great time, we did! A few bits from the wedding:

• Danelle's necklace was something old, something new and something blue. The sapphire pendant was her wedding gift from Marcus, a hand crafted necklace (new) using the sapphire from her antique engagement ring (blue and old). Her borrowed was her mother's purse and Nina's wedding coat that she wore at her wedding.
• Marcus was wearing cuff links that his grandfather wore in his wedding in 1934, and his brother also wore in his wedding in 2002. Plus his lucky silver dollar in his pocket, which he also had on his first date with Danelle.
• A few of you asked, our first dance song was "Hard to Concentrate" by the Red Hot Chili Peppers
• Also, the wedding favor photos were all photographs by Marcus took from around San Francisco and New York, both special cities in our hearts. Thanks Pam and Cheryl for helping us assemble them!

Thanks again for everyone being there, it was fantastic! Check out the photo slideshow shown during the reception. Special thanks to some of the key people:

• Fr. Reynold for flying in from San Clemente. He did an amazing job, a great spirit and fun nature! Thank you Lisa for getting us in touch with him.
• Susan Collins and Paul Riofski of St. John of God parish for seeing us through all the marriage preparation and being there to make sure it all went well.
• Joel Flory our photographer, wow! the shots are amazing we are so happy!! You were such fun to work with and you guided as throughout the day. Thanks!
• Maria Chang, Danelle's hair/makeup and personal assistant. Thank you!! You gave Danelle the strength and support to be calm, beautiful and be able to enjoy the day!
• Terry Cole, our DJ, you did a great job running the reception, the music selection was perfect we got compliments throughout the night, everyone was dancing and enjoying themselves
• The Cliffhouse staff, especially Masoud for taking such care of us that night and Virginia for getting everything setup.
• Thanks Maureen for the stunning flowers, we received so many compliments about how beautiful they were.
• ... and last but certainly not least, thanks to everyone in the wedding party and family for all the little and big things you did Saturday and for all your love and support every day.

After many months of window shopping, we got serious about house hunting at the beginning of March. We went through what felt like months of dealing with realtors, banks, lenders, and signing tons of paperwork. Thankfully we had some good people helping us through and we were able to close in what I'm told is a relatively quick time. We got the keys to our new home today! The house is in San Carlos, a much closer commute to Danelle's work. It is a 3 bedroom + a small office, 2.5 bath ranch-style home with a great backyard for our future dogs! :-) It needs a little love and care, but we're excited to move in and make it our home. In the mean time, we're continuing with our wedding planning and are excited to get the invitations out. Danelle is checking the website daily to see as the RSVPs begin to roll in. The big day is less than three months away and really taking shape, but still lots to do. Plus with moving and setting up the new home, we're really looking forward to the honeymoon! Here are a few of photos of our house, more to come as we go:

I took Danelle to her first hockey game, the San Jose Sharks vs. the Phoenix Coyotes. We had a great time, the Sharks won, we had great seats and ate cotton candy and other stuff we probably shouldn't. We even got to see a fight.

For our 6-month anniversary, we went to Half Moon Bay, which is where we went our first weekend together. We just enjoyed the clear warm weather in January and our fourth time eating at Sam's. Afterwords, I took Danelle out to the Ritz to watch the sunset, it was her first time there. Next time honey, we'll even go inside. :) Here are a few photos from it. The top photo was made using the fun Poladroid app.

For Christmas we drove down to Palmdale so we could spend it with Danelle's family. Her mom is retiring this year and hopes to visit her grand kids for the next Christmases, so we wanted to make sure we could spend what may be the last Christmas in Palmdale. Also, it gave me the opportunity to meet her cousins and extended family. Plus Danelle was happy to see one of her best friends Amy, who also recently got engaged. On Christmas Eve, the tradition is to get together for a big meal, exchange gifts and play games; this year it was at her Nina's house.

Danelle's father started the evening with a heartfelt toast to us and our engagement. Nina got us champagne and a really nice engagement basket she put together. The entire family was very warm and welcoming me as part of the family, plus very curious to meet this Marcus guy. For dinner we had a tasty roast pork, tamales, mashed potatoes, yams and plenty of desserts.

After dinner, we played some family games. Danelle is often the one to organize the games, but this year being busy and coming down late, Sarah, a close family friend took on the reigns and did a great job with it. We played a Santa bingo game, which I won! :-) Plus a raucous dice game which involved fast rolling and stealing gifts, plus a white elephant game - more gift stealing.
For Christmas, we went to church in the morning and then spent a quiet relaxing day with her parents. We took our time and didn't get to opening gifts until after 4pm. As a kid, I think we wouldn't make it to 8am before opening gifts. :-)

The day after Christmas we went out to downtown Pasadena with her parents to pick-up / exchange a few gifts. In the evening her Nina, Nino and cousin Frank came over to play cards. We pass the deck around and the dealer gets to pick the game. One time when it came to me, I made up a game I called the "Wedding Game". The game was basically Baseball but instead of 3's and 9's wild, I made 7's and A's wild for our wedding date July 11. The first two cards I flipped over for myself, were 7 and Ace. Pretty funny, plus I won the hand which only seemed appropriate.

We drove home the next day. Thankfully we both had the next week off and it was spent mostly packing up Danelle's apartment and moving her into mine. For New Year's Eve we had a quiet evening at home, we were both pretty tired after moving. I cooked us a nice meal, which Danelle's said was her favorite to date. I made a butternut squash soup, risotto with roasted vegetables and a parmesan-dijon chicken. We enjoyed some champagne and danced to Louis Armstrong as we toasted in the New Year!
Here are a few other pics from the holidays...

This past weekend Marcus and I participated in establishing our own family traditions. I can remember Marcus sharing childhood memories of his family's adventures of cutting down their family Christmas tree. Once he said they had a live tree I was hooked on the idea.

I myself don't have memories of having a "real Christmas tree" but have always had a dream of one day walking into my home during the Holiday Season to be engulfed  by the fragrance of a real tree. Not to mention Marcus stated that after they were finished the family would head off to the near by playground and drink hot chocolate.

Little did I know the energy it would take to saw down a real tree!! I have vowed to start training to not only be able to fit into my wedding gown but to have the strength required to saw down a bigger tree next year. This Christmas however Marcus and I picked a cute modest tree. Small enough that I could easily place the Angel on top and not even have to stand on my tippy toes to do so.  We even have a small collection of Christmas oranments that I have started to collect from places we have visited and an ornament that is personalized with our names (a sweet gift from dear friends).

On Sunday, Marcus and I baked some Christmas cookies; "pierniki" cookies which are a Polish cookie that his family has been making for many many years. It is like a sugar cookie but with a strong anise taste, a little like black licorice.

I didn't know if I would like them, but after having a few, I do. It was a lot of fun to bake, roll, cut, frost and decorate them, but also a lot of work. I did get to use my sheep cookie cutter Marcus bought me several months ago, unfortunately they lose something during the baking and frosting and sprinkles; and the final product is not as cute. I look forward to the years to come to work on the cookie aesthetics.