Where to Start.............

Last few weeks have been pretty full of fun, adventure and a little disappointment, but I do recommend a Christmas after New Years, kinda perks up first part of Jan !

We have been as busy as can be seeing Katie, she is growing and starting to look like herself instead of what "we" all see in her. Sadly she is getting bigger ears, that's a Dustin trait! Yeah Dad

Since we expected Casey, Jay & Janelle and Jason and his buddy for our Christmas in Jan, John and I had to finally gut the office, found some interesting things we had and had not been missing. I took 4 lap tops, 1 printer, 2 cell phones to a eco-recycling place over in Shingle Springs. They refurbish with Microsoft to give to needy, they are very proud of the fact that they do not send work overseas (child labor ,etc) it's all done in Calif. They also have e-waste fund raisers. Pretty neat, I'm going to talk to Janet who is youth leader at Cool Community about doing a fund raiser for youth group. It's weird how now everyone has some kind of e-waste in their home, but we're not sure what to do with it. I got a answer !
Anyway on to Christmas. Jay and Casey drove up wed, Jason was leaving Utah Thursday after work. Janelle was flying in Friday night about 9 pm. As we were sitting around Thursday night, jay realized that Janelle's flight was booked for am. None of the other flights were going to work, so she had to miss Friday class, but got to come up earlier, that was fun. About 12:30 am Jason called, he was in Battle Mountain Nevada. He had hit a deer, not a lot of body damage, but his radiator was crushed and car was overheating. He had to have it towed and never made it to California.

We were soo disappointed not to get to see him. He and Casey have not seen each other in over 4 yrs. Casey has Southwest credit, so I think they are going to work out getting Jason back to Birmingham on a long weekend.
Despite missing our 4th son, we had a great day, Great Grandpa Hobbs came up, we just kinda hung out and opened presents. I think the coolest gift, besides Katie, was we were able to get Casey a copy of a picture of Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison Concert that has never been public before. It's not the greatest "Cash" picture but a great performance picture.

Casey is quite the guitar player, recently he bought another harmonica, total of 5 now.He's got the neck holder so he can play guitar and harmonica together. I'm quite impressed ! He is quite influenced by Bob Dylan's songwriting. No Idea Where That Came From At Our House. Hank, Jackson, Jones,Haggard, I could understand. Dylan I'm at a loss to explain. But he is becoming a great songwriter and musician, I am so proud of him, miss him a lot.... 2-3 times a year is never enough to see your children.
Janelle and Jay are becoming Ucker (card game) pros. They are always eager to play, and getting pretty good. Very cool for John and I to be play the card games we used to spend many a night playing with Grandpa and Grandma Holcom. Brings back good memories. So enjoy the new pictures.

Notice my Dale Jr. Ornaments (new this year) I have a countdown clock on my desktop to Daytona, but speed weeks start 2 weeks before that so I'm almost there !!!! All for now, love to all..............