Christmas Part Two

More of our Christmas pictures below:


Connor and Trent getting ready to have their first Christmas.


Grandma Ginni helping Dillon open some presents on Christmas Eve.


One of those presents was a re-gifted joke present from the Evans. Someone had given this outfit, straight from France, to Trent. Obviously, it was too hideous to throw away.


Dillon hamming it up for the camera.


Santa brought Dillon the Dinoco Helicopter, a toy guitar, and more Cars toys.


Now Dillon can play Rock Band with Mom and Dad with a guitar that is his size.


Santa brought Connor a complete set of baseball cards. Dillon also was given a set of baseball cards for his first Christmas from Santa.


Otis had to check out Dillon's presents from Mom and Dad. Don't worry dog lovers, Santa also brought Otis some Christmas treats.


This isn't Christmas related but it was too cute to not post.


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Now playing: Fleet Foxes - Quiet Houses
via FoxyTunes

Christmas Part One

Christmas was so big for us that I am having to post pictures in two parts. Below are pictures from our trip down to Shafter.


Connor met his great, great grandmother. Dillon and Kaleb also wanted to be in the picture with Mum.


Granny Barbara wanted to take a picture with all of her great grandkids. My Christmas wish was to snap a picture with all the kids looking in the same direction. Sometimes you just don't get what you want.


The pictures in this collage were taken for Uncle Larry's present. They were too cute to keep to myself, especially Connor stuffed in his stocking.


Our first Christmas celebration was at Pops and Grandma Dede's. Connor got help opening his presents from Grandma Sharon.


Next, we opened presents at Papa and Grandma Sharon's house. Dillon and Kaleb each got a hand stitched Cars blanket from Grandma Sharon. I bet you can guess what Dillon now wants to take to bed with him at night.


Finally, we opened presents at Granny Barbara's house. Dillon was very excited about his Lightning McQueen rolling suitcase. He can't wait to use it on his next trip to visit Grandma Sharon.

Part two of the Christmas pictures will come later.



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Now playing: Dashboard Confessional - Hands Down
via FoxyTunes

Merry Christmas

Pictures from Christmas to follow. Until then enjoy the Christmas card (below) the Cummings sent out.



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Now playing: Bing Crosby - White Christmas (2006 Digital Remaster)
via FoxyTunes

Dillon Moments

Dillon's version of "Jingle Bells" consists of singing the title over and over and over and over.

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Here is a conversation from dinner tonight:

Dillon - "My tummy hurts."
Me (concerned) - "Why? Did you eat too much food?"
Dillon - "No, the baby's kicking."

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Christina hid Dillon's Christmas presents after a day of shopping. He found one of them within the hour.

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When Michelle was in the hospital a nurse came in to give her some pain medicine. The nurse told her to take her pills. Dillon responded with, "Mommy likes pills."

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Dillon would spend all day reading his Disney book on his toilet if we let him.

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The forecast calls for snow for the next few days. Tonight it started so Dillon and I went outside to throw snowballs at each other and try to eat the snow. Hopefully we get as much snow as we did when he was nine months old. I am still trying to learn all the settings on my camera. The only decent picture that came out was the one below.



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Now playing: Vince Guaraldi Trio - Christmastime Is Here
via FoxyTunes

Rip-off?

Coldplay has had quite a few claims they have ripped-off other musicians with their new Viva La Vida album. I dismissed most of the claims until I heard the following this morning on the radio.



I do love me some Coldplay so I hope they are telling the truth when they deny any wrong doing.


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Now playing: Coldplay - Lost+ (with Jay-Z)
via FoxyTunes

Farewell Professor

Yesterday Greg Maddux retired from baseball. I never really appreciated him until he become a Dodger in 2006, when I was able to watch him for the last part of the season. I knew he was a great pitcher but the way he sets himself to field the ball after every pitch is rather amazing. I quickly realized how he won 18 Gold Gloves.

In 2004 I took the day off work and drove to San Francisco to watch Maddux win his 300th game. And in a random turn of events I was also there for the last win of his career, #355, which placed him #8 on the all time list.

Thanksgiving Pictures

Below are some pictures from over the weekend.


Baby's first Thanksgiving.


Papa sure was happy to have all his grand kids spend the night.


For the most part, these three played well together. Occasionally one of them would try to take the other's toy but on the whole they got along great.


Pops enjoying the always relaxed Connor.


Paint time!


Grandma Sharon helping Dillon paint a giraffe and keeping an eye on Taylor at the same time.


Dillon showing the mess he made.


But Kaleb out did them all by trying to eat his paint.

Simply Amazing

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Now playing: Coldplay - Glass Of Water
via FoxyTunes

Congrats James and Michelle

Trent James Evans was born at 7:52 p.m., weighing 8 pounds 1 ounce, and measuring 21 inches long. Mom and baby are both doing well. Here is a picture of the babe with the nurse holding him up for all us onlookers to view.

More Family Pictures

Some pictures taken with our new camera.


Connor is starting to smile. Most of the time it's just gas, but there are times when tickling the bottom of his feet also puts a grin on his face.


Did you know it is almost impossible to take a picture without Dillon trying to butt in? It's also impossible to blog without Dillon climbing on the couch and jumping on my back.


Dillon is close to owning every Cars toy possible. If I had a dollar for every time I have stepped on Lightning McQueen we could build a separate toy room with a life sized Mater and Doc Hudson.

No family photos are complete without Otis. He has been my test subject for most of my pictures due to his ability to stay still so I can experiment and compare the differences in the shots.


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Now playing: The White Stripes - My Doorbell (Album Version)
via FoxyTunes

Hello Baby Connor

Here are some more pictures taken by Aunt Teri during their trip.


Finally caught the little boy with his eyes open.


One of my favorite pictures of Connor and Christina.


Sleepy head did not like the flash going off so much as he tried to snooze.


Brothers don't shake hands, brothers have to hug!


Connor was too big of a baby to reenact the baby in the mitt, so we had to improvise. This shot (pun intended) will go great in my basketball frame. Soon enough Connor will be able to don his Pau Gasol jersey and team up with Dillon to defeat the evil Phoenix Suns.

Rock Star

Last weekend Aunt Teri, Uncle Les, and Nick came up to visit. Nick and I decided to get our Rock Band on.


Then Dillon decided he would join us as the lead singer.


Dillon was quite the performer, always playing to the crowd.


In typical rock star fashion, he wore an outfit that any normal person would never wear in public. For this performance Dillon modeled his full body pajamas with the stylish green Crocs.


For his encore Dillon brought down the house with "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" and the "ABC Song".


Once his show was over Dillon pushed away the paparazzi, returned to his room, and promptly destroyed it with a slew of toys.




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Now playing: Kiss - Rock And Roll All Nite
via FoxyTunes

Canon Rebel XSi

That's the new camera that arrived today. Now that I have upgraded from a point-and-shoot camera I will have to relearn photography. I took a photography class in high school and learned shutter speed, lighting, lenses, and apertures but have seemed to forgotten almost everything. Anyways, here are some quick pictures I took.


The new flash already works wonders in our house at night. Our old camera had trouble without natural lighting.


I can't take Connor's picture without taking one of Dillon.


Dillon trying to make a fish face with Connor. This would have continued for a while if Mom wouldn't have broken it up.


Mom sure loves her new baby.

"Stop taking pictures and wrestle with me!"



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Now playing: Jessie Baylin - Leave Your Mark
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Broken Camera

Wondering why there have not been any new pictures of Connor or Dillon? Our little Kodak camera decided it will no longer take pictures. No need to worry though because a new camera has been ordered from Amazon and will be arriving by week's end.



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Now playing: R.E.M. - Man On The Moon (Album Version)
via FoxyTunes

Happy Halloween