Christmas 2007 De-Briefing

Well, we are back in Denver - safe & sound. Christmas this year sure was great fun. It was Kate's first and her best yet! We spent about 9 days in Wisconsin at the "Branch Ranch". The week included many great events & activities. To start the week my folks hosted a Cash Family Christmas Party (including extended relatives from my mom's side of the family). Complete with a White Elephant gift exchange and Kate having the pleasure of meeting her Great Grandmother Cash. We did take the quintessential 4-generation picture:


We went on to celebrate Christmas, in which Santa did make an appearance (see the previous post for a photo of Santa & Kate). The day after Christmas Kristin's boyfriend Mike and Greg's girlfriend, Amanda joined the party to get a taste of the Branches. Both Mike and Amanda were great additions to the trip, including gifts from "The Kingdom of Tonga" (where Amanda is the Deputy Country Director of the Peace Corps) as well as plenty of baby time with Kate from both of them. Mike is particularly fond of babies, which was EXTREMELY well-received by both Kristin and Kate! The day after Mike and Amanda arrived we all participated in a very "Faulker-esc" round of paddle-tennis games. It was tons of fun to get out and play some paddle-tennis outdoors and Jeff really enjoyed it. Matthew and Jeff were "Team Testosterone", complete with an overly aggressive move by Jeff which ended up in an extensive injury to his hands. He wound up with much of the skin on his fingers gone as well as scrapes on his shoulders, knees, and elbows. Here's a shot of his hands, post-injury:




The remainder of the week included plenty of snow, which was great for cross-country skiing and a couple different puzzles. Mike and I became geeky puzzle buddies.







All in all it was a great trip to Wisconsin and we were reminded of why people endure the cold winters in the Mid West - they make for warm fires, plenty of wine and good family time!