Early Morning

Just a quick post. Changed my hours at work for now in the winter so I go in at 8:30 and get off at 5. McKayla likes to stay a bit later in the afternoon to play with her friends. Anyways, decided to start getting up early to maybe work out someday, and have been hitting the beach for an hour or so before work. Been calm the last couple mornings, small surf and no wind. Been looking to get a halibut from the surf, but no go. Did manage this nice barred surfperch. Not bad considering they average between 5-7 inches. This one went about 11.5 inches. Caught a few small ones this morning, nothing big. Been nice seeing the sunrise at the beach and wetting a line...Not too cold...





Might go see the Newport Harbor Parade of lights (Christmas Boat Parade) on Friday... It's rated one of the top 10 Christmas light thingys in the country by some magazine or newspaper...

Hope everyone is doing well. We miss everyone...

Brandon and the Fam

McKayla at Gymnastics

Yesterday was McKayla's last class for this session of gymnastics. So being the last class parents are allowed to come watch. I must say that I was so excited to see how much McKayla has learned since our mommy and me gymnastic days. She has come so far in her "tricks" as Ms. Melissa calls them. She is already on the bars trying to pull herself up and flip over. Scary in my mind, but she seems to be getting the hang of it. We filmed her with our video camera and hopefully someday soon I will learn how to get the videos off of the camera and onto the computer. For now we took some still pictures and a video off my phone which I hope will work.

Here she is in her gymnastics stance and doing her stretches on the floor




McKayla being a butterfly~ flying all around!

Build-A-Bear

This past weekend was pretty exciting for McKayla. She is going to be the flower girl in Justin (Brandon's old college roommate) and Amy's wedding in March, so she got to model some beautiful dresses for us on Sunday. Sorry no pics of that~ Bad parents didn't bring the camera. We will get pics of her for sure when she is actually in the wedding and post them. I am sure you can all imagine how beautiful she was in the dresses anyways. For her gift Justin and Amy took her to a Build-A-Bear workshop in Fashion Island for her to create her very own friend. We have never been to a build-a-bear before so this was an exciting adventure for all of us. When we walked into the store we were bombarded with so many different animals, teddy bears, dinosaurs and even reindeers (for the holiday season) to pick from as step 1. McKayla took her time and checked out each and every one of the options but as soon as she saw the green dinosaur (a triceratops to be exact) she was sold. Next we take it to the sound station where McKayla got to pick out what noise she wanted in her dinosaur. She decided on a "Roaring" sound although she claims it is not a scary dinosaur but it is a good fit. Next we take it to the stuffing station where they stuff it a little bit and then they have the kids pick out a heart, rub it in between thier hands, pat it and put it in the animal. Here are some pics of McKayla watching her dinosaur get stuffed.. (Thanks Justin for the pictures)



After that Mackie got to pick out clothes for the dinosaur. They had more options for clothes there than I would have ever thought possible. She decided on a blue fairy princess dress and some high heels to match. Here are some pics of Mackie and daddy dressing the dinosaur.


So after all this you would think we were done. WRONG! Now it is time to get a birth certificate and name the dinosaur. McKayla picked out the name Sella for her dinosaur. The Birth Certificate is printed out and waiting at the cash register for you, but also near the register are tons of accessories for the "bears". McKayla being the girlie girl she is could not resist in getting Sella a purse. I am sure she would have gone all out with accessories if we would have let her. McKayla had so much fun picking out her new friend and we have a new member of the family that joins us everywhere we go. She even goes to work with mommy~ (mommy lets her keep an eye on the car to make sure no one breaks in~ just don't tell Mackie) Here is McKayla with Sella

Thank you Justin and Amy again for Sella~ McKayla loves her new best friend!