Our last Christmas in Japan

Since we will be back in the States this time next year, we decided to do something a little different this year. We had breakfast at home, opened presents, played with the presents then headed up to Yokohama for our Christmas dinner. After hanging out in the Red Brick Area for a little bit, we found a Hawaiian Burger restaurant. It was a chain restaurant, but the food was good! It was way too cold to hang out for too much longer so we headed home shortly after eating. We will miss taking unplanned trips to Tokyo and Yokohama when we move!!!

Our science kid jumped right into this puzzle! 

Auntie S sent ninja turtle gear!!

Halloweening with Team Fletch

A very "Chili" New Year's Day

Coop snapped this pic! 

Justin had to work on New Year's Eve and Day, but was able to get away for a little bit to have lunch with us (on base, of course).
Coop wanted to go to Chili's (even though he never eats it!) and I can never resist their buffalo chicken salad, so here we are enjoying a little taste of America as we celebrate the new year missing our friends and family from back home.

Sam's first Christmas

Halloween 2013

It wasn't a surprise to anyone that Cooper wanted to be Mario for halloween. We already had the hat so from there we put together an outfit to fit the look. Justin was Luigi and while we thought about making Sam a mushroom, he ended up being the giraffe (from Coop's very first halloween) and I was a lion, but my mom was also a lion so we shared the mane. 

All of that fun was such a blur! 

"Halloweening"

Yes, that's a real word. Trick or treating here is called halloweening, and the base opens up to the public so the local kids can participate in "halloweening". I don't believe it's tradition out in town, but we did see a lot of halloween stuff at the Home store (Home Depot)...

Coop couldn't believe that all he had to do was say "Trick or treat" the

Christmas, Christmas Time Is Here!!!

Christmas is our favorite time of year and our radios will only be playing Christmas tunes from now until...Easter?!
We got our tree a few days after Thanksgiving and Justin couldn't wait to put lots of lights up outside! Ashley was in charge of decorating the tree. She picked out the ornaments and dressed up our tree beautifully! We still haven't picked up the wreaths, but we will soon....along with other fun decorations! Yay! It really is the most wonderful time of the year!!!!

A few pictures of the finished "product" will be on the way once i make some more room on our memory card!

Coop's "first" Halloween

Coop is finally at an age where we can really have some fun with the holidays! This year for halloween he dressed up as a Tiger for a birthday party and a Krabby Patty/Whataburger (Mmmmm...) for trick or treating.  Anyway, here are a few pics. This is the first year (since I've known him) that Justin refused to dress up. I was, of course, dressed to cheer on the Giants aka World Series 2010 champs!!!
Enjoy!

Pumpkin hunting

Papa came to visit just in time to accompany Team Allen to the pumpkin patch! Lots of football on TV set us back a few hours so we ended up going to a "parking lot patch" close to our house. Despite the somewhat shabby location, we had a ton of fun picking out pumpkins and snapping lots of pics! Cooper is in heaven anywhere that Ash is so the best shots are of those two together!