I must have been a good girl this year....

We had our family gift opening/exchange last night..and as you can see, there were plenty monkeys in the house as usual..ha ha...It was exciting watching the kids open all their presents..Vali and Miri received a lot of nice stuff..I got vali air hogs remote control helicopters . There are two and you fly them and they shoot infrared beams at each other..If you shoot your opponents helicopter 3 times it goes down..they are pretty cool. Remote control helicopters must have been the gift to give this year..Vali ended up with 4 and all three of my brothers got one (from different people) ..My house was buzzing with copters flying all over the place.


Mirika got a watch and a bunch of new earrings (she had her ears pierced for one of her gifts).


Both the kids got new Fuji digital camera's with water proof cases from my mom, so they can't wait to go to the beach. The also both got new cell phones (from their dad, not me..).


I didn't get a camera or a cell phone..he he.. but I did get three things that were on my Christmas list, a BB gun, a new fishing pole, reel and tackle box with lots of goodies, and two Harry Blalock prints (the lion fish and a turtle)..I also received a bunch of mula, crock pot, gift certificates and a beautiful turtle shell necklace from mom.
My Rod n Reel
My air pistol..too cool!


One of the gifts i received that touched me the most was for hand made cross stick pillows that our seamstress made for me. (you can see one of them in the first picture behind Ulu on the couch). That was so touching as she put a lot of work into cross stitching the puppies on each pillow and I never expected any gift from her...very cool!



Today we are making a traditional Samoan umu complete with palasami (taro leaves with coconut milk), Roast pig, Pilikaki (Mackerel with coconut milk), breadfruit, banana and whole chickens.. everything is in the umu and cooking so I snuck away to take a break :)


Mom's making a huge steamboat roast and dessert..

Im getting really hungry :)


Hope everyone's having an awesome Christmas Day!

Ok. gotta go..back to cooking..more pictures to come later..