Merry Christmas! We hope everyone had a great Christmas, got to spend lots of time with family, and were able to take some time off of work. Jill and I spent Christmast in Birmingham again - shorter trip home this time though (less than a week). Ashley and her family were in town so we had another full house at my mom and dad's.

We spent Christmas Eve with Jill's mom and Mike (another great lobster dinner). We spent Christmas morning with the kids at my mom and dad's house. It's a lot of fun watching the kids go nuts over their presents! Roy showed up again this year (with a twist).

We really enjoyed spending time with everyone! We wish we could have stayed longer. We appreciate all of the wonderful gifts that were given to us. We love and miss you all!

The Shake Shack is, well, a small shack located in Madison Square Park. We found it one day while we were going to see the Flatiron Building. I grabbed a cheeseburger and cheese fries - Jill only got cheese fries. The food was outstanding - Jill agreed after trying some of my burger.

How good is it? It's so good that we went back again - in the freezing cold! It was below freezing and the only tables they have are outside. First of all, we stood in line in the cold. Then once we got our food, we sat at one of the outside tables. It was so cold (they were installing heaters, but they weren't ready on this day).

We had to put our hands in our pockets between each bite. Yes, that's how good it is! It was worth it - and the shakes are amazing too!

The Universtiy of Alabama Alumni Club of NYC had their annual Holiday Part at St. Bart's Cafe. This place is in Midtown next to the Waldorf Astoria Hotel. We met up with our friends Lisa and Tim and we had a really good time. Among other University officials, Dr. Witt (President) and Mal Moore (Athletic Director) were there hanging out with everybody. They gave some great speeches about how things were going at the University of Alabama - very exciting things on the horizon.

We enjoyed listening and chatting with them, the open bar (very nice Bulleit Bourbon), food, and the silent auction (which Lisa won again this year). We also ran into one of my fraternity brothers who we haven't in many years - it was great seeing you again Daniel! Roll Tide!

We moved right at the beginning of baseball season, so we quickly jumped on the Yankees. The Giants and Rangers came next, but before basketball season, we found out that we would be moving to Phoenix. Given this, I told Jill that since we loved going to sports games we should choose the Phoenix Suns since we would be moving to Phoenix and had not yet gotten into the Knicks.

I have been traveling to Phoenix every month this year, so I watched some games last year and really enjoyed them. Nash is just plain incredible, and I really love watching that man play ball. So I had already decided – I am for the Phoenix Suns.

Jill didn’t buy into this so quickly. She has always loved basketball and was even on the dance team for Alabama basketball in college. She has also always loved the New York City Dancers. But I still tried to talk her into it, and she finally started to come around. I was able to get her to buy a Suns shirt and pull for them during the game.

We had a great time at Madison Square Garden, and the Suns were victorious. We realized how much we miss basketball – especially Jill. Go Suns!

Jill wakes me up this morning with the “it’s snowing” cry! For those of you who have lived in Alabama, you’ll understand this. For the others, we just get excited when we see snow since we didn’t see much growing up in the south. It wasn’t a ton of snow, but it was enough to make the city a beautiful white color.

Jill takes Levi out to the dog run right away - this is his kind of weather! They are gone for a long time – they finally come back and she tells me how he was having the time of his life out there. He was running around and playing with other dogs more than usual, howling all the way. He ate lots of snow and never wanted to come back in when Jill tried to tell him that it was time to go.

After that, we headed up to Central Park – nothing better than walking through Central Park in the snow – absolutely beautiful! We walked right through the heart of the park and enjoyed the spectacular views. Another note about raising kids here – instead of sledding down their yard in the snow, they come to Central Park and sled there. We saw quite a few of them riding their snow sleds down the slopes!