The Bingham Family Review

For those of you who did receive our Christmas card this year this might sound a little familiar to you. For those of you whose cards got lost in the mail you might enjoy hearing about our year.

2008 has been a great year for us. As you know, we started our Bingham family on February 2, 2008 in the Oakland Temple. Our wedding day was perfect and we were so happy so many of our friends and family were there to celebrate with us.

We moved into an old brick warehouse that was converted into a loft in Oakland, CA. It has 20 foot ceilings, brick walls, hardwood floors, and a wall full of windows. We love it! We can run around the house and even play glow in the dark Frisbee with our new Frisbee that we got for our wedding - thanks Emily!

We have been enjoying our new married life together and have been keeping very busy. Rick is currently the ward clerk and the first councilor in the Elders quorum presidency (has since been released as the ward clerk) and I am the first councilor in the young women's. We enjoy our very diverse ward which includes inner city Oakland.

Rick is still at Del Monte and has moved from the StarKist business on to the dog biscuit business. He is now managing the Milk Bone & Meaty Bone brands and loves to spend time in the pet food aisle of the grocery store. I now realize that the tuna fish aisle wasn't so bad after all. I am still at ChefsBest and am working on my ninth year there. I am currently doing sales and marketing, working with all the big food manufactures. I now get to travel to fun places like Battle Creek, MI and Minneapolis, MN to visit with Kellogg and General Mills. Sometimes I make it back to the kitchen and do a judging session or two.

We have had a ton of fun together this year. We started our married life off with a two week vacation to the West Indies. We started in Jamaica and spent 4 days there in a bungalow on the rock cliffs over looking the beautiful blue ocean and beach of Negril. We then flew to Grenada and the Grenadine Islands. The Grenadine Islands are a bunch of deserted islands about 60 miles off the coast of Venezuela with beautiful sandy beaches and blue water, perfect for a honeymoon! We went sailing, kayaking, snorkeling, exploring and of course took our yellow rubber raft with us. We ate great food and had a wonderful time.

A few months later we spent the week in the Mexican Riviera. We went to Cabo San Lucus, Mazatlan, and Puerto Vallarta. We went jet skiing, shopping, boogie boarding, sailing and zip lining.

This summer we did some camping in Santa Cruz and at Lake Berryessa, went 4 wheeling in the Sierra Mountains, entered a tuna fishing contest in Oregon (we did not win but we did catch about 60 pounds of tuna), hiked in the Lava Caves at Lassen National Park, and spent the 4th of July in Westwood. We ended the summer season with a 27 mile backpacking trip along the Lost Coast of California hiking along the beach with the bears.

We hope your year has been as great as ours! Happy New Year!