Snow Day 2010

It's been 10 years since we've had snow like this. TEN YEARS!! Needless to say, we were very excited. Especially since we have the little princess now. We had the most wonderful time playing in the snow. Tim built a snowman with very fluffy snow-very impressive. And Finlay helped by...well, Finlay just made yellow snow. We got about 6 inches at our house. The electricity went out for several hours, but all of Avery's frozen milk survived (thank goodness). The snow melted almost as fast as it came. Here are some, who am I kidding, a bunch of pics from our wonderful day. I love snow!

Our backyard

Avery's wearing a hand knitted hat that was mine as a baby

With Fred Snowman

Finlay sniffing Fred...

and bounding in the snow

Playing in our front yard

Happy B-day Aunt Shaunna!

This weekend we headed to the beach to see the evil twin for her birthday (she's turning 28...again :) ). We had such a great time! Shaunna has a beautiful house that she has been decorating, painting, etc. It was great to see the work she has done since the last time we saw it. Now if we could just get those neighbor's pesky kids from tearing up her lawn! I offered to have Finlay strategically place poo, but she didn't take me up on it. Oh well.

Saturday we did a little shopping and that night we had a fabulous dinner at one of our favorite spots. Avery got all dressed up and even put a bow in her hair for the festivities. Just thinking about the wonderful food makes me wish I had more than a lean cuisine for dinner. Oh, so yummy. Our time was short but wonderful and we miss her already. Happy Birthday Shaunna!!!!!

Here are some pics from the weekend. And a little update on Amy: no cancer in any organs, although there are some spots that are suspicious around her clavicle. She had her first chemo session on Monday. For my med friends -she's on taxotere, paraplatin, and herceptin for stage 1. Anyway, keep her in your prayers as she goes through this very tough year.

I hope everyone as great week and Valentines day!

Shaunna and Princess

At the birthday dinner

38 Weeks

Let It...Frost?

I just talked to my friend Summer and they have 8 inches of snow where she lives! I don't think I've ever seen that much snow. This weekend we got a little ice and this morning the grass had a some frost on it. I guess that doesn't really count for much, but I still got excited seeing the little bit of white in the yard. We'll just have to take Princess up to visit Summer so she can see some REAL snow.

This weekend was pretty uneventful considering it was freezing out. Tim and I did get to go on a date night Saturday. It was really nice to get out and have a quiet dinner. Mom and Dad were kind enough to babysit for us. Dad even brought his guitar to play for Avery. That is one thing I really miss from when I was younger. Pretty much ever night Dad would come home from work and play his guitar before we went to bed. Sigh...kinda wish I would've stuck with those guitar lessons.

Oh, and Avery's allergic rash cleared up as soon as we stopped the wheat. She's starting to feed herself some with the rice cake bits. She does great with it. I'm still scared to death she's going to choke, but I gotta let her spread her wings :). I hope everyone has a great week!

Avery's first guitar lesson from Dad

37 Weeks (Thank you Alison, Kyle, and Hayes for the too cute outfit!!)

The Little Gym

Avery and I joined our cousins Bella Grace and Katie in a gym class for 4 month to 10 month old babies. Our intro class was last week and today we had our first real session. O.K., I know...a gymnastics class for infants??? It really is great though. There is music, bubbles, balance beams, rings, and lots of other fun things. The girls are too cute playing with each other and Katie and I get some adult conversation (always a plus).

We are trying more new foods since the princess is 8 months old now. She is eating her first meats(chicken and turkey) and we're trying mango tomorrow. I make most of her baby food, so we get to try a lot of different things. The one generic store bought baby item I tried last week was Gerber sweet potato puffs to practice finger foods. Um, that didn't go so well. Apparently these items are mostly made of wheat...which come to find out, Avery is allergic to. I'm hoping this is something she will grow out of (like I have). Wheat is in everything!! Cherrios even. I ended up buying unsalted rice cakes to break up for her to practice. We'll see how she does with those.

I hope everyone is having a wonderful week. Oh, and go Cocks! They beat #1 ranked Kentucky last night in basketball!!

Avery and Bella Grace on the parachute

On the cheese wedge. I think that's a "love pat" Avery is giving her cousin

Avery's classic presentation of allergy related hives from her wheat puffs :(

36 WEEKS

We're going to have to move those blocks further away next time :)

A little family drama

Where to begin...this past week was rough, to put it mildly. Sadly, we lost my grandmother Rhoda. She was a beautiful and wonderful woman. She had her share of health problems, but it was still a shock to lose her. My Mom and Aunt Connie are holding up alright. They were able to get everything together fairly quickly. The funeral service was beautiful and we saw a lot of our cousins we haven't seen in a long time. The most meaningful part was my Dad playing the guitar and singing "On Eagle's Wings". It was beyond gorgeous.

On top of this sadness, Monday my brother's girlfriend Amy found out she has breast cancer. They gave her the news and 2 days later she had a mastectomy and ports placed for chemo. She is only 28 years old! For my friends in the medical field- it is HER2 positive breast cancer. 17 of the 24 lymph nodes were cancerous. She is stage 3, so she's been told she'll be undergoing chemo and radiation for at least a year. Amy is probably one of the strongest people I know. She has this "kick butt" attitude towards it, so you can't help but think positively.

Thank you everyone for your prayers and thoughts of concern. It really does mean a lot. And please continue to pray for Amy's speedy recovery. We'll keep you posted on any news.

Enough of the sad stuff! This week we had some happy times too. Avery and I had a lunch date with some friends at a cute little bistro downtown. She loves hanging out with little ones her age :). Also, her cousin Bella Grace (Jason and Katie's girl) was baptized this weekend in a sweet ceremony. I have to say, that baby is gorgeous. I know she's family and all, but oh! The baptism was followed by a fabulous luncheon and time with our loving family.

I was a little out of sorts, so my picture taking suffered. But here are a few memories from the week.

William, Elizabeth, Camden, Avery, and Cassie enjoying a wonderful lunch

Aunt Connie and Mom at the baptism luncheon

My little ones. Don't they just melt your heart?

35 WEEKs

Just in case you couldn't see them above-now presenting o and p :)

Sniffles and a Birthday

We are finally getting over our colds we've had for way too long. There are still some sniffles but we're feeling much better. I ended up getting a cold vapor humidifier for the princess and it helped a lot. Plus, it's really cute. It's shaped like an elephant and the vapor comes out of its trunk :).

We celebrated Mom's birthday this weekend and got to have a fabulous dinner at our usual place. We would have celebrated it on her actual birthday, but Dad took her on an amazing surprise trip. He took her to a luxury resort south of Cancun. Apparently, it was so wonderful that they didn't leave the resort the entire week! Ugh, so jealous!

Mom's Birthday Dinner

Our house finally looks like a kid lives here (there used to be a really great game table in this corner that's now banished to a spare room)

34 WEEKS

New Years

Happy New Years everyone! I hope you all had a great holiday. Tim took the week after Christmas off , so we were able to have a lot of good family time. We went to our home away from home for a few days and got see Shaunna, Palmer, and Alison and her family. We got to meet the little heartbreaker Hayes for the first time. Huge blue eyes, blond hair and oh so sweet- I think I found Avery's first boyfriend :)

When we returned home, we had a visit with cousins Jessica, Mark, and James. James is a few weeks older than Avery and it is amazing how advanced he is. Already doing the army man crawl and he'll be walking soon. Avery still has him beat on the hair, though :).

Last night we had a great dinner with our friends Staci and Candy and her family. We got to see Candy's little boy Thomas (another little heartbreaker). It was wonderful catching up with my best buddies.

I hope everyone doesn't have too much trouble getting back into the work mode after the holidays. Wishing you a great week!

Shaunna, Palmer, Hilary, and Tim

Alison with the princess

Tim, Hayes, and Kyle

"Baby it's cold outside"

Cassie, Avery, Jessica, and James

Cassie, Avery, Staci, Candy and Thomas

33 Weeks