Saturday, December 31, 2011

First Christmas

We had a small Christmas celebration with just our little family of three at our house in the week before Christmas.  Andrew opened up a few presents from mom and dad.

A dog named Rufus

Stacking cups


A wood stacker

And a bead maze
We then flew to Michigan to spend the holiday with family.  We stopped at the W's in Ann Arbor to visit Andrew's godparents and Lucas and Katie.
...and brought gifts of maize and blue paint and a real hammer and toolbox.
We spent the weekend at Gma Joyce and Gpa Mike's, but Gma Mary Ellen and Gpa Jerry also came up from Florida to stay and visit and spend the holiday.

We played with measuring cups

We had naked time

We took naps

We nursed
And had tons of holiday fun.
Then Santa came on Christmas morning, and in the afternoon, we opened presents from Santa.  For about 6 weeks, the one word that Andrew said over and over and over was "ladle."  He would say, "La-dle, la-dle, la-dle..." with his tongue sticking out.  Santa took this to mean, of course, that he was requesting a ladle for Christmas, and there was one waiting for him on Christmas morning.

Ladle
Drum

Xylophone and shape sorter

And blocks
There were also many generous gifts from other family, too many to list all of them here, but here are some.


Goodies from daddy's childhood

Lots of handmade awesomeness from Gma Joyce


A recorded storybook from Uncle Tyler and ATB Monique
Andrew shares his tissue paper with Chewy

My first "Mommy" Christmas Card
Riding the dog like it's a small horse is frowned upon in this establishment.
What?
And God bless us, every one.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from our family to yours!

Sunday, December 18, 2011

Christmas Tree

One of our great family traditions, started the first Christmas Travis and I were dating, is to go cut our Christmas tree from the national forest.  For the past 5 years, that's been in the Buffalo Creek Wilderness Area in Pike National Forest, which is surprisingly just down the road from our house now.  This year, we had to shoehorn it in around a European adventure, a wedding, possible food poisoning, and a crazy work schedule, but we managed to carve out the time to do it, even though it sat undecorated for a week.  And I have to say, I think this is the best tree yet.



The one



Beautiful Colorado day

We had a winter picnic with hot dogs, chili, and hot chocolate


Stringing the lights



Saturday, December 17, 2011

Belly Laughs

Two of Andrew's favorite things: peekaboo and mommy's hair.


Also, the last one of his front teeth came in on 12/13.  So for those of you keeping track, that's four teeth in 10 days.  Phew!!

Sunday, December 11, 2011

A New Aunt

Uncle Devin and Aunt Kathleen got married!  Andrew has his first aunt (officially) and Amy and Travis both have their first sister - this is a big deal!

We flew out to Indianapolis and got in at a much more reasonable hour than we did on our last trip - no three hour delay! - and then stayed the night at the Radisson Indy Airport.  We then headed up for the lovely ceremony and totally fun reception at the Anderson Center For the Arts (TACA), and had fun with family and friends old and new.

The Groom awaits.

Uncle Tyler the Groomsman

Andrew really enjoyed Great Uncle Tim's ceremony - he was so well behaved!


Look how pretty Grandma looks!

Their unity ceremony was blending paints - it was SO COOL

Kissin' the bride!

Nursing at the gorgeous venue

The nephews
Why, yes... she is my older sister...  :oP

Wedding par-tay

"Blue Steel"

My brothers.  *sniff*  They're so handsome.
Too much fun with ATB Monique to be non-blurry

Robert is a natural.  I think he needs one of his own.

Sorry, guys, you have an interloper at the head table.
It was a beautiful evening, a beautiful couple, a beautiful wedding... and we hope and pray it will be a beautiful marriage!  Congratulations!