Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Christmas is my favorite time of the year.  I love the decorations, getting to spend extra time with family, looking for and finding that perfect gift to give, the food...the list could go on and on.  It is even more fun with little ones.  I love how their eyes light up at Christmas decorations and lights. Mattilee loved helping me pick out gifts and helping wrap them.  And she couldn't wait to give them. One day Matt came home from work and she said, "Daddy, do you want to open your shirt that we wrapped for you?" Ha!  She got much better as the season went on.  She still couldn't keep to herself that we had presents for others but it progressed to "Gigi, we have a present for you under our tree. Do you want to see it?"   

Christmas brings so many opportunities to talk about Jesus and the reason He was born.  We loved talking and reading with Mattilee about it, and hearing her say "It's Jesus' birthday!" randomly when someone would mention Christmas. We hope that our children will always remember the real reason for this special season. It can be so easy to get caught up in the commercial side that really has nothing to do with our  Rescuer humbly coming to earth as a baby. I hope that Matt and I will always do our part to keep the focus on Christ.     

A few pictures from our Christmas

Christmas cuties!

We took these pictures after church on the Sunday before Christmas.  

Opening presents at Kit Kat and Bobbo's house. She waited a long time for this baby doll. She picked her out while shopping with Kit Kat in October.   

Mattilee playing with her new leappad and Ivey Kate having a seat in her cousin's new rocking chair.   

Our little ham on Christmas Eve.  I love how fun she is. 

This little one after Christmas Eve festivities. She loves any kind of stuffed animal.  And those two fingers. 

Ready to open presents Christmas morning!

After opening the presents under the tree, Mattilee found her new bike at the end of a scavenger hunt!  My parents always did a scavenger hunt for us with our last gift, and it was always so much fun! 

Since it was raining and cold outside she practiced riding it inside.

Checking out what is in their stockings. 

What a difference a year makes!
Christmas day this year and last year!  They have grown and changed so much!

Getaway for Mommy and Daddy

In October Matt and I got to go to Riviera Maya; just us, no kiddos.  Matt won the trip through his company.  It's really hard to qualify for the trip so I'm really proud of my hubs and his hard work (not to mention extremely thankful for the vacay).  Of course it was really hard to leave the girls and we missed them like crazy, but it was so good for us to get away by ourselves.  We rarely get time alone. I'm not complaining; that's what we signed up for when we decided to have kids.  However, I think it probably does every marriage good to spend one on one time together.  For those few days we felt young and carefree again.  We laughed and cut up, had real, meaningful conversations without interruptions, and truly just enjoyed one another.

The place we stayed was beautiful!  I didn't take many pictures so I got some pics that a friend took. She and her husband were there too with several other couples from Matt's company.  It's so much fun to be able to have alone time with Matt but also get to hang out with friends too while we are there.  

A lot of the other wives and I climbed this lifeguard tower for a picture.  We weren't supposed to climb it but it was just calling out to us.  We had a good time; this group of women were so much fun.  

The infinity activity pool.  There was also a relaxation pool for guests that didn't want to hear music or other noise... like our husbands playing pool football.:) 

Another view of the activity pool. 

The beautiful view of the ocean.  

I think this is the only picture I have of my handsome hubs and me from our trip. This was the last night at the company dinner. 

Family Pictures

We had family pictures made in November.  We don't take the time to do this often enough.  Life just gets so busy and it's hard to remember to slow down and take these.  I know I'll regret it later in life so I'm going to try to be mindful of doing these every 6 months or so.  My extra-talented brother-in-law took these for us.  This works out perfectly for many reasons, one being that both of my girls are crazy about him so it was easy to get them to smile and cooperate. :)

Here are a few a my favorites....

LOVE this chubby smile and these neck rolls. :)

So cute!

:)

 I know you can't see their faces really well, but I just love this one.  

I love that Mattilee is giggling here. 

So sweet!

 Sweet sisters. 

Many Thanks

We have so much to be thankful for.  We realize this all year and try to make sure girls realize how blessed and thankful we all should be, but at Thanksgiving we are especially mindful of how good God is to us. After all, there is no blessing apart from Him.  We have two wonderful families that love us and that we get to enjoy even more on special holidays like Thanksgiving.

One of the things I am most thankful for is my family.  And this sweet woman is at the top of that list.

 This is my amazing Granny with four of her great-grandchildren, Mattilee, Ivey Kate and my brother's daughters, Addie Brown and Lyla on Thanksgiving Day.  I can't express how special this lady is to me.  When I think of the Proverbs 31 woman, she is what comes to mind.  I can't even begin to describe all of her wonderful qualities and attributes because there are too many to list.  I'm sure she has spent countless hours in prayer for our family and I know that is one of the main reasons our family is so blessed! She has five children, 14 grandchildren and over 20 great-grandchildren.  I really hope that my girls will get to spend lots of time with her growing up.  I want them to really know her and the wonderful woman she is! I am so blessed to call her Granny!

Happy Halloween

Halloween was even more fun with two little ones to dress up.  Mattilee changed her mind daily about what she would like to be for halloween. So I thought I could get away with picking out her costume this year.  I'm sure next year she will be much more opinionated.  I saw these adorable costumes a year or so ago and thought how I would love to dress my girl/girls in them.  I kept watching amazon and ebay until I could find a price I wanted to pay and ordered Mattilee the pink poodle costume and Ivey Kate the pink piggy.  They both loved them! I was afraid Ivey Kate wouldn't leave her pig hood on but she loved it.:)  She was the perfect piggy, I felt like the costume was made for her!  I couldn't get enough of our pink piggy.  Mattilee's little poodle costume was killing me too!  She was too precious and loved barking everywhere we went.:)  We spent the evening at a halloween party with Matt's office and then went to our church's fall festival.  

Check out this precious pink piggy

Sweet sisters 

Piggy and puppy posing beside their pumpkins.

Pink poodle and piggy with their precious bat cousins!  

Our family at Matt's office halloween party

Painting pumpkins.

Breakfast Halloween morning

Carving the pumpkin with Daddy

At the Pumpkin Patch

Petting the horses at the Pumpkin Patch

Mattilee picked out her pumpkin!

She loved this swing!

We go to the pumpkin patch every year with our precious small group.  These families are so special to us.  So thankful for them and the encouragement and sharpening they give us.   

Ivey Kate's Winter ONEderland!

Our little Ivey Kate is one!!!  It is so hard to believe!  I feel like it's only been 6 months or so since she joined our family.  She has brought so much joy into our lives in her one year and I know that she'll continue to bring so much more.  We had a ONEderful time celebrating her.  We went with a winter ONEderland theme and had so much fun with it.

Here are some pics from her Winter ONEderland birthday party.

"I'm One"

Ivey Kate's snowflake birthday cake and snowman cupcakes.

I didn't have the right settings on my camera but the branches have a picture of her from each month. It was fun looking back through pictures from our year with her.   The little white Christmas tree has the snowman ornament party favors that said "I had snow much fun turning one" on the back. :)

Our greeter at the front door.

I tried to do our Christmas decorations less red and green and more wintery to go with her birthday theme.

The birthday girl with her KitKat (Matt's Mom).

Cousin Addie Brown and Mattilee enjoying the cupcakes.

Ready for her cake!

She didn't waste any time! She knew exactly what to do and loved it! Her birthday cake and smash cake were strawberry and were so yummy.  

It's on her nose and all over her mouth but she didn't seem to care.  

She's still digging in.

She got a trampoline from Pop and Gigi and the kids loved jumping at the party. 

What a ONEderful year with our sweetheart! 

Our precious one year old can say:

"uh oh"

"momma"

"dadda"

"book"

"bye bye"

"hey baby" when seeing another baby or any kind of doll. 

"hey puppy" to our dog, Molly and her new favorite toy stuffed puppy. 

and she can sign "please" and "all done".

She gives kisses and hugs and blows kisses.  

She can tell you where her head, hair, nose, mouth, tongue, feet, hands, belly...most parts of her body are located.
She can hold up one finger when you ask her how old she is. 

I've just recently noticed that she really seems to be understanding what we are saying.  I can tell her to go get something familiar and she can do it. If we are talking about hair, she'll touch her hair, if we see a giraffe in a book she'll tilt her head back to show me her long neck life a giraffe.  :)  This age really is so fun.  It seems they pick up on new things every hour they are awake.  

She still isn't walking but is cruising around a little.  She doesn't seem very interested in it right now. I think she is perfectly content crawling to wherever she would like to go.  I LOVE watching that sweet little body crawl down the hallway, swaying from side to side and knowing that she's coming by the hand slaps I hear on the hard wood as she crawls. They only crawl for such a short time and then they walk for the rest of their lives so she can just take her sweet time. But I have to say, I am looking forward to seeing her wobble around on those chubby legs. 

My favorite things about our Ivey Kate right now:
When she gives kisses she leans in with her mouth open.:) And when she's in the mood to give them out, everybody gets several.
Sometimes when I pick her up she squeezes my neck so tight and just keeps holding me like that.  Such a great feeling.
Girl loves to dance.  Every time she hears music she starts dancing and then looks at us smiling to make sure we see her. I can't even sing to her at night when we rock without her popping up her head off my chest and bouncing and swaying from side to side.  So cute.
Her favorite things are stuffed animals.  She loves to "love" them by saying "aww" and hugging and patting them. It is the most precious thing.  We can put several in the floor around her and she'll go to each one, hugging, patting and saying "aww".  It's so precious!

At Ivey Kate's 12 month checkup she was 21lbs 3 1/2oz and 30 1/2 inches.  She's in 90% for height and 50% for weight.  I'm so proud of my chunky monkey.  She's seems to be doing great! So thankful for our happy, healthy one year old!