Happy 34th Birthday, Daddy/Bradley!

Happy Birthday to the guy who always makes us laugh! We love being silly with you and the crazy things you do for us. Thank you for taking such good care of us and for being a great Daddy and wonderful husband (let's say 98% of the time on that husband thing! ;)) We hope you have a fantastic birthday and that 2010 is a great year for you! We love you so much! Happy Birthday!

Picture Recap of Christmas Eve

Here are our Christmas Eve in pictures. Because we were under the weather we never made it to the Christmas Eve service at church and our usual dinner consisted of KFC and some side items I whipped up. Joe, Anne, and Bethany came over and we ate dinner and then opened presents. Ava had a great time passing out presents and opening everyone else's. These pictures are a combination of mine and Bethany's.

This is also Harrison's 1 month birthday.

Ava would open Harrison's presents and then show them to him.

Bradley was too late to get to the florist and get his mom's gift certificate so he made one using my scrapbooking supplies. My favorite part was the motto he made up, "Come buy our flowers!" Too funny!

Can you tell we love McDonald's? Ava was pumped with an Avatar toy and gift card from Aunt Bethany. It went with her new reading chair that she also got from Aunt Bethany.

And since Ava is so into making faces right now, we always have to end with silly ones. In this one you can see she is more interested in what everyone else is doing.

Christmas at Nanny's

The weekend before Christmas was spent at my Mom's Mom's house (known as Nanny). It was the first time my family (except my mom and dad) had a chance to meet Harrison. Unfortunately, I didn't take many pictures, but here are some highlights. (And the first couple are of Ava eating leftover batter from the Heath Bar cake we made to take.)

My Dad and Harrison

Bradley teaching Ava and Trayton to play Memory. Kind of tricky when there are 72 cards! Oh, and the kids are 3!

On our way back to TN we finally got a chance to stop in Draffenville, KY to drive through the park. It has a fantastic lights display which Ava loved.

Some cuteness while you wait...

Here is a little cuteness to hold you over while I am downloading pictures from Christmas. These were taken Christmas Eve night. Harrison started smiling on his own on the 20th (just a couple of days shy of 4 weeks old). Now he grins quite a bit and it melts your heart!

All in Calm, All is Bright

Got the brightness, check.

Got the calmness, well, not so much...

Merry Christmas to everyone. Here are the things that I did not get done this holiday season:

• Making candy


• Making cookies


• Mailing out Christmas cards


• Hosting my traditional Christmas Eve dinner


• Finishing up proofing Harrison's newborn pictures


• Sending out Harrison's birth announcements


• Doing my Daily December scrapbook


• Getting my Christmas shopping done before stores ran out


• Attending church


• Wearing makeup

But that's okay because....we had a baby this holiday season! ;)

Please excuse us for not being up to par this year and we hope that next year we will be back on track. Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas to all of our friends and family.

Here is a fantastic picture of what life is like at our house right now! Take care and God bless!

Some more recent pictures

Big Sister checking on Harrison

One day closer to Christmas

Ava's pink tree that she decorated herself. All the ornaments are at the bottom and it even includes some hair bows. Harrison - Day 16

Newbern Christmas Parade - Dec 3rd

As soon as the workers came by to put the numbers in our yard Ava had a fit to watch the parade. It was all she talked about all afternoon and as soon as she saw the band out the window, all semblance of calm Ava was gone. Ava loves to watch bands and see could not contain her excitement any longer. Nana and Pop had come over to watch Harrison while we took Ava to the parade and even though Pop had brought back Sonic for everyone, Ava still couldn't eat. The excitement and promise of getting to see the band was too much.

Finally a few minutes before the parade was set to start, I took Ava over to see the band and talk with them. She got to talk with the drummers and listen to them warm up and see was on cloud 9. She carried her Little Mermaid camera and took pictures of them and just loved it.

When the parade started she took pictures of almost every float, loved getting candy, and waved at almost everyone. Her cute little voice yelling Merry Christmas at everyone was so cute. As we traditionally do, after the bands marched we headed back to our house to watch the rest of the parade and to see the last float which is always Santa. Anne had been inside with Harrison the whole time, but knew we would come get him as it got closer to time for Santa. He was passed out though and didn't even wake up as I put his reindeer fleece on him. He never even stirred as Santa and his sleigh went right by our house. After the parade we watched the remainder of it on TV and then enjoyed some cake made by a lady from church.

I don't know why, but this parade is one of the highlights of my December. I love our house's location for this reason and I was so happy that we got to see it again this year. I also love how excited Ava gets and she will talk about different aspects of the parade for weeks to come. This year's was just as much fun and just as corny as it usually is, but it is one thing I love about small town life.

Ava loving real peppermint.