harper’s first easter

The Easter Bunny (and some relatives) gave Harper a few goodies!

And the bunny ears! Cuteness overload!

santa baby

We enjoyed Christmas at home with our little santa baby and Drew’s family who flew in to help celebrate Harper’s first Christmas. Maeby enjoyed the company, but Margot hid under our bed the whole time.

Harper got to meet her Aunt Kari and Uncle Brett and her Uncle Kyle.

To celebrate turning 3 months old, Harper wore jeans for the first time! Aren’t baby jeans the cutest?

We ate quite well when everyone was here – a nice change to the ham sandwiches I’ve been living on. We had brisket and empanadas and then a turkey dinner.

Harper loved being held by everyone and hanging out. She had lots of presents under the tree and we took turns opening them for her. Lots of books, toys and clothes!

On Christmas Eve, we watched Christmas Vacation like we do every year. Drew gave his siblings moose mugs just like they drink from in the movie.

I made sure to get plenty of family pictures while I had people here to take them! (Harper’s face in this one cracks me up.)

Yum egg nog!

Thank you to our family for coming to Austin for Christmas, cooking for us and spoiling our little girl! She is lucky to have such a loving family!

someone’s ready for santa

She can’t wait for Santa Claus to visit – she’s been a good girl even if just for a quarter of a year!

early thanksgiving in austin

We celebrated Thanksgiving early this year on my brother’s birthday with my family visiting in Austin to meet Harper. My dad and Julie flew in from Arizona, my brother from Illinois and my sister and Branden from New York. It was a great visit and great meal.

My dad got to meet his granddaughter for the first time.

She also met my brother for the first time. Uncle Chris was a natural with her.

She also met her NYC uncle.

We had a traditional turkey dinner, including a giant mound of mashed potatoes, and it was delicious!

harper’s first halloween

Happy Halloween! No fancy costume for little Harper, but we took some pictures with a pumpkin Gram got her when she was here. The kitties wanted to be included too.

Harper has started smiling! It’s usually when she’s in her bouncy seat or after a sneeze. A few times she has smiled back at me! It’s hard to get it on camera, but I’m sure I’ll have many more opportunities.

walking in a winter wonderland

This was our first Christmas since moving to Austin and you’d think we’d have our family come to us since the weather is nicer, but noooooo. We decided to go big for the holidays and visit ALL of our family. That meant 4 Christmases. Yeah, I suppose I can’t complain about that.

I also can’t complain about the snag-free flights and the mild weather we had in both our destinations—Flagstaff and Chicago. We got lucky.

When we decided to spend Christmas in Flagstaff, AZ, I immediately pictured driving through a blizzard to get from Phoenix (where it’s warm) to Flagstaff (in the mountains.) But the weather cooperated and was actually 50 degrees on Christmas day!

A dumping of snow a week or two earlier made for a beautifully idyllic Christmas setting in the mountains amongst the juniper trees.

Spending Christmas in Flagstaff with my dad and his wife, my sister and her husband and my brother was so wonderful. We enjoyed a wine tasting, a crackling fire in my dad’s retro wood stove (which is actually a new gas stove made to look old), and a wonderful stroll on Christmas day followed by drinks on the deck (did I mention it was 50 degrees?)

After Flagstaff, Drew and I flew straight to Chicago for the rest of our Christmases. We celebrated with Drew’s dad and siblings in Chicago with dinner and breakfast. We were also celebrating Kari (Drew’s sister) and Brett’s last night in Chicago. That week, they were moving to Boulder, CO!

Then we all headed out to visit with Drew’s mom where we played a little Wii and I did my annual photo-stalking of the kitty cats.

I got a new lens for my camera for Christmas – the Lensbaby Muse. I was playing around with it to practice and it seems I still need a lot more practice – but it was fun seeing some of the effects!

Our last stop was to visit with my mom and some of our friends and their husbands and babies. Our friends Jill and Sean just had their baby boy Flynn in early December. Cuuute!

Stefanie and Adam are expecting their first in March!

And Sara and Brady brought their 4-month-old Jameson. He’s getting so big!

Ummm…I think my friends are trying to tell me something.

this time of year when christmas is near

Well, it was our first Thanksgiving in Austin and we decided to go big…like everything else in Texas. We had Drew’s whole family down! For most of them, it was their first time visiting, so we wanted to show them around town. And I was really excited to cook my first turkey in my new kitchen!

Drew’s dad and sister were the first to arrive. We started the holiday at the Oasis on Lake Travis for a sunset meal.

The Oasis was decked out in holiday decor, even though it was warm enough to sit outside. Yes, this is still weird to me.

Then we went to Uncorked, a wine bar, to have a flight of wine before my brother-in-laws flew in later that night. We sat outside on the patio with a great view of downtown.

The next day, it was turkey time baby. I put on my new apron that Drew’s Grandma made for me (I love it!) and got the snacks started while the turkey was in the oven. Thank heaven for my sister-in-law – what a big help she was. She and I were cookin’ like it was elimination round on Top Chef.

The turkey was perfect!

The meal went off without a hitch.

Even the kitties got to partake in a little turkey action.

For the 2nd half of the weekend with Barb (Drew’s mom) and Tod, we walked down SoCo, the Ladybird Lake trail and ate dinner at Eastside cafe. We also went to the Zilker botanical garden. Unfortunately the nice weather turned a little cool and windy, but it was still better than northern Illinois – so they were all good sports.

After the botanical garden, we walked around the UT campus a bit before everyone headed back to the airport.

All in all, it was a great holiday weekend with family and we were so excited to have them visit. The cats were so excited from all the excitement, they slept all day. Oh wait, they do that every day.

*Blog post title is a lyric from the song “This Time Of The Year” by Ray Charles

on a cold winter’s night that was so deep

The Christmas holiday of 2010 was special because I was able to visit with all of my parents and siblings! My sister flew in from NY (as always) and spent a few days with me to do some wedding planning and shopping. Then we headed to my mom’s where we had our annual seafood dinner – this time with lobster!

We started with oyster shooters. Not my favorite thing.

But the rest of the food was delicious! When we visit with my mom, one thing’s for sure: we are well fed.

While we were there, we started on some DIY crafts for my sister’s wedding. We’re creating some fabric flag banners to hang as decoration.

“Lord help the mister, who comes between me and my sister. And lord help the sister, who comes between me and my man!” I heart White Christmas!

Next up was my mother-in-law’s for Christmas. There, we learned that African cats do not like snow.

Then we spent a few days with my dad and his girlfriend-turned-fiancee! My dad popped the question to his girlfriend of 9 years ON CHRISTMAS DAY! We were ecstatic to hear the news!! It was great to spend a few days with them in Chicago. I hadn’t seen my dad in a year and a half!!

I gave my dad a telescope t-shirt for Christmas and he totally geeked out about it.

We went to a local bocce ball court and had some wine and beer and played some bocce. Of course my dad, the engineer, had to measure for accuracy.

The next day we went downtown to the Art Institute. Luckily, this year it wasn’t sub-zero temperatures like the year I took everyone to Shedd Aquarium.

After the museum, we walked down the walkway from the Modern wing which plopped us right into Millenium Park.

We had fun taking pictures of the Bean until our faces were numb.

I took a picture of my sister taking a picture of my dad and Julie taking a picture of themselves in the Bean.

Our final visit of the holidays was with my father-in-law and his girlfriend and my siblings-in-law. We had a great dinner at Cooper’s Hawk and a nice visit. As always, my two weeks off of work flew by. I ate to much and was spoiled with gifts, but I enjoyed every minute with my family.

See the rest of my pictures from Christmas 2010 on Flickr.

no retreat no surrender

We thoroughly enjoyed our two Thanksgivings again this year. Two tasty turkeys were turned out by my mom and mother-in-law as always! Was it just me, or did the holidays kind of sneak up on us this year?

We also had two other turkeys in the form of my mother-in-law’s cat Oliver and my sister-in-law’s cat Nanaa for entertainment. Last year I had blogged about their interaction (or lack thereof) and this year was no better. Nanaa is getting braver, but not more tolerant of Oliver. It’s always fun to watch them hash it out.

After a fabulous dinner and dessert, we enjoyed the fire and of course, some wine.

Even Oliver enjoyed the fire.

Nanaa preferred to keep to herself so as to stay out of Oliver’s way.

Don’t hide Nanaa!

Later on we played Cranium. Girls against guys. The girls were winning for most of the game, but somehow the guys came back to beat us.

Maybe it was my brother-in-law’s awesome blind-drawing skills.

Then the boys played some ping pong in the basement. Like boys do on Thanksgiving.

Meanwhile, Nanaa decided to venture out to the living room hoping that the coast was clear.

Look out behind you Nanaa!

She was not amused.

Eventually, they just ignored each other. They were too tired to strike up a game of clawless-paw batting. (Speaking of which, have you seen this video? Hilarious!)

Too much turkey I think.

Looking forward to the holidays! I better get back to my x-mas shopping. My sister flies in on 12/21!
See the rest of my pictures from Thanksgiving on Flickr.

*Blog post title is a lyric from the song “No Surrender” by Bruce Springsteen

me and my cousins and you and your cousins

Over 4th of July weekend, we drove down to Missouri to see Drew’s relatives and to celebrate two upcoming weddings in the family – Aaron (Drew’s cousin) and Chrissy and Kari and Brett – by having a joint wedding shower at his uncle’s house. It gave us a chance to see a lot of family – aunts, uncles, cousins, cousins’ babies. Yes, there are a lot of babies. Actually more toddlers than babies. Three were born within 3 weeks of each other last year, so they’ve all just turned 1! And boy are they cute!

Layne

Avery

Molly

We watched some fireworks launched by the neighbors, which looked more like a big city production than backyard firecrackers.

Played some shuffleboard…

On the 4th, we got together for the wedding shower. Had some great food and played a game. We broke into teams to answer trivia questions about the couples. Of course our team won after answering most questions right. Since we won, Drew and I had to go head to head against Kari and Brett to see which couple could tear open a pack of powdered donuts with our teeth and eat all 4 donuts the fastest – all while having our hands tied behind our backs! By the time Drew and I teared open the package, I looked over at Kari and Brett and they already had all 4 donuts in their mouths. They were serious competitors.

The bride (right) and her Matron of Honor (and cousin) Annie

The soon-to-be-wed couple

Then it was time for the couples to open presents!

All the while, the kids were running around the yard and helping open presents. They had fun playing on a new toy – an airplane teeter-totter. Even the “big kids” got in on the fun!

We had a blast with everyone and it was a great way to continue a busy, but fun summer. We’re looking forward to Aaron and Chrissy’s wedding in KC in August, and then Kari and Brett’s in IL in September! See the rest of my pictures of the weekend on Flickr.

*Blog post title is a lyric from the song “Cousins” by Vampire Weekend