Christmas 2015

We had very warm weather here in Texas on Christmas so we spent Christmas Eve morning outside playing soccer and flying a kite. Harper wanted to fly it all by herself which meant she ran around dragging it on the ground behind her. But after I showed her how to do it and she let me help her get started, she ran with it in the air for a bit.

We also did our annual Christmas Eve crafts – we made bead candy canes and painted wooden gift tags. I also tried to get a little Pinterest-y and do a handprint wreath with Harper and a footprint mistletoe with Finn but they turned out horribly, as most of my Pinterest endeavors do.

Harper was excited to frost and sprinkle some sugar cookies and put them out with milk for Santa (and some carrots on our driveway for the reindeer.)

I put them in matching jammies and Daddy read The Night Before Christmas.

Christmas morning started at 6am and after feeding the baby and getting Harper a snack in her room and all ready to go, I walked the kids out while Drew shot video from the living room. Harper immediately spotted Finn’s Little Tikes car and then her bike and rocking chair. She was so excited! And because it was so warm, we got to spend some time outside trying out the new toys! It was a very merry Christmas!

//embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js

holiday fun

I LOVE LOVE LOVE Christmas and was particularly excited this year since it was Finn’s first Christmas and our first Christmas as a family of 4. Last year, I was so sick (and pregnant) and it kind of took all the fun out of the holiday. It’s hard to believe in the span of a year, we had a baby and now he’s big enough to sit up and open presents.

We started the holiday season by decorating our tree on Thanksgiving weekend and then I started the myriad of holiday photos of my kids. I just can’t get enough. But they sure had enough. “Ugh! Not another picture, Mom!”

This one of Finn might be my favorite of them all. Bah hum bug!

But he eventually relented and let me snap away. Cheese!

I used these for our Christmas card.

We went to a big electric train set display in downtown Round Rock and stopped for a few pictures outside where they had a giant tree and giant ornament.

There was a big stage that Harper kept running over to and doing her happy dance for us.

Our annual santa hat picture!

And this is blurry, but I caught them sitting together under the tree and giggling and thought it was so cute.

4th of July 2015

Drew’s sister, brother-in-law, dad and nephew Augie came to visit for his birthday and the 4th of July. It was Augie’s and Finn’s first 4th and our first time meeting Augie. The boys are just 2 months apart and already fast friends!

Augie’s hand on Finn’s thigh kills me.

We walked to the neighborhood pool for Finn’s first swim.

The water was a bit cool that morning. I’d say Finn didn’t like it or dislike it.

But he was happy to dry off and relax.

We went to the local coffeehouse/brewhouse on Drew’s birthday.

We spent a lot of time outside on the new patio.

We had a yummy carrot cake for Drew’s birthday.

On the 4th, I tried to get pictues of my kiddos holding flags, but they were too distracted by them to look at the camera. Harper tried to get Finn to wave his flag.

And we got pictures of the boys together in their matching outfits.

Little bandits!

What a fun weekend with family!

Easter 2015

Easter weekend started out with Gram and Toddy visiting to meet Finnegan. Harper had an Easter egg hunt at school, so Drew, Gram and Toddy went and Tod snapped these pictures.

Then on Easter morning, the Easter bunny left goodies in the kids’ baskets! Finn was too sleepy to notice.

But Harper loved all her goodies!

And Gram made Harper a bunny-shaped pancake!

It was too wet and cool outside to do an egg hunt, so we hid some eggs upstairs in the playroom.

Harper was pretty excited about all the candy.

Our first holiday as a family of four!

harper’s 2nd easter

Easter gets a whole lot more fun when you have a toddler! Harper loved hunting for eggs. So much so that we did it 4 times that weekend. Harper already showed great hunting prowess at her first egg hunt at school. She knew exactly what to do! She grabbed all the eggs and put them in her basket until it was overflowing!

Then we went to our neighborhood egg hunt where she and her neighbor friend didn’t get one single egg. There were just too many kids. So they filled their baskets with wood chips instead and did some swinging.

We got the obligatory scared-of-the-easter-bunny shot.

Easter morning was quite fun to see Harper enjoy her gifts – Legos, some books, and a few other things.

Then we headed over to our neighbor’s house for a make-up egg hunt since the neighborhood one was a bust. Harper loved swinging on her friend’s playscape and now points to it from our yard every time we’re outside.

And finally, later that afternoon we headed to Drew’s cousin’s house for dinner (like we did last year!) and Harper’s 4th egg hunt.

Needless to say, Harper really enjoyed the holiday and we loved watching her enjoy it.

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!

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

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