Family Christmas!

The weekend was full of fun! All of my family including the two future "newbies".. Courtney (Nate's fiance) and Sean (Sarah's fiance) all came here to celebrate Christmas!

Yes... Sarah is engaged!!!



They are cute!

Okay..back to Christmas. We had a blast!
This year instead of all of buying individual presents for everyone we decided to play Dirty Santa. It was a lot of fun.



Courtney opened this William Sonoma chicken cooker.. but I stole it!!!! Get ready for lots of new recipes (IF I can get Casey to help me put it to good use on our outdoor kitchen!)



I think she ended up with a really nice set of Auburn glasses so I didn't feel too bad stealing from her!

Houston and Nate both got camo bags/coolers with bullets and hot-hands
Sarah got Boccee ball
Lacey stole Sean's Ihome and he got a bunch of fun games (I probably would have stolen the games but we already had a couple of them)
and Casey got a digital photo frame (which is already up and running)

I think everyone was super thrilled with their gifts.

Mom and Dad didn't play because they still wanted to get gifts for everyone.. but I think next year they will play too! Mom said it just looked like so much fun (because it was!)



Anna got lots of food for her kitchen: which she LOVED and some clothes. Mom and Dad gave her a LadyBug Ihome (that she uses with Casey's ipod).. she loves this because she can run around the house and dance...

At first she just liked the packaging (naturally)...





I think everyone had a great time.. I know I sure did!! I wish I had more time to share more.. but.. you know how it is... CHAOS!

Next year I'll try to stop and take more pictures!!!

I'll be back soon with some cute pictures of Caroline. Right now I've got to go feed her. She's crying for a bottle and Anna is in my face saying "bottle go beep, beep mommy! it's ready!!!" over and over again! ahhhh.. I love them!!!

Merry Christmas!!!

Just a glimpse...

into my life of total chaos:



First I had the girls the other way around and Anna was down in all the groceries OPENING everything so I had to move them.
THEN... nothing fit in the cart with Caroline but I couldn't put it up with Anna because she wanted to eat it ALL.. ALL!

So... this is how we rolled. With food all over Caroline and under the buggy..

Poor Caroline. It's a wonder she wasn't throwing a fit.. especially with Anna turning around every 5 seconds "flicking" her head twice and saying "knock,knock"!! (she's also doing this in the picture if you were wondering..)

They are fun but it's so much easier to grocery shop without them!!

I'll be back soon!

TWO!

Anna's second birthday was Thursday! She's our precious two-year-old now!!



It took Casey hours to put together her birthday present!




But... he did a great job..



and... she LOVES it!!!



After cooking in her kitchen for a while we moved to the real kitchen to make Christmas Cookies. She had the best time!






She had a blast and so did I!


Wednesday she had a fun little birthday party with Casey's family!






She loved all her presents!



The rest of our weekend was spent celebrating Christmas with my family!

It was great fun and we had a blast with everyone. Stay tuned for a weekend re-cap!

Bootcamp, Christmas Trees, & More!

We've been in "training bootcamp" over here this week! Caroline is sleep training (and slowly progressing to say the least) and Anna is potty-training!



We're having much more luck with the potty training than sleeping! Too bad Caroline is too young for M&M's! Anna will do anything for one single M&M and a sticker!! Yesteday we only had ONE accident!! Today, training was put on hold due to a puny-feeling-little girl!



She isn't really sick anymore and for the most part feels fine.. but, when she lays on the couch like this for 30 minutes.. you know something doesn't feel good!!



*****

It's beginning to look like Christmas around here!

Our Christmas Tree fell over last week! Thankfully only two ornaments broke.. and one of those I kept on the tree anyway! We finally got it back up and put together yesterday!

The night before Anna tried so hard to get the beads looking just right!



and Caroline just sat in her swing and looked at the lights!


(sorry it's not the best picture! My camera was not on the right setting!)


This is the first year I've ever decorated the mantle.



I'm pleased! I LOVE our stockings!! I ordered them from Pottery Barn last year and I went ahead and ordered three extras... (just incase!) I'm glad I did because now Caroline has a matching stocking. I've just got to get her name on it!

****Looking Back****

This is Anna a year ago:







I LOVED this one:



My how things have changed!

Anna turns two next week! I can hardly believe it! Time has just flown by!
I decided not to do a party this year but she is getting an AWESOME present.. stay tuned til next Thursday to see!!

...and speaking of birthdays... one of Casey's cousin's little boy had his first birthday last weekend.



Anna was NOT fond of the bounce house..





except for when it was deflated! So funny!

She couldn't believe the pinata!





but really LOVED getting candy!



Caroline was a little sweetie just having fun with her Memaw!



Jon-David had a fun little party. He was a total cutie!



And boys are totally different than girls... that is the only picture I could get of him that wasn't a total and complete blur of a moving baby =) Anna will look at me and cheese so big.. or come to me and say "pretty picture please" which means she would like a pretty picture of (whatever) please!

Well, I better run!
I'll be back with weekend re-cap (we are headed south... after being away from "home" for seven months I'm itching to get back and visit all my friends.. and introduce Caroline!!)

See ya soon!