My Favorite Quote

"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?' Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn't serve the world. There's nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us. It's in everyone. And as we let our light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."
~Marianne Williamson

Hannah's First Christmas Present

Friday night, Manda & Chad came over to visit. We had mexican, played games, and just had a fun time (Manda managed to stop Rob's winning streak in Apples To Apples!). Hannah also had a good time because she really enjoyed the gifts they brought her. They were her first real Christmas gifts, so we were very excited to see what she would do. She loves to rip paper and it didn't take much convincing to get her to open her presents. She got a very adorable blanket, a toy that makes cute noises when you roll it (ask me how cute I think the noises are in a few months ;)), and a table that has lots of fun things to do. Of course, I think she thought the wrapping paper was the gift because that's what she wanted to play with. Oh, she may have also thought the box was a gift because it was close to her and Lacey wanted to lay in it, so it got the cat to actually come near her. For the rest of the night, she crinkled the wrapping paper and shrieked and smiled at the cat. All in all, a very fun night for everyone!

O Christmas Tree

I finally managed to get up all my Christmas decorations. I was hoping to do it right after Thanksgiving, not because I'm one of those crazy people who declares it the "Christmas season" the second the turkey is off the table, but because I honestly don't want to do so much work for something that's only up for a couple weeks. Between the sickness and the kids, we just never got around to it, so I finally got around to it this last weekend. Hannah helped by playing peacefully in the exersaucer, and Rob helped finish up by hanging a few ornaments and putting the tree topper on. We also put up various other decorations around the house, but my favorite is always the tree. Now I just need to finish my shopping so I can wrap the presents!

I Miss Them Already

Well Dustyn and Emily left a few hours ago and seeing them always reminds me how much I miss living near them. We had an awesome weekend even though we spent a good deal of it calming children and fighting off colds. Bradyn and Hannah really enjoyed being around each other and liked holding hands and babbling at each other. Bradyn also kept "hugging" (tackling) and "kissing" (putting his mouth on) Hannah. He drank out of a straw for the first time over the holiday and Hannah took her first step towards being mobile - she began scooting (backwards). Hannah also turned 6 months old on Thanksgiving day, which was very exciting to me. I can't believe it's been 6 months already! Thanksgiving was a success - we were sad we couldn't see Rob's side of the family but we had a good time seeing all of my family and the meal was excellent. It was only served about 15 minutes after the time we had said we were going to eat, which is amazing since timing all the food is always hard, especially if you are cooking for 15 people. Friday night was a little rough because Hannah was starting to come down with her first ever cold and she couldn't sleep well because she had the sniffles. I spent a good deal of the night trying to comfort her in any way possible, so I was somewhat tired on Friday when we went to Target. (Yay Target - that's for my brother-in-law Paul) I forgot pretty much everything I went there for so we had to go back that evening. Dustyn and Emily bought "Cars" and we watched it while playing games that night. They weren't quite the games we used to play in graduate school (mostly because it didn't involve any alcohol), but it was a good time and the movie was very cute. Friday night was worse for Hannah than Thursday night, so we took a quick trip into the doctor's office on Saturday morning to make sure it was nothing more than a cold. Once we got the news that it was viral and nothing they could do about it, we spent a good deal of the day just hanging out since now Emily, Bradyn, and I were all also not feeling so hot. We cooked, played some more games, and just generally bummed around. Luckily Hannah was feeling better last night and got some sleep, which let me get some sleep. We got up this morning and everyone was feeling better, but we didn't really have time to do much since Dustyn and Emily had a 4 hour drive ahead of them so we just sat around and talked. Darius and his girlfriend stopped by for a little bit, but they had an even longer drive than Dusty and Em so they left pretty quickly. Hopefully we'll get to see them more at Christmas. Anyways, all and all we had a very good holiday weekend and are excited to see Dusty and Em again in just a few weeks!

The Calm Before The Storm

It's hard to believe that the holidays are already here. We have had a pretty relaxing last few days, which I would like to think of as the calm before the storm. I got to go shopping on Friday with my friend Amy, who is 18 weeks pregnant. We talked about babies and pregnancy and shopped for Christmas gifts, clothes, and baby stuff - it was so much fun! Saturday, we spent some time with Rob's family. His dad was on a day pass out of the short term care facility he is staying at while recovering from being hit by a car a few weeks ago. It was so great to see him smiling and playing with his granddaughter. See picture above. :) Today, Hannah and I tried out a church that is new to the community. It's called Journey Church and I thought it was a pretty neat little service. My little princess got to wear a new dress that I bought her on Friday when I was shopping with Amy and she seemed to enjoy playing in the nursery area with the other babies. She was also fascinated with the shoes I put on her, since she has never worn shoes before. Mostly, she just sucked on them and tried to figure out how to get them off when I wasn't looking. We are currently waiting for hubby's call to meet him at Meijer so we can purchase all the necessities for our big Thanksgiving feast. Dustyn and Emily are coming down with their 15 month old son on Wednesday. Before then, we need to clean, baby-proof the house, and get some of the food prepped. We are so excited to see them - we haven't seen them in quite a while and we have lots of fun things planned for the week/weekend! It will be fun but very busy, especially with a 6 month old (our baby girl turns 6 months on Thanksgiving day!) and a 15 month old! I can't wait!

Just Another Day

Well Amy has finally convinced me that I need a space to blog, so here we are. I'm not sure why I chose today to start this - I really have nothing interesting going on at the moment. My daughter is playing in her high chair while I am taking a break from cleaning. She has fallen in love with her high chair since we started solid food (besides cereal) about two weeks ago and it's nice to have somewhere that I can put her besides the exersaucer. I can only hear "the cat is orange" and "three purple triangles" so many times! I guess we do have one other option now that our big girl has started sitting on her own. She started "tripoding" the day before my birthday, and has now graduated to sitting up straight on her own (as you can see above). It's nice to put her down and let her play. Plus, if she's not laying down, she can't roll away and get into things in the few seconds that I look away like she loves to do these days. Anyways, hubby's aunt & uncle are coming into town today and I always end up scrubbing our house before company comes so no one knows the clutter that usually takes over the place. My mom says that everyone will understand the house being a bit disorganized since we have an infant, but I think she just remembers how my twin and I used to keep our room at home and figures this is nothing in comparison to that. Well back to cleaning!