New Year's Eve

We met up with family for hibatchi to celebrate New Year's Eve. It is a little different now that we all have two kids or working on the second (Carrie is due at the end of February). We had a great time even though it took forever to get our food. We took up two tables and luckily I was at the table that got the cook first.

Amber and Morgan and I happened to be standing around and got a picture with Mom and Dad. Haven't had a picture of  our original family in a long time!

Sophie loves miso soup and wants to do it "by myself"

We didn't even plan to match the boys

Dinner out at The Parthenon

We had dinner at The Parthenon while Tara was in town. I'm sure she was thinking that we picked a nice restaurant to take two kids:) Sophie was obsessed with the salt and pepper and Aunt Tara taught her how to put it on her hand to lick it. The food was great at always and Sophie and Sutton were pretty well behaved. It helped to have Tara to help out.

Wish we could have gotten the kids to look...

Sophie's First Haircut

 We finally got Sophie's hair cut for the first time while Aunt Tara was visiting. We wanted to wait until after her 2 year old pictures and then I had surgery and pneumonia and then it was Christmas so it was well over due. Amanda did a great job with the cut and got enough off to make it look healthier, but still left enough length. Sophie did great! She sat up on the board and held still the entire time without any fuss. I was so proud of her.

 We had talked about the hair cut all day and she was excited to go. It probably helped that it was Amanda cutting her hair and Aunt Joyce, Leslie, Cason and Wyatt were all there too. Nanny came in toward the end of the hair cut too.

 She loved it and was happy to show off the cut to everyone.

This is her turning around so Sutton could see her haircut

Wyatt was in his pack-n-play and Sophie was trying to talk to him...too cute!

Aunt Tara Comes to Visit

 Tara came to visit for a few days after Christmas. She is working on a PhD in psychology in LA and had gone back to NY for Christmas with her family so she was actually flying out of NYC. The huge snowstorm delayed her visit a few days and instead of getting in at 5pm on Monday she finally got her 11am on Wednesday. Her flight back was originally Wednesday at 3:30pm, but luckily she was able to change it to Friday around lunch. This was the first time Tara got to meet Sutton and Sophie was loving all the attention she got.

 We went straight from the airport to my doctor's appointment in Franklin to follow up on the hernia repair. Everything is healing well and I was released to pick up things over 15lbs. Tara entertained the kids in the waiting room while I was in for the appointment.

We met up with Amber, Karlee and Katelyn at Bishops in Cool Springs. My parents were in East Tennessee and I was in no shape to be cooking a big southern meal so this was the next best thing. We had a great meal and as always everything was delicious! We had a fairly tame meal considering the kids out numbered the adults (which is always a little scary).

Sutton got some good snuggle time in with Aunt Tara when Sophie didn't dominate her time

Recovering From Christmas!

We spent Monday relaxing and taking it easy after a crazy few days of Christmas celebrations. That evening I had my follow up chest xray and found out that the pneumonia was gone! It was a long 5 weeks of recovering from the hernia repair and pneumonia. Thanks to everyone for their prayers and thoughts during this time.

Of course it didn't last long that they were both asleep at the same time, but how sweet do they look???

Christmas at Mammy and Pappy's

We went straight from Nanny's to Mammy's (after I drove Sophie around for an hour nap). Needless to say it was a long day, but the kids did great considering. They had such a great time playing with each other. It makes Christmas so much fun to watch them get so excited and have so much fun.

Once again...lots of cameras taking pictures at the same time!

This side of the family is growing too. Three new great grandchildren this year (Luke, Sutton and Rebecca Lynn) and one due in May (well really Elizabeth and Michael are having a grandchild but still another baby in the family). Katie had Becca Lynn on December 4th while I had pneumonia and we got to see each other for the first time at Mammy's. I still didn't get to close since Sophie had a cold and pink eye just days before. Maybe we can hang out again in the spring when everyone is over all the illness:)

Aunt Deborah read "Going on a Bear Hunt" and the kids sat and listened to the entire story!

They loved it!

Sophie had the right idea about eating Mammy's coconut cake...when she finished what I gave her she just helped herself to more.

Mammy giving out money from her "money tree"

Sutton was all smiles!

Pajama time

Looks like Grandpa could have used a nap like Sutton got:) It was a long day for everyone.

Christmas at Nanny and Grandpa's

We celebrated with the immediate family after church. As you can see, pictures were not exactly what the kids had in mind for fun. I am not always loving the group pictures when the kids aren't cooperating, but I am so glad that Chad's family make it a priority to get pictures no matter what. I am glad to have the pictures in the end (and especially now that I blog).

My babies were tired!

Love that Chad caught this face!

Sophie got the Leap Frog DVD called The Letter Factory and I would highly recommend it! Grant has had the DVD for a while and we saw how quickly he learned the letter sounds so we asked for it for Christmas.

Sutton slept through most of the present opening

Grant and Luke got a table like Sophie's and they started using it right away!

Sophie and Grant got new "bikes"

They love riding through the house on the bikes!

Sophie got "stuck" in the laundry room

Happy boy!

He fell asleep while we were getting ready to go to Mammy's