Valentine's Day

A beautiful, sunshine-y day.

Spent the entire day with my 3 favorite boys.

Lots of chocolate {proud to say I only had one little piece!}.

Walked along our favorite trail.

Received a sweet package in the mail from Mimi & Granddad.

Lunch date with Mr. Bonjour {alone!}.

Noah partied at MDO & brought home way too much candy.

Einstein's birthday was celebrated; he was king for the day.

Absolutely no cooking took place.

Except for some homemade dog bones made for the king.

Took a little nap. It was so nice.

Surprised with this iPhone cover. I'm in love.

It was a lovely day.

How was yours?

A January Valentine

Last night while I was grocery shopping at Walmart, I came across another Toy Story toy Noah just had to have. Seriously people, I've got a problem. Every time I spot something Toy Story my body naturally gravitates towards it, and I end up buying it. This time around though I was a good girl and decided I better ask my hubby if I could buy it... especially since I just had the "don't go overboard" lecture before I left. Me? Never! Ha.

Anyway, I spotted this race track toy and knew Noah would just love it. So, I had to think up a good excuse. Hmmm. Oh! Valentine's Day! I knew it would work, so I sent Josh a text with a picture of the toy and told him this toy would be the perfect Valentine's gift for Noah. I got a text a minute later saying, "yeah that's fine." Told you it would work! ;)

When I got home I put it in our laundry area and closed the door. I meant to eventually move it to our closet or somewhere else but forgot. Whoops. Well, guess who found his new toy today?

I just couldn't say no to the little guy once he saw it; he was so excited. So, he got his Valentine's gift a month early. Ha. It's safe to say, he loves it! He even took it to bed with him tonight. :)

Christmas with our Families

I had quite the scare today!

Someone {ahem, Noah!} dropped one of my memory

cards in a cup of Dr. Pepper sitting on our computer desk.

Josh told me to put it in some rice, so I ran to the kitchen,

threw open the pantry door and grabbed myself a bag of rice.

My little memory card is currently buried in a cup of rice, so I

am hoping and praying it's not ruined. That would be so sad.

Apparently the rice pulls all the fluid out of the card??

We shall see.

Anyway, I learned my lesson!

I'll never leave my memory card in reach of little hands ever again.

I was worried at first because I thought all of our Christmas pictures

were on that card, but thankfully they were on another one.

After we had our little Christmas, we drove to Oklahoma to

celebrate with my side of the family. We were only there a little

over 24 hours, so it was a very short trip, but the time we spent

together was so wonderful! I loved every minute of it.

Here are some of my favorite pictures of our

time together. You should have seen my parents' living

room. It was covered in wrapping paper! Ha.

I love this picture of my dad. Definitely the parent

my brother gets his funny expressions from.

The cutest twins I know.

Noah opening a present! Let me guess... something Toy Story?

Seriously, you should see our apartment.

Toy Story all over! :)

Noah got the coolest Buzz Light year from Granddad and Mimi.

Buzz says like sixty different phrases, has lasers, pop-up wings,

a moving head... you name it, he does it. All the guys

kept saying, "Why didn't we have cool toys

like that when we were growing up?!"

Noah waiting patiently as Daddy tries to get Buzz out of the box.

Noah showing Megan and Delilah how Buzz works.

My Mom surprised my Dad and got him some cowboy boots.

He was really excited about them.

And my Dad got my Mom a new flat screen T.V. for

her sewing room! Now she is set, and there is no reason

she can't get going with a sewing business {right Mom?}.

Guess what else Noah got? A potty!

I love the picture of him eating his cookie on the pot. Haha.

Bibi and Abby-- happy little newlyweds.

Oh goodness, here we go.

To make a long story short, my Mom and Josh have

an ongoing war each Christmas where they buy each

other something ugly. For the first year or two, they

bought each other the ugliest ornaments they could find.

But this year, they changed it up a little and Josh bought my

Mom this ugly "make your nose hairs curl" type of candle.

And my Mom found this beauty for Josh:

Can you guess where the shirt ended up?

Before we left for Amarillo, Josh had me distract my Mom

while he laid it down in Samson & Delilah's cage.

I love seeing what those two come up with every year. :)

Such a sleepy little guy.

It was a quick trip, but a wonderful one!

After we spent some time in Oklahoma with my

family, we drove to Amarillo to see Josh's side of the family.

We had an easy four hour trip to Amarillo and arrived late Sunday

evening. Papa and Grammy met us at the door and we all stayed

up a few hours talking and catching up. It was so good to see them!

The next morning we had breakfast and opened up gifts.

One of my favorite gifts that Grammy got Noah was a Toy Story

book recorded with her voice. Noah loved it! And he still

smiles each time we open it up and read it. What a special gift!

I loved how Noah tore off the wrapping

paper-- he knew what he was doing!

What is it??

Woody!!!

And boy does he love Woody.

He also says a bunch of different phrases from the movie

when you pull the string on his back. But Noah's favorite

thing about Woody is putting the hat on his head.

Thank you Grammy and Papa!

I guess Papa was surprised! Love this picture!

Noah playing the tickle game with Daddy.

He looooves to be tickled.

We were so glad Nanny and Pa {Josh's grandparents}, Joseph and

his girlfriend, Ashley, and Quentin were able to come over to see us.

Grammy cooked out steaks, and we all had lunch; it was so nice

to catch up with everyone and spend the afternoon together.

Family picture!

We also went to visit my grandmother Gigi

while we were in town. We sure miss her!

And we had the chance to see Josh's Aunt Kim for

a little bit one afternoon. It was great seeing her too!

I'm kicking myself because I didn't have my camera with me!

Sweet, sweet picture of Noah and his Grammy.

They sure have fun together.

What a blessing to be able to spend Christmas

with both of our families! We love you all!

Christmas Morning

It's funny how things change when you have a child, isn't it?

Josh and I decided to just give each other something small this year,

but honestly I would have been okay not getting anything.

I was more excited about watching Noah open his stocking & gifts.

Josh had to work Christmas Eve, so when he got off work Christmas

morning around six, he came home and got busy in the kitchen

making us some breakfast sandwiches. These sandwiches {which

are amazing by the way!} are what Josh grew up eating on Christmas

morning, so we decided to keep that tradition in our own family.

Sooo yummy!

We all sat down together and stuffed our faces!

Noah loved the breakfast sandwiches! In fact, I think it was his

very first time to taste the famous Bonjour Christmas sandwiches.

Not long after we finished eating, Noah climbed up on one

of the kitchen barstools so he could turn on the faucet and play

in the water. That boy loves to play in the kitchen sink!

You can tell by the look on his face in the first

picture he knows he isn't supposed to be up there.

And he got caught by Daddy!

And yes, Noah is wearing mummy pj's. Ha

I looked and looked for some cute Christmas pajamas

and couldn't find any! Even Walmart, of all places, was out.

Oh well. Guess I didn't look early enough.

Anyway, before we opened up stockings and presents,

we all sat down together and Daddy read the Christmas story.

It was a wonderful, quiet moment we spent together

reflecting on the birth of Jesus Christ.

And then Noah opened up his stocking. When we first gave it to him,

it was funny because he really didn't know what it was all about.

But it didn't take him long to figure it out.

He loved all of his stocking stuffers! He got

lots and lots of Toy Story stuff, a few cars, some

candy, a paint brush set, and a squishy ball. :)

Santa did good!

Noah loved the pound-a-ball toy he got.

He had so much fun hitting the balls with the

hammer and watching them go through the holes

onto the ramps that took them to the bottom.

He loved it so much, he didn't even care about

any of the other presents he had. Ha.

And then he saw Woody, and Buzz, and Jessie,

and Bullseye and all the other Toy Story characters...

and couldn't wait for Daddy to open up the box!

We spent a lot of the morning watching

Noah play with all of his new toys. So much fun!

It was a wonderful Christmas morning!

Merry Christmas

I can't think of a better way to start our Christmas weekend.

As Noah and I snuggled on the couch this morning to watch this video,

Noah kept signing something to me that I couldn't understand at first.

Then it hit me.

He was signing "Jesus" every time he saw the baby.

There is nothing that blesses my heart more.

Truly it is all about Jesus.

Hope you and your family have a very Merry Christmas!

Santa Claus!

This weekend we took Noah downtown to see Santa Claus.

He was definitely not a fan of the big guy in red.

But Josh was.

Right before we left, he went up to Santa and said,

"You're the most realistic Santa I've ever seen!"

And Santa looked at him like he was crazy and said

with his jolly voice, "Oh... well, thank you."

So funny.

p.s. Happy birthday Dad/Granddad!

We love you and hope your day is wonderful.

Anxious to see all of you this weekend!

Off to Lowe's

This year we went to good ol' Lowe's to get our Christmas Tree.

We planned on going to Flower Mound's Christmas Tree Farm, but

we changed our plans at the last minute for the following reasons:

a. Our little Toyota Camry

+

a big ol' Christmas tree

+

a 45 minute drive home

= a very nerve-wracking drive home.

b. We have a toddler who doesn't care where we buy

our Christmas Tree. Lowe's has everything the little guy

could ever want: twigs, branches, rocks, dirt...

c. Lowe's is two minutes from our house.

So, the decision was made, and we were off to

Lowe's to find the perfect Christmas Tree.

Josh was my Christmas Tree handler...

Overall, he was patient with me.

Not to say we didn't have the conversation we

have every year when we're out looking for our tree.

And Noah, well, he was being his little toddler self, and was all

over the place interested in everything but the Christmas trees.

He sure was looking cute doing whatever he was doing.

Sweet picture of Noah and Daddy.

It wasn't too long before we Mommy & Daddy found the perfect tree.

What a wonderful evening we had together as a family. We love our Christmas tree!