Irish Christmas Eve

When Irish Eyes are Smilin'....

Christmas Eve is at my parent's house. Each year we choose a different country and it's traditions as a theme for the evening. This year was Ireland and we had such a good time. Here's my little darlin' all dressed in green for the holiday.

It helps that we have Irish ancestors, most of our menu came from my great-grandmother's cookbook. Beer stewed lamb, oysters, scalloped potatoes, soda biscuits, homemade fruitcake and of course the tea and coffee were "flavored" with whiskey. Great job Gamma, everything was delicious!

The boys look like they are about to head out to a pub.

Three genereations of girls, I believe the fourth is watching Mickey Mouse in the living room.

It is customary to clean the whole house for Christmas and give linens as gifts. I love my new linens. Maybe I'll get around to that cleaning by spring.

On Christmas Eve, the youngest girl lights a candle in the window to light the way for weary travelers like Mary and Joseph. Very smart Gamma, an electric candle so our toddler could be safe.

All decked out in her new flannel robe and nightgown.

We danced a couple of Irish jigs, and laughed and laughed. No, I will NOT be posting those videos. We also sang the Twelve Days of Christmas and talked about the true meaning of the song. During times of religious oppression, this popular carol was used to teach about Jesus, the real reason for the season. Merry Christmas Eve!

Christmas Pictures

Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday to all of our loved ones with December birthdays - Nanny, Aunt Heather, Nanie, Grandma Bobbie, Grace, Danny and Baby Jesus!

Gingerbread Houses

So I had this brilliant idea to make gingerbread houses with Tessa this Christmas season. Granted, I haven't done one of these in years, but I remembered it being a fun and relatively easy activity. Hhhhmmmm, fun and easy is defined differently when a toddler is involved.


I love the kit I bought, it came with five mini houses for my mini person to decorate. I assembled and iced the houses and divided the candy into little bowls. Then I let Tessa decorate the houses. (OK, honestly I totally helped.) It was very cute to watch her alternate between eating the candy and mushing it into the icing. I believe she has a mouthful of mini M&Ms in this picture.

By the time we were done the kitchen was a disaster, the floor was covered with candy and crumbs, Tessa looked like she had been tie dyed and I was a little stressed out. But it was fun and the finished houses are pretty cute.

Here Comes Santa Claus

Our SS class hosts a very fun Santa party each Christmas. One lucky man gets to dress up like the big guy and pass out presents to all the kids. You'll notice there are no posted pictures of Tessa on Santa's lap. She screamed like we were absolutely torturing her and the picture is so sad. No more Santa pictures for awhile Baby, I promise.




Tessa is currently into bows and likes to pick them out herself. She is wearing three at once in this pre-party picture. Not just any girl can pull off the triple bow, but she matches and doesn't she look cute? We settled on one big bow with two different colors for the party.


Hanging out with our friends C and S.

Sharing a cupcake with S. More sugar please!

We may not like sitting on Santa's lap, but we do like receiving presents. Mickey and Minnie stuffed animals are a hit, at least for about five minutes. That's pretty good in toddler world.

Last year was a little crazy when most of our little darlings were still babies. Now that all those babies are fully mobile toddlers, it's especially wild! But that's the beauty of this party, it's totally kid oriented. Here they have formed a sort of conga line where they burn off a little energy. Can you tell they are on a sugar high?!

You Bring So Much Joy To All Our Hearts

Today we celebrate and remember

The day you came to us

To be part of our family for always.

You have brought love, joy, warmth, and togetherness

Into the family and into our hearts.

You are special, today is special, and you are loved!

Happy Adoption Day Tessa!

Thanksgiving in Texas

We traveled to Texas to spend Thanksgiving with Ryan's parents. For the first time, Tessa had her own seat on the airplane and it made flying with her very pleasant. On takeoff we threw our hands in the air and said "high to the sky!" This child loves to fly!

We had surprisingly great weather all Thanksgiving week. Nanny and Pa took us to the Houston Zoo and it's hard to say who liked it more, Tessa or Ryan. So many neat animals including a baby giraffe. The live oaks are even more beautiful than I remember.

To Tessa's absolute delight, we rode the carousel. She was so cute saying "hold tight" while we went flying around on different animals.

We rode the train which brought back fond memories of my grandparents taking me on the very same train. The tracks have been extended and the train now runs to the medical center where I did my nurse training. Tessa was obviously more impressed with the train and its whistle than my former hospitals. In this picture she is saying "Choo-Choo!"

In the children's area was a petting zoo where Tessa brushed and petted the goats. We cracked up watching her fuss at them when they would walk away from her. "Oh no goat!" Toddler translation: 'You're not getting away from me, I want to brush you some more!' Thank goodness for patient animals.

Since we won't be seeing Ryan's parents for Christmas, we celebrated early and opened gifts. Tessa is still more excited about tissue paper than anything in the package so Momma and Daddy helped open presents. Once she realized there were toys and dolls for her, she became very interested.

The best present was her pizza oven. We all LOVE pizza and it seems like we go out for pizza every time we see Paula, which is how she earned the nickname Nanny Pizza. What better gift from Nanny Pizza than a pizza oven?

Tessa and I received matching aprons. I'm the Cookie Maker and she is the Cookie Taster.

We had to put such cute aprons to use immediately. Nanny and Tessa made turkey cookies.

On Wednesday the Burches got together for brunch. We marveled at all the renovations and watched Tessa climb the stairs over and over again.

We can't visit Texas without a trip to my favorite fast food restaurant. WHATABURGER! Tessa approved and was so cute eating her fries I had to take a picture.

Nanny and Pa have great parks in their neighborhood and we visited them several times. It was a great way for Tessa to burn energy. In fact, Thanksgiving morning we wore her out so much that she took a great nap. Ryan and I both were able to sit down and enjoy Paula's wonderful Thanksgiving meal while Tessa slept.

Traditionally we all gather at Aunt Kristin's house Thanksgiving night and let the kids play. It's amazing to see how much everyone grows in one year! Congratulations to Kellie who had another girl four days after this picture was taken.

The trip home was thankfully uneventful. It was great to see everyone but it's nice to be home too. Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Happy Birthday Gampa

We went to Gampa's favorite steakhouse for his birthday this year. The food was delicious and Tessa was thrilled with the free birthday dessert. Now we know how to get the child to sit still for more than five minutes, give her ice cream and a spoon! Happy Birthday Gampa, we love you!!!

Mountain Getaway

This past week-end we headed up to the moutains with two other families for a mini vacation. Tessa did very well, only protesting her bedtime the first night. After many tears, Ryan miraculously convinced her to go to sleep. She slept all night in her own room that night and every other night. I think this is a vacation first!

We are lucky to have friends with girls Tessa's age. They played together with a minimum of fussing and fighting. Each morning they would wake up and ask for each other, so excited to be having this extended playdate.

Feeling adventurous, we decided to take the girls on a one mile hike. They loved tromping through the woods and criscrossing the creek on wooden bridges. I love this father/daughter picture.

The area is very family friendly with two nearby parks. The girls had plenty of energy to slide and swing and play, even after hiking all morning.

The house had a wraparound porch where the girls spent lots of time running and playing. The weather was so great that one night we even decided to eat outside. I love that it wasn't too cold! The boys showed off their man skills by building a fire and we all enjoyed smores. I still can't believe that Ryan had never had a smore! Needless to say, he thought it was yummy and Tessa did too.

We were just across the street from a gorgeous golf course. I hit a handful of balls at the driving range and was pleased to discover that I can still hit a decent 7 iron! The boys played a few holes that afternoon while the girls were napping.

We saw lots of deer, inlcuding this baby one. No bear sightings though, and that's probably okay. Very nice, very relaxing long week-end with good company. Let's do it again sometime!

Bouncing Baby

After a very busy work week for me, Tessa and I had some playtime at Monkey Joe's. We introduced Gamma and Gampa to the joys of inflatables. They were great sports about bouncing with Tessa and she was happy as can be jumping and sliding with all of us. She's no longer as interested in the toddler area but preferred to spend most of her time on the biggest slide in the whole place. No fear! I'm very impressed G&G both tackled the slide with her more than once. Then we headed over to our favorite Mexican restaurant for lunch where Tessa delicately dipped her chips in salsa. Amazing! After all the excitement she took a three hour nap - yay!!!

Trick or Treat

Happy Halloween! Earlier today we headed to the clubhouse for a neighborhood party. It was lots of fun with cookie decorating, a picture frame station and pin the nose on the pumpkin. Tessa really wanted to go to the pool and didn't understand that it is closed until next year. Several times we walked over to the pool gate behind the clubhouse and said "Bye-Bye Pool." She loves to swim and apparently is like her Momma, already wishing for the return of summer.

Tonight we dressed both Tessa and Anabelle in their bumble bee costumes and had a fabulous time trick-or-treating. While my darling daughter has an unbelievable sweet tooth, she was more excited about knocking on people's doors and socializing than actually eating the candy. I guess she had more than her share of M&Ms while I was bribing her to smile for the camera.

Gamma and Gampa joined in the fun too! They helped pass out candy, take pictures and even got to trick-or-treat with us. Tessa loved all the attention and was very excited to stay up two hours past her usual bedtime.

Happy Halloween everybody!