Allie's Christmas Adventure!

I'm pretty sure Allie would say she enjoyed her Christmas. She's such a spoiled puppy. We were going to board her while we were in Wilmington but when we called they were completely full! Andy's parents told us to bring her along so they could see their "grandog". We were so worried that she would whine and cry and bark but she was wonderful! I don't think we could ask for a better dog. She also had her first experience with the beach!!!

Allie's box of Christmas toys:

Mommy brought her Santa Paws

and FANCY cookies!

Nim was so cute with the box ribbon tied around him...he had to make an appearance:

"Is that for me?"

"Really, do I have to weart this bow on my head?"

We think she liked it but since it was so cold we didn't get her too close to the water. Last time she fell in teh lake though she was not a big fan. Maybe next time we'll give it a try.

She LOVES her Andy!

Christmas in Wilmington

Christmas morning we headed to Wilmington. It was such a great time being with family and Andy's mom was so hospitable! They blessed us with so many nice things including our very first nativity set! It's like nothing we've ever seen and I can't wait unti lnext year so we can put it up and have its picture on here too! Chrsitmas dinner was also amazing. I love Wilmington, Christmas, and family :o)

Our stockings. We decided to let Mama LaGrange keep this tradition in Wilmington. Plus, Santa always leaves such special notes in them!

Christmas tree!
Allie got to come, too!
Andy playing Santa:

Christmas dinner and the BEST turkey EVER!

Thanks so much for having us!!!

A Cary Christmas

We had such a great time here in Cary for Christmas. My mom was able to come Christmas Eve and stay with us for a few days. We were heading to Wilmington Christmas morning so we decided to go ahead and have Christmas on Cary Christmas Eve. It was so nice to be able to spend it with people you love and care about. And we were so blessed :o)

Shopping for boys is VERY difficult:

In case you don't know, Andy is crazy about frogs...my mom said she saw this and just couldn't resist. Well, I think he LOVED it:

Wii Extreme Challenge, if you have a Wii, I highly recommend it :o)

Thanks to Andy's work we got lots of smelly stuff for our mommies:

I LOVE giraffes :o)

Andy was so sweet, ever since I saw the Lion King on Broadway here in Raleigh I've wanted to see it again. He's been looking constantly but a[pparently the closest it is getting in Iowa or something like that. Instead he got me tickets to see Beauty and the Beast. I cannot wait to see it!

The kitties got to have Christmas, too! We got them this fun little toy and they love to play with it. Especially when it's bedtime.

Pizza!!!

Out of all things to crave, why pizza? There are a ton of amazing pretty soft foods out there and what do I want? Pizza. Thank you Little Ceaser's to making life easy. Friday was our last day of school until the New Year. Lucky for me I didn't have to go to work Friday, instead I spent the day having my wisdom tooth removed. What fun that was! It's been pretty sad eating pudding, ice cream, soup, and cream of wheat but finally tonight we went for pizza. It was fantastic! Who thought you could get tired so qickly of ice cream? Everything seems to be going well. The tooth fairy even came although the oral surgeon probably through away my tooth. She brought stickers for my car. I now have Allie, Andy, Suki, Nim, and myself on the back of my car. How throughtful of her! Today I worked off 3 more hours of community service, too. Energy is pretty low but I guess once we get back to real food that should help.

Christmas Break - Part 1

I do LOVE this time of year! We made our first "family" Christmas cards earlier. Some we have sent out and others, well. we have become, or at least I have become a slacker. Trying to take the pictures for the card was quite challenging. It ended up pretty cute. Trying to get Miss Allie to pose for a picture though, is pretty much impossible. For now, here was the process:

I tried to have a heart to heart with her

Then we tried bribery

Oh well, Merry Christmas!

Blue Christmas

This past weekend Andy and I headed to Greensboro to celebrate my mom's 60th birthday! I secretly got her tickets to go see Christmas with Elvis at the Barn Dinner Theater, which by the way is a super cool place and I highly recommend you go at least once if given the chance. She was completely clueless up until the guy introducing everyone came on stage. I mean there were posters and cards everywhere. Just before "Elvis" came on she excitedly asked if this was an "Elvis" show. Man, that was great! Anyway, the show was really good. Elvis shook every man's hand and kissed every lady on the cheek before the night was over. He even serenaded my mom at the beginning. I don't think I'd ever seen her smile that big! The barn opens maybe about an hour and a half before the show actually starts and there is a buffet so you get to eat and enjoy your company before the show. Then they clear away the buffet tables and lower the stage. It was so cool! Thanks to James and Echo we were able to spend the night in Greensboro and visit my home church, too. That in itself was EXTREMELY refreshing. It's crazy how you don't realize how much you miss something until you go back and revisit it.

O Christmas Tree

So really we have had our Christmas tree up since November 15th. We got it the Sunday after my birthday and just couldn't wait to put up our very first Christmas tree! I figured now that it's after Thanksgiving it would be appropriate to share some pictures. Yay for the holidays! First are always so exciting but what abou the seconds?

Our First Thanksgiving

This was our very first Thanksgiving together and it was SO exciting! Our families met at our house since its in the middle which was awesome but of course that left us with the bulk of the cooking. I shouldn't say it like that because it really was so much fun! Our Turkey Tom soaked overnight in our sink with some sea salt and different spices. He came out tasting quite yummy and he wasn't even dry! I was pretty excited. The whole day that was all I was worried about. Anyway, it was great having everyone here and entertaining. We need to have people over more often. Here are a few pictures of our 1st Thanksgiving!

Our table before all the food:

Amusing ourselves while waitng for Tom and various other yummy goodies:

Finally, food!

Good job carving your first turkey love :o)