Christmas Morning!

Christmas a.k.a."Pismas"

It has been a busy holiday season this year - but I am happy to report that we are finished with our addition! It is fantastic and we are loving having the extra room to play and to host our entire family for Christmas this year! Emma adores her new play room. But, I must say, it has been a crazy 2-3 weeks leading up to Christmas...with moving out for 10 days to have our floors refinished, and then having to move back in, as well as prepare for the holidays and for company - we are all relieved and glad to have it all done and to finally relax and enjoy! Enjoy a few pictures from our Christmas celebration thus far - and Merry Christmas!

{Emma's Christmas Party at school...she dressed up as a shepherd and walked in a parade!}

{Making Rice Krispy treat ornaments with Grandma Sue!}

{Decorating our tree [on 12/19] with Mommy!}

{Playing in her new playroom with Daddy [before carpet was installed]}

{Celebrating Granmom & Grandad's 25th Anniversary!}

Vacation

Here are a few of our favorite pictures from our trip out west in October! We flew into Albequerque (spelling??) and toured several National Parks in Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah, and then flew out of Salt Lake City. We camped in the RV with Granmom, Grandad, and Uncle Michael - and Emma had a great time! We saw the Great Sand Dunes (our favorite!), Monument Valley, 4 Corners, Canyonlands, and Arches National Park! We all had a blast, saw beautiful scenery, and got to do some great hiking...of which Emma LOVED! She was just a little miniature person and motor mouth while hiking...kept telling Daddy how much she loved hiking with him. Precious! I will try to add more pictures but have been having problems uploading them... Enjoy!

Being silly at Monument Valley :-)

"Balanced Rock" at Arches National Park

Canyonlands National Park

Hike at Canyonlands

Great Sand Dunes...

Hiking at Great Sand Dunes

Fall...well, sort of!

Here are a few pictures we took this week while on a nature walk with Emma! We got to the park, and the light was perfect, so we ran home and got our camera, and went back. She is such a ham and loves posing for pictures (and insists on taking pictures of us too!). We're ready for some fall weather...we got a little "taste" a couple of weekends ago but it's back to hot! Come on fall!

Our addition is going well - coming along quickly - and Emma loves touring it often to check progress! Enjoy some pictures...

Addition

We are making major progress on our house addition! Emma and I check it out every morning, and then we all check it out [and play in the dirt] every evening! Here are a few pics from this week...Monday and Tuesday they put the second floor up including walls, and today they installed the trusses. Emma is excited...but is not sure of the loud noises. It is a treat every morning though for Emma [bright and early at 7 am on the dot] to see what trucks are in our driveway!

Hipstamatic

I bought this new app on my phone, called Hipstamatic, and have been having a blast getting some cool new photos of Emma [and my other "children"]! It has different film, lenses, and flashes that you can select to create a variety of old fashioned photo images! Enjoy my favs!

Emma & Lena

Our friends Amy & Seth and their adorable daughter Lena visited us last weekend from Pennsylvania! We had a great day - had snacks, lunch, swam in the pool, and had a great dinner. The girls got along great from the first moment! They were very sweet together and enjoyed each others company - and gave each other hugs and kisses when Lena left!

School Days

Emma started 2 year old pre-school last week! She will be going to pre-school 2 days a week, from 9 am - 1 pm. So far, she's doing pretty well. We definitely had some tears, but day 2 was better than day 1 - so we have our fingers crossed! Her "First Day of School" pictures were so cute - we had to share them!

Haircut

I posted these on Facebook - but here are the hilarious pictures from Emma's first "Salon Haircut." I took her to where I get my haircut - since she has been there many times and I thought she would do better. Well, not exactly. She was very weary of this whole ordeal - and started going down hill when they tried to wash her hair (she doesn't even like US to wash her hair). So we bailed on the hair washing and just spritzed her hair to wet it. But then the cape was not a hit - so eventually, she sat in my lap, with no cape on and we finished. Her hair looks good (just a trim all around) but boy, I may have to learn to cut it myself. What an ordeal...for both of us!