Audrey is 2!

Today, our sweet girl turned 2 years old! 

I couldn't help but try to remember what we were doing at certain times of the day two years ago... in the morning, I was at the doctor being told that there were no signs of baby yet (it was still a week before my due date).  At lunch time, we had no idea how much our lives would change in just a few hours.  At 4:45 that afternoon, my contractions started, and it was a whirlwind deciding to go to the hospital and getting to the hospital to find I was 9 cm dilated.  And then we met our baby girl at 6:31 in the evening.

Audrey is very silly, very independent, and very loving and cuddly.  Our family is so blessed to have her as a part of it.  We love her so much!

Pictures are coming... today we spent some time at Pump It Up with cousins and a couple friends for open jump, and then we headed over to Central Market to play on the playground and eat cake.  Audrey is having her official birthday party this weekend.  Stay tuned!

Christmas

I need to get caught up and write about Christmas Eve and Christmas Day before Audrey's birthday tomorrow...

Christmas Eve

For the past few years, we've met The Gonzalez's (Aunt Karyn, Uncle David, Tristan and Bella) for lunch at one of our favorite restaurants, Fortuna.  The restaurant is never crowded, and it's a nice place to visit and exchange gifts.  James and Audrey love their cousins!

It is a bit of a challenge to get a "good" picture of the 4 of them together, but we love that they're silly.

 

In the evening, we went to the family Christmas Eve service at our church. The service has been the same for several years, and we get to watch a re-enactment of the Nativity Story. They have real animals and a real baby. The service always ends with the lights out, candles in everyone's hands (flameless ones for the kids), and everyone singing Silent Night. It's really beautiful, and most importantly, the kids love it.

 

Christmas Day

This is the 1st Christmas that James has had any concept of Santa.  We didn't talk to him much about Santa because we know he hears lots of stories from school and other kids.  We didn't want to make things confusing by telling him a story that might contradict something he's heard, and then we have to explain why there's a difference, and then we have to be tricky, and then the whole thing spirals out of control.  So, we let James decide for himself.  When he asks us about Santa, we always respond with, "What do you think?"  So, according to James, Santa lives in the sky; he come down our chimney and eats cookies; every present under the tree is from Santa.  Needless to say, some of James' ideas are funny and original and some are the usual.  The funniest idea he has about Santa comes from Mama not being very good at being sneaky.  James asked Santa for a pinata (who knows why).  So, I bought one when he wasn't with me, and put it in the back of our SUV.  A couple days later, James was climbing into his car seat, and saw a Buzz Lightyear pinata in the back.  Of course he got excited, and told me all about it (oh no, why didn't I take that out of the car?).  I tried to convince him he was seeing things.  He's too smart for that.  So, after a confusing, awkward and vague conversation, James decided that Santa is so tricky that he put the pinata James asked for in the back of our car (I did not tell him that; I kept trying to convince him that he was seeing things).

Anyways, we had a wonderful Christmas morning. The kids loved seeing all the presents under the tree when they first woke up. We tried to alternate between Audrey and James, and have only one present at a time be opened, but their excitement took over and resulted in a little chaos. Happy chaos, though.  We all had a fun day playing with new toys and watching it snow outside.  And, we finished the day with a Greek Christmas meal.  So yummy!

North Pole Express

The weekend before Christmas, we took a trip to the North Pole on the North Pole Express in Grapevine.  We didn't tell James and Audrey what we were doing (well, maybe we told James earlier that day), and they were very confused why we were changing them into pajamas in the middle of the day.  But, both kids were thrilled to discover that we were going on a train ride, and that Santa might make an appearance.

Waiting to board the train...

 

 

On the train and keeping a lookout for Santa.

 

 

Here he is!

 

 

James is enamoured.

 

 

 

It is getting impossible to get a good picture of these two together!

 

 



Bella's princess birthday party

Our niece (the kids' cousin), Bella, turns 3 tomorrow, and she had a princess birthday party last weekend.  Audrey wore her new princess dress, and James dressed up as Batman (not very prince-ish, but he loves an excuse to be Batman).  We had so much fun celebrating Bella and are so happy we got to be at her party!  Happy 3rd birthday, sweet Bella!

 

 

Audrey's 1st haircut!

We decided Audrey needed a haircut (well, a trim), so we took her to the girl that cuts my hair.  We were pretty sure it'd be quite the struggle to get Audrey to sit still, but she not only sat still, she acted like she could care less...

 

 

 

Finally a smile (which took some silliness from Daddy)!

Happy Thanksgiving!

We had a nice, relaxing and fun Turkey Day this year.  Nana came up from Buda and spent a few days with us.  We were supposed to run/walk in the Turkey Trot in the morning, but I had a cold (that didn't stop me from making a full Thanksgiving spread), so we decided to skip it.  We watched the Macy's parade instead, and we played football with the kids in the backyard, and we watched some football, and of course we ate a delicious Thanksgiving meal.  It was a wonderful day reflecting on what we are thankful for... mostly, our family and friends.

Homemade cinnamon rolls for breakfast.

 

What are you looking at?

 

Sword fighting with Nana.

 

Yummy!

 

Audrey was still napping when we started dinner, so we were down a person at the table.

 

 

Someone woke up happy!

 

Cheese!

 

 

Christmas pj's on Thanksgiving night! Yahoo!

 

Christmas decorations in downtown Fort Worth.

 

 

Running at the track

James loves to run.  He runs laps around the house, and he runs back and forth across the backyard, and if there's an open field wherever we are playing outside, he runs.  We drive past the TCU track regularly on our way to church and school (same place), and James is always looking to see if anyone is out there running.  He calls the track, "the race". 

Sometime in late October, we took the kids to the TCU "race" so James could run.  He ran 100 meters in 39.4 seconds, and he ran 400 meters in 3 minutes 23.2 seconds (and he ran the entire lap in lane 5). 

 

While James ran, Audrey organized cones.

 

 

James took a break from running to climb the bleachers with Audrey.

 

On your marks, get set...