Christmas Continued

This is the best Christmas present I got this year!

I got to see smiling baby boy when he woke up! This might not seem like a big deal, but actually it is HUGE!! I was supposed to have to work Christmas day. But in a crazy turn of events we only had 5 babies at work. We are not the biggest NICU, not even close, but for us that is a ghost town. So I got to stay at home with the family!!! Yeah!!!Avery practiced his scooter some more. Before we went to brunch.
I was so thankful that Linde's husband Jeff's sister, Leeanne, was kind enough to include my family in her Christmas day brunch. I thought I was grateful because it meant my boys would have something to do while I worked. Luckily, I got to be grateful that it meant I got to see my sis on Christmas day even when it was time for her to be with Jeff's family. Either way I am grateful for her hospitality and generosity.

The day after Christmas we headed to Michael's family's for their Christmas. We had so much fun with a big lunch at Grandma and Grandad's with all the family. That night we got to hang out with Granny, too. It was a great day, but we thought we left our camera batteries at home so I of course have no pictures.

Saturday morning we found the camera batteries so we documented some quality time lounging with the family. Avery Blake and Uncle Blake share a very special bond. They had so much fun together until there was an unfortunate diaper episode... Luckily, Uncle Blake is very forgiving. :)

Pop and Avery had so much fun, I can't believe I actually documented Pop not holding Avery. He loves to hold him and play with him and pretty much do anything Avery wants. Avery had lots of fun with Almost Aunt Courtney, Blake's fiance, on Friday but you know, no pictures. So I added this one from the fair. We are so excited for the big wedding next September. Blake and Courtney started booking things this weekend!!

And of course Grandma and Grandad came down for some more Avery time Saturday morning. Grandad is the original Avery and they are always having fun together. Little Avery was having so much fun talking to Grandma and Grandad Avery that he was not real impressed when Grandma turned him around for a photo op.
And as always Avery got in some good time with his Honey. Honey was very generous and shared Avery with everyone else since she gets to play with him while I am at work. I know she and Avery are looking forward to some quality time after the first of the year when things get back to normal and Daddy isn't the daycare and Honey IS!

I am so thankful for so many things this year, especially our families who work so hard to love us and love Avery. God blessed us with wonderful families that I know anyone would be glad to have. Who else gets to have 3 fabulous Christmas celebrations???

Merry Christmas

Well we had a very Merry Christmas and we hope you did too! Beware, LOTS of pictures. I couldn't help myself. This year we celebrated Christmas Eve because we thought I was going to be working Christmas day. Santa's elves need some tutoring. We sort of forgot to put the big present together...Lucky for us the little prince was patient playing in his room while we worked.

His patience paid off, I think he like his new toy. Maybe soon he will be able to push it all by himself, but I am thinking it is going to be awhile.

Mom, Linde and I always wear matching PJ's. This years were from Ann Taylor Loft, I highly recommend them. They were on sale, are very soft and not too small. It seems like lots of PJ's are too small who wants to be squished while they sleep?

Avery also had fun kicking back reading some of his new books. He especially likes the ones that Great Aunt Suzi illustrates.

I got some little spatulas in my stocking, but somebody thought he needed them more.

Daddy got chip clips...

Like any good kid the shiny ribbon was a huge hit. So was the book with pictures of the family, including the pugs.

Mamma and her stocking treasures.

Jeff and Linde having fun.
We eventually took off our pajamas and had a wonderful Christmas lunch. We even got to share it with Jeff's parents Steve and Linda, it was great to get to celebrate with so many people.
Avery joined us and had teething biscuits even though it was nap time. He decided his Christmas present to himself was NO naps. Even without them he was still really great, but he did sleep 15 hours that night.
See here he is happy and smiling for his 9 month picture before he went to bed. I can't believe he is 9 months old!

We also had a great Christmas day and day after. I will tell you about those soon.

6 years!

I can't believe it was 6 years ago today that I married my prince! There may be a little prince at our house these days, but no one can replace THE prince. Thanks for being my best friend, a great dad and a wonderful husband. I can't imagine anyone else being the man in our lives. I love you,
Abbe Jo

Christmas Card Out-takes

I attempted to take Christmas card pictures by myself today... what was I thinking. It is not easy to keep an almost 9 month old, wow! is he really that old, and energetic pug in a dress to look at the same place at the same time. But, we had fun trying! Thank goodness for 1 hour printed cards from Sam's some of them will make it by Christmas.

Little stinker hardly ever crawls, but those decorations were perfect motivation!See he could just take one more crawl and reach easier but instead he stretched until his belly full of jelly was hanging out.

Pug kisses, yummy!

Avery thought Cleo's belt and tail were so much fun. You would think he'd never seen her in a dress before.

Aw, they love each other....

Merry Monday!

Did you know Avery is Famous???

He is! At last count he or his room are on 3 different websites, you should check them out.

Aunt Linde's Fabulous work on his room can be seen by clicking here

His super cute crib was made by Matt Colvin you can see it here

And of course his adorable photos are here on Lisa Woods' photo blog and other places on her website, too visit him here

I hope you all have a great weekend. Only a few more days until Christmas are you ready??? I know I am NOT. But, somehow we will get there. I am off to wrap package and wash Christmas jammies.

We Made It!

I am very thankful that I did not get called in to work today, because Avery and I got to do something very fun instead.

We went to see SANTA! Last year when I was pregnant I started to scoping out the local Santa's and thankfully determined that the best was in fact at my beloved North Park. We tried to go last Friday with Katie and David, but we then learned that you have to go early and get a ticket or wait FOREVER, I told you he's good. So, the Wal-Mart Lover, AKA Aunt Linde, popped over to North Park this morning and got us a ticket. Then Avery, LouLou and I loaded up and went to see Santa. I think our time slot would have been perfect if the little prince had taken his usual 11 o'clock cat nap, but of course he was far to busy for that. So we made it with no nap and had a great time.
He thought Santa was way cool and really checked him out, but I think he was a little too tired to smile. The Santa was so nice, I hope he hangs around awhile so he can chat it up with him next year like Santa did with the other big kids. This picture may end up on the Christmas card if my other ideas don't pan out, so act surprised if it turns up on your card!

Isn't it Ironic...

Look what I got at work today

Merry Christmas to me, Love Texas Health Resources! Guess I'm going back after all.

I can say I tried it!

Well, today I tried something I HATE! And guess what I still hate it! I loaded up Avery on this crazy cold day to go to Wal-Mart... I am a Target snob, but I have been hearing that I should try Wally World for groceries that it is so much cheaper and not that bad if you go to the new one so it is not dirty.... WHATEVER! I am so mad. It took me forever to shop and I spent WAY more than I ever spend at Tom Thumb or Target. Ugh. I am so irritated. I will say that I always complain that there is a pregnant teenage girl yelling at her mamma and we did not see that, but we did see 2 old men talking about "fornicating and adultery." Yikes, good thing Avery had on his hoodie, I am hoping he didn't hear I know I am working hard to forget I heard it.

On a fun note I saw that my friend Annalee's blog designer is back in business, Fabulous K designs, I LOVE her designs. She also did Witt's (the button on the R), so I am entering her contest to see if I can win a cool design instead of my obnoxious purple blogger look. Hopefully I will win. You should all go to her site and buy one, but let me win the contest. I don't have any money left because I spent it all at Wal-Mart. :)

Good thing I had this precious face to keep me company through all the fun.

Kim and Slim Jim

We have had such a fun weekend! Friday night we drove to Tyler to celebrate one of my best friends from high school Kimmy. We had so much fun getting together after the rehearsal dinner. There were 8 of us and all but Mere made it to the pre-game party, she was busy taking care of her precious 2 week old baby boy.

We had fun giving a giant group hug instead of our usual 2 rows of 4 pose. :) We had so much fun just us girls catching up and meeting some of Kim's new friends, too. Abby, the snacks were fab.Saturday was the big day and it was beautiful. I love winter weddings, probably because I had one, and this one didn't disappoint. The decorations were beautiful and so was Kimmy. We all cleaned up pretty well, too.
It is fun to see how our group is changing. Meredith was so sweet to come in for the wedding, and Brian and his mom took care of sweet Hudson for her. Emily and Jared came all the way from Kansas, we were so excited to meet Kate. Unfortunately Avery couldn't care less about anything but my necklace, I think he is going to be a jeweler when he grows up. We had so much fun catching up with everyone and are so excited that Kim was patient and found Jim, not only do their names rhyme which is super fun, he is GREAT! We are looking forward to fun at Ranger games and much more since they don't live too far away.

Go Cowboys!

A few Sundays ago Avery went to his first Cowboys game. He was so good and we had a blast. I thought you might need to see pictures. If you know Michael's family, you know this was a big huge deal. We were so glad there was a game that we could go to and that the weather was so nice, too. It was great because we got to go to a game the week of Thanksgiving even though we didn't go on Thanksgiving day. So we got family time and football in just a few days early. I also was so glad Ben and Emme were there. I am afraid I didn't get to watch enough of the game talking to Emme and enjoying Avery enjoying all his fans/family.

Sorry, blogger is turning this one for some reason, but the Tom picture is crucial to being an official man in the family.

Thankfulness and Lessons Learned

This is super late because I haven't made time to upload my pictures... sorry!

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving. I don't know if we will every figure out how to "do the Holidays well" as far as keeping the families happy, but I feel like we did better this year than we have in awhile and are learning lots of good lessons to do better every year.

Avery and I headed out to Tyler Tuesday with Aunt Linde in tow. It was so fun to have good sister chatting and some Chick Fil-A on the way there, as always I am SO thankful for my sister. I really hope Avery boy gets a sister some day, I can't imagine my life without mine. Lesson #1 Sisters are the greatest. (especially when they greet their hubbies in their wedding dresses for Thanksgiving)

We made it to Tyler in time for Linde to do a work consult at her friend Lindsay's momma's house. It was great to see their family and remember fun times when Linde and Lindsay were BFF's back in the day. The Walkers are such a special family that I really admire.
Lesson #2 Pray that Avery makes good friends, they are so important.

Then Avery and I took Aunt Linde to see Krista the Hair Hero, she is amazing. Linde came out in just a few minutes looking amazing.

Lesson #3 Krista is still the hair hero, should have her do my hair forever!

We finally made it to Mom and Dad's house and had a great stay with them. Avery was charming and wonderful as always, minus some new going to bed issues. Luckily, Aunt Linde stepped in and saved him when I thought maybe he just needed to cry it out.
Lesson #4 Aunt Linde's a sucker, but Avery boy loves it.
Wednesday was a fun mother daughter day. Mom, Linde, Avery and I had big fun at Brookshire's with all of Tyler but because we were together it wasn't so bad. Then we went home and had fun making pies, cake and pizza. Avery was happily entertained by Papa when things got a little to girly. Avery especially loves singing the new song Papa created just for him, for once I wish we had a video camera to hear him "sing" it back is the funniest thing ever.

Lesson#5 Anything is fun if you make it that way with your Mom and sister.

Michael and Jeff came after work and had pizza and Armadillo dip with us. Armadillo dip is the greatest dip ever! We were all so sick we could barely eat pizza, but don't worry I made room for several pieces.

Lesson #6 Thanksgiving isn't just about Turkey, Armadillos are important, too.

Avery also discovered that Aunt Linde's cross necklace tasted to good and felt fabulous on his little gums. Linde (aka the sucker) let him chew it to death and completely soak her shirt in the process, literally she had to go change after...We decided he needed his picture in the trough with his new obsession, we thought he looked like baby Jesus, but now I am thinking more of a really wierd nun. :)

Lesson #7 Avery loves Jesus and Jewelry

Thursday we all got up watched The Parade and had a fabulous breakfast, biscuits gravy and sausage... so good! Who needs lunch with this breakfast. Then we all loaded up and went on a fabulous boat ride. It was a beautiful day and Daddy was the greatest captain. We cruised and had a blast, Avery even helped drive for awhile. It was a great way to spend the last of our time with Linde and Jeff. Lesson #8 Everyone's parents should move to the lake in Texas, boat rides on a balmy Thanksgiving day are GREATNESS!

We had a fab snack of cheese and crackers and Linde and Jeff headed out to go see his family. We were sad to see them go, but so grateful they made time for our family.

Lesson #9 It is one thing for me to go see my other family, little sis not allowed. :)

We finally had a wonderful Thanksgiving lunch while Avery took a nap. Mom, Dad, Michael and I had a great dinner with adult conversation and the Cowboys kicking some booty in the background.
Lesson#10 I am so glad for an easy, relaxing Thanksgiving it doesn't have to be fancy or big to be big fun.
I napped while Mom and Dad did the dishes, I know I am wretched, I didn't mean to but I fell asleep trying to get Avery to nap a little longer and she left me sleeping.Lesson #11 I have the greatest parents ever!

We watched the Aggies, not much to say there, not worth any lessons either...
Thursday night I headed home and Michael and Avery went to see Michael's parents. I hear they had a great time at the big Thanksgiving lunch the next day. Avery was charming as always despite being out of his routine for so long and being around so many people.
Lesson #12 It is important to have fun family to be with my family while I work, I love my job but it sucks to work on the Holidays.

Saturday Michael and Avery regrouped at home with a LOT of sleeping for Avery, until 10:45 Sat morning and 3 good naps, too. I had a good day at work with my friends, I am so glad I love the people I work with.

Lesson #13 Naps are good so are good friends.

I hope you had a great Thanksgiving with lots of fun lessons learned. Now it is time to bust out the Christmas decorations. We have 2 trees up, 2 more to go and tons of other decorating to do. I LOVE IT!