Twas the week after Christmas. . .

and I'm still trying to get caught up on everything. . . We had a wonderful Christmas full of time with family! R and I were very excited about Tink's first Christmas and she seemed to love it as much as we do :) Of course, she was completely interested in wrapping paper and exploring all of the new places we visited - she's getting harder and harder to keep up with! There were way too many pictures to choose from, so here are some highlights (don't forget to mute the playlist at the bottom of the page before you start the video) If you're on Facebook, these are the same pictures I posted this morning :)

Halloween

I have a lot of posting to catch up on, so I decided to spare myself the headache and post each separately as if I had been keeping up with things all along :)

We had such a fun Halloween! My niece spent the day with us and I had a great time taking the girls' pictures in their cute Halloween shirts. We also hosted a Halloween party for our friends with little ones, which was hilarious - there should be a rule against forcing your child into a fuzzy costume just for the sake of pictures, but it's way too cute to resist! Tinkerbell was a pretty good sport, I must admit. She wasn't a big fan of her wings, but I'm not sure I would be fond of having something strapped to my back that completely threw off the little balance I constantly worked so hard to achieve. Fun was had by all (except when we tried to take pictures) and I very quickly began having Pumpkin Patch flashbacks. . . Oh well, maybe they'll be more into it next year.

Cute Halloween shirts

(Thanks, Grandma!)

My sweet ladybug

(Props to Aunt Lorie for scoring such a

CUTE costume at a consignment sale!)

Cousins in costume

Our sweet friends

Just for Fun

I thought I would share some pictures and a video that we've taken lately (I'm sure the bathtub video will be appreciated when she's older!)

Loving sweet potatoes!

Matching Ladybug Outfits

The perfect outfit for a rainy day

"The Happiest Place on Earth"

We got to take a short vacation with my parents last weekend and decided to visit Orlando. We didn't make any official plans because we were supposed to be going just to "relax". Of course, we ended up running around most of the weekend (apparently, we are terrible at relaxing!) We enjoyed shopping, eating, and playing cards (R's favorite new pastime). I also read a lot, which was wonderful - we were very lucky to have Nana and Papa along to help - I decided it's the only way to travel with a baby! We didn't officially visit Mickey and Minnie - Tink should be old enough to appreciate it before we make that venture. We did, however, visit Downtown Disney for some shopping and fun pictures - a preview of what's to come some day! R and I are huge kids, so we can't wait to go back for the full-blown version of our family vacation to The Happiest Place on Earth. . .

Looking out the window with Daddy

We loved the princess section of the Disney store!

Notice the excitement. . .

Family Photo Op :)

Snuggling with Tinkerbell

First Visit to Chuck E. Cheese's

Tinkerbell's cousins spent the weekend with us, and we had a great time! We got to swim, make play-dough, and the boys went bowling while the girls got pedicures (definitely my kind of afternoon!) We topped off the weekend with a trip to Chuck E. Cheese's. We were celebrating a birthday, but it was also an important visit for Tink - her very first! As you know, Chuck E. is a VIP in our family, so it was a really big deal for her Daddy to take her for the first time. She wasn't really sure what to think of it all, but I'm sure she'll grow to love it as much as he does :)

Science Museum

Hoping for a strike

Cute toes (yes, the blue ones are mine)

Happy birthday!

Watching the show

First picture with Chuck E.

House Divided

Just had to share this cute picture that K and I took of the girls for my Dad's Father's Day gift - I used Creative Memories' Storybook Creator to do the editing (the same program I used to make her announcement - it's an AMAZING program!). It took us no less than an hour to get the picture, but it was definitely worth it!

Cousins

Tink got to spend some time with her cousins yesterday - My cousin and her daughter came to see my niece and we took the opportunity to take a few pictures of our girls! K and I were very fortunate to grow up close to our cousins and two of them live in the DFW area, so we hope that our kids will get to play together often. The girls have two older boy cousins that love to play, and there are only eight months between them, so we hope that they'll have lots of fun together.

Two generations of cousins

The girls

My sweet niece

Tink has a brand new cousin! She was born Wednesday, May 28 at 8:04pm. She weighed 8lbs 7oz and was 21 inches long. K delivered completely naturally, and is now my hero - I can't imagine being brave enough to deliver a baby without an epidural! They came home from the hospital today and are doing really well.

Showers of love from Oklahoma

We spent last weekend in Oklahoma and were "showered" with love by our family and friends! It was wonderful to see everyone, and so much fun to open presents! We are so blessed to have such special people that care for us in our hometowns and so excited about all of the fun new things!