Christmas 2012

Well, I have a corrupt camera card so some of the pictures I took from Christmas I can't show.  That's ok because we spent all of our Christmas vacation sick from the flu.  Yep, that's right we had the gift that keeps on giving.

Here is one picture I did take off of a different camera card.  Hunter is playing with a remote control toy that he got.  This is a few days post-flu for me and Korey.  We're just thankful that Hunter didn't get it.

Our 4th Anniversary

Just over a month late in posting this!

In November Korey and I celebrated four years together.  We spent a weekend in Dallas doing a food tour.  There was a whole bunch of restaurants that we wanted to try, ok well me, really.  

Here's a quick list of all the places we went:

Cane Rosso

East Hampton Sandwich Company

The Grape

Crossroads Diner

I had also purchased a groupon to go and see the Dead Sea Scrolls in Ft. Worth.  Those were really neat to see and it was fun to be back on campus where I used to attend (only got ten hours credit though).

Happy Anniversary to my husband!  I love you!

Driveway Time

The Wednesday before Thanksgiving I got to come home early from work so I got started on my pie baking.  I made 5 pies plus a batch of lasagna soup!

It was so nice to have the afternoon free that Hunter and I took advantage of the daylight and went outside in the driveway to play.

Be still my heart!

So cute!

He wanted to ride his scooter so he pulled it out and rode around for a few minutes.

When did he get to be so big?

Halloween 2012

This guy loves firetrucks and ambulances and things that go "woo woo woo."  When I found the fireman costume on sale at the consignment store I knew that it would be perfect for Hunter.  Plus, it was low maintenance.  Toss on the coat and pants.  Done.

This was our first Halloween to actually let Hunter dress up and participate.  His first year he was only a few months old so we put him in a costume for about five minutes just to take pictures.  Inside.  Last year he participated in a church fall festival but he wasn't dressed up.  And by participated I mean he ran around the gym and we chased him.

This year was the year.  We dressed him up and took him door to door to trick or treat.  He doesn't even eat candy (yes, I know).  But we did use it as an opportunity to meet our neighbors.

Thus, cuteness abounded before dark.

Hunter was joined by his cousin Levi.  He didn't last very long but he was so cute in his costume.

 Here's my sister and her husband.  And Levi the Giraffe.

 I love a man in uniform!

 Fireman Hunter patrolling the sidewalks...for stray candy.

 And Hunter and his daddy off to see more neighbors.

Triple Trouble

Korey has a cousin that was coming into town a couple of weeks ago and his mom wanted us to come down for a mini family reunion.  We packed up the car and headed south the weekend before Thanksgiving.  And of course Dallas traffic put us an hour and a half behind schedule due to two wrecks.  Sigh.

We ended up arriving at 10:30pm at night and Hunter and his cousin Brandon quickly reunited and started playing.  We didn't go to bed until 1am!

On Saturday we we were reunited with Korey's cousin.  They have a 2 year old also so we spent the weekend with 3 two year olds.  And it was seriously so much fun seeing them together.  (I'm just realizing in the middle of typing all of this that I don't have all of the pictures downloaded.  Guess I'll do another post later!)

We went to a pumpkin patch and Hunter climbed up on the pumpkins.  It was the last weekend before Halloween so it was very crowded.

Here are the three cousins!  Andrew, Hunter, and Brandon.  Nana bought them each a Halloween shirt so we dressed them up in them for our Saturday adventures.

This was at the pumpkin patch.  The three of us moms were crouched down behind the sign holding our kids up.

On Saturday night we put all 3 of them in the bathtub together and they were so cute.  We, of course, aren't posting those photos.

Here are the three cousins!  Becca, Korey and his brother Kevin and their kiddos.  We had so much fun hanging out with them.  I wish they lived closer.

Here are the ladies from our weekend.  Bekah, Corey, me, and Korey's mom "Nana."

The Energy Bus for Kids

I know I've mentioned this on Facebook but I've been meaning to write about it here.  Earlier this year Korey got contacted to do a book with Jon Gordon.  He is a well-known motivational speaker and has several books out for adults.

He decided he wanted to make a kid's version from one of his popular adult books so he needed an illustrator.  Korey agreed and worked on it all summer.  We had to keep it on the down low until the book finally released.  And being the good wife that I am, when I took this quick picture, I didn't get all of Korey's name in the frame of the picture.

You can read more about the book on the Energy Bus for Kids site.

Serving Home

After we moved out of our former home and into my parent's home I took a blogging break minus a few family posts here and there.  I spent the summer praying and obsessively talking to my husband about our family blog and the possibility of starting a new blog.  I kept thinking about what I wanted to blog about and even though "food" seemed an easy choice there are tons of food blogs and it didn't encompass the new home we were about to have and what we wanted to do with our home.

What is it that we want to do with our home?  Well, this is "the home" which means we aren't going anywhere for a good while.  This is it.  No more checking the MLS listings and counting out pennies to see what we can afford.  Our new home has enough room in it for us to grow and expand as a family (no I'm not pregnant) and have room to entertain.  But not just entertaining.  Entertaining with a purpose.

For awhile Korey and I have been talking about using our home to bless others.  For example, we've already signed up to host DNow in November.  Actually, I signed us up before we ever moved in.  Crazy, I know.  I grew up going to DNow as a youth in our church and I have fond memories and it's always been one of my desires to be able to host.  We also really want to get to know our neighbors, invite them over for dinner, and build a relationship with them in the hope that we can share God with them.  Both of us have been overseas to share God's love with people but we feel a burden for us to just go across the street and get to know people.

All this to say that I decided I wanted to start a blog about this process.  I wanted it to be separate from our personal, family blog which is not going away.  So yes, I will have two blogs and no, I don't know how I'm going to keep up with them when I work full-time outside of the home and I'm a parent to a toddler.  But try I must.

What's in the blog?  Well, because I like to multi-task there will be a chronicle on decorating, organizing, entertaining, and feeding others.  It will be about how I make our home a place to welcome others.  I don't claim to know everything or even have the necessary skills.  I'm just jumping out into the deep end and seeing what happens.

Our family blog is hosted on Blogger but after doing some research I started the new blog on Wordpress.  All.By.Myself.  Without paying a designer.  And I still don't think I know what I'm doing.  But somehow I managed to go through all the steps to get it to where it is today.  Oh and let me just say that Wordpress and I almost broke up a couple of times.  I told Korey somedays it felt like I was walking into a BioChemistry class and being asked to take a test on something I knew nothing about!  It was exhausting, people.  And I still have a long list of things that need to be tweaked, added, or fixed on my blog.  I see why blog designers charge the prices they do.  You deserve it!

With all that said, join me as I blog here and at my new place, Serving Home!

Pizza Night

Every Friday night is pizza night at my parent's house.  Sometimes my mom makes the pizzas from scratch, crust included, and other times we eat Papa Murphy's.  On this particular night we ate Papa Murphy's.  Hunter LOVES pizza.  He asks for it all the time.  We never have to worry about him eating his dinner on Friday nights at their house.

Galveston 2012

At the end of August we set off on our first real family vacation.  We decided to spend a few days in Galveston because we wanted an easy and affordable trip considering the huge purchase that's coming our way.

First, let me say that Korey and I have always been anti-DVD player in the car kind of people.  We just don't believe in constantly making our child consume TV at every chance he gets.  But roadtrips?  A whole different ballgame.  So we loaded up a DVD player, toys, snacks and Hunter kicked off his shoes as soon as we left.

Our first stop was in League City to see where Korey's paternal grandparents were buried.  Korey's grandfather was an architect which is how he inherited his drawing skills along with his drawing desk.

Since Hunter didn't nap at all during the car trip despite two doses of milk, we tried to get him to lay down once we go to the hotel.  Fail!

Hunter was not bored at all in our room.  As you can see below he loved playing with the A/C.  He would constantly turn it on and off despite us telling him numerous times to stop!

Underneath the night stand was one of those pouf seat things so I put it in front of the bed and that became Hunter's way of jumping on the bed.  He easily entertained himself in the room.

I guess he had to yell while he jumped, too.

Haha just noticed the TV caption "Party City."  I think that's fitting for this picture.

Poor Monkey was tired after all that.

That night we went and walked on the beach.  This was Hunter's first time to see the ocean.  Pleasure Pier is in the background.  I have no idea why we're both looking in different directions.

We got our feet wet.  Poor thing wanted to go swimming so we kept telling him tomorrow he could go.

I picked up a seashell to show him but he didn't stay interested too long.

The next morning Hunter woke up and literally said, "Hi Mommy, go swimming ocean."  It made me laugh!  But unfortunately it was raining so we took the ferry to Bolivar.

Korey and I both grew up taking vacations in Galveston and feeding the seagulls off the back of the ferry so it was a precious moment to see my son doing the same thing.  Some nice kids gave him some bread slices to feed the seagulls so in between bites for himself he threw chunks to the birds.

Once we got to Bolivar we headed to a neighborhood where Korey's other grandfather used to live.  He has many good memories of staying there with his family.  Sadly, the cabin isn't there anymore.  I did see this on one of the streets so I just had to take a picture.

After lunch we threw caution to the wind and decided to let Hunter swim instead of napping.  Day 2 of no nap!

We got him dressed in this flotation shirt that made him look like he was wearing football pads.

He was happy playing in the sand.  When we walked him out to the water he was scared so he ended up sitting in my lap and we let the waves splash on us.

A boy's dream - miles of "dirt" to play in.

Then we chased the birds and while we tried to "catch" them Hunter would say, "Hold chicken."  Gotta love that.

After dinner that night we took him to LaKing's or rather we took me so I could indulge in all of their goodies.

Hunter raced boats and horses while Korey and I ate ice cream.

I took this picture of Murdoch's to show the original pilings in the back where this location used to stand.

Not a happy car rider.  I think he wanted to go back to the beach.

And yet another horse he got to ride outside of a Mexican restaurant.

Our last day on the beach.

I finally snagged someone to take a family photo of us.  I have a better one but I guess it didn't upload.

Then we walked around the beach some more....

and we found a HUGE rainbow!

It was gorgeous!  I was pointing it out to everyone that walked by.  I thought it was a great finale to our vacation.

This final picture is a quick one I took at LaKing's.  It's the candy maker feeding salt water taffy into the machine which cut it, wrapped it and dropped it into a basket.  If you stood and watched he would toss you a piece.  I loved this place!