Angel Tradition

We used these pictures for our Christmas card, so many of you have already seen them, but I wanted to explain our tradition.

When my mom was a baby, her parents took this angel picture and used it for their Christmas card.  When I was a baby, my parents did the same with me.  I was so excited when I found out we were having a baby girl because I knew I would carry on the tradition.

We just used posterboard for the wings and an embroidery hoop for the halo.

Hope you have a heavenly Christmas!

Christmas Week

On Tuesday night, my girl friends and I had a little cocktail and gift exchange at the Jefferson Hotel

The hotel is always decorated so nicely for the holidays, so it was a great way to get into the Christmas mood.

KPL drew my name for our secret santa exchange, and she gave me a certificate for a mani/pedi.  I am SO excited to use it, since I havent had a pedi since before Adeline was born! Yikes!

Thanks for a fun night, girls!

On Wednesday, Santa made a special trip to Miss Chris' house...

Adeline LOVED Santa!  She was bouncing up and down and smiling the whole time!

Miss Chris was so sweet. She had cookies and milk for all the parents, and had gifts for Santa to hand out to the kids.  We also did a book exchange for the kids.  We are SO lucky to have found Miss Chris!!

Here are all the kids with their parents and Santa.  Notice how Adeline is too busy petting Santa's coat to look at the camera!

Christmas in PA

Last weekend, we went up to Lancaster to celebrate Christmas with my family. We left early Saturday morning and drove straight to the Philly area for my dad's side of the family Christmas party. I have lots of cousins, so we had a total of 35 family members attending! No one had met Adeline yet, so they were very anxious to see her, and I think she was held the entire time!

We always do a little Christmas carol sign-along and everyone plays instruments... It's pretty entertaining.

My cousin, Kristi, brought her new 3-week-old baby, Raena.
Here she is with another cousin, Kierstin

Sweet baby Raena

On Sunday, we celebrated Christas with my family at home.

My mom was excited because we got her a new camera

Santa baby

Adeline had a lot of fun opening her presents, although she kept shoving wrapping paper into her mouth...

My mom loves baby shoes, and got her these "Uggs"

On Sunday afternoon, some friends came by to visit and we had lots of fun introducing Adeline to everyone.  The weekend went so quickly, and before we knew it, it was time to head back to Richmond on Monday night! Thanks for a great kick-off to Christmas!

7 Months!

Adeline turned 7 months old on December 15th!

She loves playing with her toys, especially Sophie the Giraffe.  She puts everything in her mouth, and soon her 2 bottom teeth will be in.

She laughs and smiles all the time, and loves interacting with people.

She's able to sit on her own about 10-15 seconds before toppling over, and she is able to roll both ways.

She loves all of the foods we've tried except carrots.

Look how much she's grown!

December

I can't believe we are almost halfway through December already! We've had a very busy couple of weeks.  Here's what we've been up to:

Adeline and I went down to Raleigh and stayed with Rob's parents for a couple days last week.  I went to a continuing education course at Elon while Adeline stayed with her Yaya and Papa.  It was great to be back on campus and see all the new buildings. Elon was beautiful, as always.  Adeline was in good hands and got lots of attention, as Yaya introduced her to many friends and neighbors!

Tyler and I continued our annual tradition of attending the Bizarre Bazaar.  We got some cute gifts and ornaments, and also took note of some good decor ideas.  We took a picture of a Christmas decoration we liked, then came home and showed it to Rob.  He made the cutouts for me to decorate for our doors.  Other than my less-than-perfect handwriting, they turned out pretty well! (and cost a lot less than the $50 price tag at the Biz Baz)

We drove back down to NC this past weekend to spend time with Rob's sister, Chelsea, and her family in Charlotte. It's fun to watch Cooper and Adeline interact more as they grow.  Since they are less than 4 months apart, we know they will have a lot of fun together one day!  We had a mini- Christmas with the babies.

On Saturday night, we went to a surprise 30th birthday party for my friend Alli.  She was totally shocked!!!

Her husband enlisted the help of Katie and Logan to pull it off, and they did an awesome job!

You can hardly tell, but Alli is expecting a baby in March and we are so excited for Adeline to have a little friend!

It was so nice to spend the evening with my Elon girls.  I wish I could see them more often!

 On Sunday, we tried to take some cute shots of Cooper and Adeline in their matching outfits.  This was the best we could do!

It's been a busy couple of weeks, and we have lots more traveling ahead of us!  We are headed to PA this weekend to do Christmas with my family.  I'll be back next week with pictures!