Merry Christmas AND.....

First of all, Merry Christmas to all! I hope the holiday was good for everyone. We had a wonderful holiday here. Tater Tot was missing :( and that was a definite bummer.
At least we'll be able to focus on only her when she gets back while she opens her gifts but nonetheless, it would be better to have her here, of course. Next year...

So it wasn't so chaotic today. It was quite nice. The girls woke up early, overjoyed with what was in their stocking and under the tree. They loved their gifts, which, in our house, were focused on a dollhouse and the Gym Spin. They had oodles of fun with the Gym Spin, which is sort of like a sit and spin but more robust and on a slight angle so you can use your weight to perpetuate its motion. It allows people to spin who are 125lbs. or less, so all the kids can enjoy it and Hadley and Imogen on it together worked out very well. I gave it a go, but I'm on the bigger side and was slightly nervous about it. It IS fun though. The girls also loved playing side by side with their nifty dollhouse. There were amazingly no fights over who got what. It was sweet and a pretty simple affair. Oh, how could I forget?! They also got twin baby dolls (they talk amongst each other) and a stroller, crib, swing, and highchair for them. They LOVED these dolls. They played with them ALL day long.

Late morning we made our way to the rest of the family and had a very good time there. We had a lovely meal, and were able to relax and watch most people open their gifts. By the way, we all got lovely gifts! We were all very appreciative. We watched the usual movie, well most did, I took a nap. We got home in time for the girls to promptly crawl into bed, and were they tired with the day's events.

Going back, minutes after we arrived there, Eric made the announcement that our family is expanding and since I made no attempt to change out of my pajamas today (I might do this anyway, especially on Christmas) and since I can hide it no longer what with my throwing up on a pretty consistent basis and feeling utterly awful, I guess it was time to share, though Eric's been pressuring me to share for some time previous to today. While I might not be sporting the baby bump yet (though my clothes are strangely tight and have been for nearly a year :)), a stomach bug can only continue for so long. It's been perfectly obvious something else is going on with me and I feel silly telling people I'm sick for the millionth time. I sound like a broken record and a whiner and with the holidays here and all the people....you get the picture. Just a couple of days ago, my sister-in-law asked me what was up with the Sea Bands and then the next obvious question, "Are you pregnant?" Since she's seen me looking sick for longer than a week, closer to two, in the Sea Bands, AND complaining about being sick, I could not deny it any longer.
Now, having only the baby to look forward to, well that, and naming him/her, as I'm nearly too sick to ever enjoy my pregnancy, I needed a visual reward to view on a regular basis, hence, the blob to your right who's starting to resemble a human being. So there you have it, thanks to Eric (though many of you reading this are probably already aware). My first appointment with the doctor is on January 5th. Hopefully, a healthy baby #4 is on it's way.

So again, we hope everyone had a great day and the festivities were good to you. We look forward to seeing more family and friends this week and in the weeks ahead. We hope travels are safe for everyone. For everyone that we could not be with, we miss and love you and can't wait to be together again. Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!
P.S. I hope to be in the mood to share pictures tomorrow. I do not have the strength to share them now. Sorry, folks.

Christmas Portraits 2008

Okay, so we FINALLY got these done too. I figured I should post them because there's no way anyone will receive them in time for the holidays. Oh well. But anyway, we took advice from Aunt Abbi and went to Portrait Innovations and they were FABULOUS!!! Talk about a painless experience! You go in, get your pictures, and they're done in about fifteen minutes! I even got the holiday cards today too. I was so utterly impressed. And did I mention they're cheap too? Yeah, it was totally worth the hour drive. I'll definitely be going back. Maybe we'll get the family picture next time....

Our Decorated Tree 2008

Okay, well here it is. It still needs a little tweaking. I'll take care of that tonight. As I look at the picture, I see some areas that need some attention with things like bows, balls, ornaments, etc. There are some things that can't be helped, especially the spare/bare spots, but again, that's what I like about the tree: the lack of perfection. Although, to know me, you'd know it takes me HOURS to decorate a tree. Eric really hates me this time of year. I seriously strung the lights on twice after I took his lights off! We used three different techniques. It was lots of fun, NOT! What WAS fun were the girls once we began to put on the balls, bows, and ornaments. It's funny how many things they'll put on the very, very, edge of the SAME tree branch. Things I go with, and then, when they're not looking, change. For some reason, I remember doing the exact same thing when I was little. But we had a great time coordinating it all and I stuck with my pink and red theme this year. I find it to be so cheerful. We didn't do silver balls this year. I thought it would be too much. I could still add them but don't think I will. The ornaments are a collection of mine over the years, Tate's, Hadley's, and Imogen's. We couldn't have a tree without Ernie(an ornament from my childhood), could we? Eric's are still with his parents and this is the first year in four that we didn't have to squeeze EVERY ornament under the sun on the tree. Whew! Now we'll be on to wrapping gifts and doing a just a tiny bit more shopping!

Tate

Last Day of School Before Break

So here are the girls just minutes ago. It was a hectic/chaotic morning as I didn't bother to prepare the night before. I've been under the weather these days so after running all the errands yesterday evening, I was ready for bed. Between gifts for the teachers, treats for the kids classmates, and a little extra flair for the hair, it was quite difficult to get any shots this morning. Immy, of course, was NOT having it, as you can clearly see in the pictures, Hadley was excited and couldn't hold still, and Tatumn was brilliant and because of this, I got some lovely pictures of her. It's nice when you can FINALLY reason with your kids.

FINALLY, Our Tree

Okay, so here's our naked tree. We finally went yesterday evening and picked it out! The pickins' were pretty slim but our tree is not. It's fat. I actually love it. It has character to me, as it's far from perfect with it's lack of branches in various places. Couldn't tell you what kind of tree it is but I initially planned on getting a Frasier Fir. When we got there, there were lots of F.F. but they were HUGE and since we had short ceilings, we needed something in the 8ft. range. Besides, I love the color on this tree. Sometimes I think Frasiers are a bit too blue for my taste. Don't get me wrong, I think they're a superior tree, but I really like the color on this one. Not to mention it was way cheaper, which is always a plus, of course. It's not a soft needle tree like FF but it's certainly not the worst I've felt. The needles might be messier, for sure, but hey, we're soooo late getting our tree this year, we'll only have to tolerate the mess for a mere couple of weeks. Oh, and what really rocks is that we got a new nifty christmas tree stand! I'm totally excited for both and can't wait to decorate the tree this weekend with the family. Should be good times and nice and chaotic. I promise to post the final product when we're done!

Snow

Here we are in Morton, IL just before visiting Grandma and Grandpa J. Since Grandpa J. has recently broken his hip, we wanted to be able to see him on our trip too. While we didn't visit him right away, as we wanted to wait for the right time, we did see him before we left to come back home, but only very briefly. He's pretty sick but he's fighting hard.

As for the snow, we didn't get the amount of snow or the snowfall we hoped for, but at least the girls got snow leftovers and it was VERY COLD. So now, at least, the girls know what cold is. Tatumn's wiser than these two, who ran out to have a snowball fight near this field in front of the grandparents' home. She chose to stay in the car for as long as possible. I was so cold, I only took a couple of pictures and now am wishing I got more than this. But here are these two, at least. Goodness, did they have a blast with this.

Hadley Loves Her Cousin, Morgan

This past week, we were fortunate enough to be able to visit Gracie and spend time with her and her family. It was a special time for us and I have many pictures that I want to post of our time together. Andrew and Abbi came as well, and brought little Morgan too. The kids were so very excited to be able to see their Gracie Witch (a name she and the girls made up some time ago at some point during pretend play).

The girls, especially Hadley, are always so very excited to see their cousin Morgan, too. Hadley adores this little boy and everything he does is AMAZING. She still can't believe he can walk, even though talking is his focus now, and remarked at what a feat he had accomplished by being able to walk while we were there. Yes, in Hadley's mind, Morgan is a magician. He's the sweetest boy, that's for sure. But here are some pictures of Hadley enjoying her time with him at the Register house. They had a blast together. Imogen, being a bit more independent, played alongside them a great deal. She's coming around, slowly but surely, but it's our Hadley Bear who could squeeze this little boy to death. Actually, I nearly think she did.

The Photo Shoot

This week, Hadley took an interest in her baby doll. She's the most like me as a kid and I LOVED my baby dolls when I was little. Now compared to Hadley, my imagination didn't amount to beans because, as most of you know, Hadley is always pretending and making up stories, which are always very elaborate and drawn out. While she's very creative, she has not been interested in baby dolls and I was surprised about that. She mostly makes up stories about her drawings and I DID do that all the time too. But this week, for no apparent reason, she played with her doll and she had to take it with us when we left the house. On this particular day, she insisted on a photo shoot with her doll and her sister after school. I thought it was cute and happily obliged. BTW, the baby's name is Jasmine. Now, I don't necessarily think this is a long term interest, but it was a surprising and cute one that I could relate to.

Disney 2008 (May)

I've been missing Disney lately and found this picture today while going through photos. This was one of my FAVORITE times we had at Disney in the million times that we've gone there (we're spoiled as most of you know). A definitle perk to living in Florida is the seasonal pass for residents. On this particular day, we went to the Pirates and Princesses party to celebrate Imogen's third birthday and it was the very best. The fireworks were the best I've ever seen at Disney and the girls had so much fun (not that they don't usually had fun). This was a VERY long day for them and they were happy 99.9% of the time. It truly was magical. Anyway, just wanted to share, while I was thinking of it.