Snow 2009

We survived the Great Central Texas Blizzard of 2009 . . . and even caught some of the action on video. It only snowed for about 20 minutes (and none of it stuck), but we still had fun experiencing this rare treat.

Babymoon to Hot Springs

After Thanksgiving, Josh and I left Kate with my parents and drove to Hot Springs, Arkansas for a babymoon. It was just a two-night getaway, but we thoroughly enjoyed our time.

This is the bed and breakfast where we stayed. It was built in 1905.

We toured a restored bath house, strolled along the local historic shopping district, and did some sightseeing.

It was a really nice drive up Hot Springs Mountain.

The view from the top:

At the base of the mountain, there are several public "jug" fountains to fill up your personal bottles with spring water, so I partook along with the locals.

The thermal springs are really amazing. Although most of them are capped now, there are still a few open and available to view. The water is 143 degrees coming out of the ground...note the steam.

On our last evening we went to a botanical garden that had holiday light decorations. 17 million lights filled this huge woodland garden...it was a nice, albeit chilly, stroll.

Thanks mom and dad for watching Kate and giving us this much enjoyed break before baby#2 arrives in a few weeks!

Pics from Thanksgiving

We enjoyed a wonderful Thanksgiving with family in East Texas. Kate was able to play with her little cousins that she doesn't see very often and have some "country" experiences.


Here's Kate and cousins Addison and Ethan enjoying a "tractor" ride.

Kate was excited to get in the driver's seat.

My aunt planned a pumpkin-turkey craft for all the kids to do.

Posing with their pumpkin turkeys.

Here's my grandma, Kate's great-granny, with some of her great grand kids.

More fun with the cousins.

Feeding "Scout" a carrot.

The kids had LOTS of room to run.

Here's Kate having fun in the autumn leaves.

Grandma and Kate.

Trick or Treating with Friends

We invited the families in our small group to come to our house for trick or treating on Halloween. These are some of Kate's closest friends, so she was super excited to have them all over. She kept asking me all day, "Are my friends here yet?"


Adelaide the Monkey and Cinderella Kate . . . so excited!!

We also had another princess, a cowboy, Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz, a fairy, and a pirate in our group of trick or treaters.

Thank goodness it was daylight savings time on Saturday night, because it made for great timing to keep the kids up a little extra later than usual. After rounding up candy from the neighbors, we returned to our house to put all the kiddos down for bed. The parents spent the rest of the evening hanging out in our backyard roasting smores by a (borrowed) firepit, enjoying the cool weather and good conversation.

Pumpkin Patch 2009

Our friend Sunee snapped this shot of Kate at a local pumpkin patch. I'm struck these days at how grown up our little girl is looking. So much has changed since we took her to her first pumpkin patch two years ago. At a baby shower I attended this weekend, someone mentioned that when raising your children, the days and nights can seem so long, but the years so very short. True indeed.

A Girly Girl

Despite a total lack of coaching or prompting in this area, Kate has become a lover of all things princessy, frilly, fluffy, and shiny. Is this a phase all girls go through? If it is, I sure don’t remember experiencing it. As far as I can recollect, I was a tom-boy through and through. My idea of playing dress up was to tie a cape around my neck and fly around the room as Batman. (I always made my cousin or my younger brother be Robin--somehow I think I realized that even Robin was too girly.)

I always hoped that my daughters, if I had any, wouldn’t be girly girls. But of course, God has a sense of humor so it really didn’t surprise me that much when we passed a Cinderella costume at HEB this week and Kate nearly exploded with excitement. Maybe future Halloweens will bring us astronauts, pirates, or Batman. At least for now, Kate is every inch a girly girl. And, I hate to admit, it is awfully fun to watch.

Update on the Big Girl Room

Kate slept in her big girl bed for the very first time today, and it has been a great success!

For naptime, she was pretty excited and told me she didn't want to read a book or anything, she just wanted to go to bed. She kept saying, "Goodbye!" (trying to get me to leave). So, I tucked her in, and then went to my room to watch on the video monitor, not quite knowing what to expect. She quickly got out of bed and went to turn on her owl lamp that she adores. Then, she turned it off and ran back into bed, as if sensing I was on my way in. I did go in and gently reminded her that she needs to stay in bed. I left, and once again the scene repeated itself. I went back in, and this time I wised up and put on the bed safety railing. That seemed to do the trick. I think Kate felt a little more snug and secure, and after talking to herself for a few minutes she fell asleep and slept for an hour and 45 minutes. Yea!

So tonight, we put her to bed and watched her, and she did get out once to turn on her lamp, but all it took was one visit from me to tuck her back in, and she settled down, sang some songs, and is sleeping peacefully now. :-)