Happy Birthday Faith!!

Today is Faith's 5th birthday! I remember when she was first born, just a little peanut!!!

And this year she started KINDERGARTEN! Where does the time go??

Well we all wish you a very happy Birthday! XOXOXO

HAPPY Thanksgiving Everyone!

From our family to each of you, we wish you a wonderful Thanksgiving!!!Heehee, isn't that a funny sight! And here's one more from Daisey too:
We are going over to Liz & Bob's today, I can't wait to see everyone! I hope you ALL have a wonderful and happy Thanksgiving. We are so thankful this year for so many things, our loving family, friends, and of course our new sweet little angel who has brought us so much joy and love. We love you all!!

Fun Tuesday with cousins!

On Tuesday, we had ALOT of fun with Gabrielle's cousins who came over to visit. Lauren got here early and wow, Gabrielle was so intrigued by her! I couldn't even get Gabrielle to look up for a picture, she couldn't take her eyes off of Lauren :) Here they are in her room:

Lauren got to pick out the outfit for Gabrielle to wear for the day - isn't she so cute?? Lauren did a great job, didn't she!
Lauren & I played some games together and then she helped me stuff some dolls.
Then Emily & Denise came over for lunch and to play a bit. Lauren and Emily had fun 'hunting' for Daisey - who ran straight for her little bed in my sewing room. They are soooo nice to Daisey, she just gets a little jumpy at first with kids sometimes. She was spying on them from her house as they were spying on her:

We ate pizza and grapes for lunch and the girls were so happy to see each other:

Then they wanted to watch a movie - Little Mermaid won out, so we went in to put it on for them and they were all cuddled up watching it in bed, how CUTE!

We really enjoyed the visit girls. And yes we will have Aunt Cindy's dolly making workshop REAL soon, I promise! And it was great to spend some time having adult conversation with Denise - love ya lots!!!

Anyone want to adopt a U.S. Marine?

One of my closest friends' husband is deployed to Iraq - his unit left in Sept. and they won't be home until April or May. She told me there are guys in his unit who don't get ANY mail during mail call! I can't even imagine that and with the holidays coming up, I thought I'd post here and ask if you would like to adopt one of those guys to send some mail to.

It can be as simple as sending a holiday card (with their personal name on it so they get 'called' out) or you can send a box of goodies - believe it or not, they mostly want comforts of home.... junk food, beef jerky, candy, sunflower seeds, peanuts, drink mixes, tums, etc.

Please do not feel obligated to send boxes...a letter, a postcard....just knowing that folks back home are thinking of them especially with the holidays coming up means alot.

To mail them something costs the same as it would within the U.S. since it goes to an FPO address. Boxes and mail are taking about 2-3 weeks to get to them so if you think you would like to do this, please email and let me know - I'll send you a name and address right away.

THANK you and I'll be posting more soon!

O Christmas Tree

I wanted to share this picture too - heehee, I got a 'skinny' tree to fit in our living room this year; we are having my family down and I wanted to save as much room as possible (our other tree is huge!). So I got it on my trip and pretty much put it together as I unpacked the car on monday! Here's Gabrielle's face; the first time the lights are turned on. Looks like she's saying HEY mommy, what IS THAT? heehee!

Back from our trip

We had a wonderful trip to NY to visit with family. It's been a very long week since I got home - lots of business deadlines (lots of new doll faces on my website too ;). Soooo my brother Jeremy used to live in Rochester, NY and had the NERVE to say he wanted snow on this visit (um yes since he is in SUNNY south Carolina now). Well on Monday morning, we had about 3 inches - and it came down so fast!!! We still left and the drive was fine after we got further south. And Uncle Jeremy got home safe N sound.


Here's my favorite picture of Uncle Jeremy with Gabrielle!


We got a few visits from Aunt Diana and the kids too :) My sister gave Gabrielle her Christmas present early and what a wonderful gift. This play gym is so much fun, Gabrielle LOVES it. She coos and talks to the little birdies and kicks so much in there. Here's Faith & Lucas cuddling up with her on the floor:
We celebrated Faith's birthday a little early since we were visiting so close to her birthday. Here she is blowing out candles on her ice cream cake!
Jeremy's dad, Rich came out for a visit... sorry Amy - I guess everyone did get to see Gabrielle so far :( I SO MISSED YOU THOUGH!!!!!!!!!

It was funny, the men all watched football on Sunday and when Grampa or Uncle Jeremy had Gabrielle, she watched too - HAHA! Her first football game! She is really watching too!

Oh and we gave her another bath in the 'bowl' - hahahaha! She hung on to the sides, it was so stinkin cute. She couldn't get her little legs kicking/splashing like she does at home in her tub.

So anyway that was our trip in a nutshell! I am still looking through pictures and can't believe it's Thursday already. I've got alot of updates to do here, I'll get to them SOON!

Going to visit Gramma & Grampa

Gabrielle & I are getting ready to visit Gramma and Grampa again in NY. We are leaving today and won't be home til Monday. I'm so excited, my brother Jeremy is going to come up from Charleston, I haven't seen him since Amy & Trent's wedding last year. AND of course, we will get some visits from my sister and the kids, it's going to be a really fun week!!


When I get back, I'll update the blog with more birthdays & events that you sent me. I have some pictures to add too :) In the meantime, here is one from last weekend with a cute onesie from Gabrielle's Uncle Peter:

Happy Anniversary Amy & Trent!

HAPPY one year Anniversary, Amy & Trent!!! We wish you many many more years of happiness and love! XOXOXO!

Family blog

There's been LOTS of questions out there - can we use this blog to add more info on other family members? List upcoming events? Use it to keep in touch with each other? Share pictures and news? OF COURSE we can :) Anytime you want to add something, just email me and I will add it! I am just learning to use all the fun features offered with blogger - I'll play and see if we can do a calendar or some other neat stuff. But *please* do share family events and news with us, I'm so happy to include everyone!!!!


And in the spirit of having a little fun with this blog, lets play a game of Guess who?? We have been scanning some older family photo's and I will post them here to see if anyone can guess who they are.



Heehee, that 2nd photo is one of my favorites ;)

Happy 4 months old Gabrielle!

Gabrielle turned 4 months old on Sunday - her bib was a gift from Aunt Kathy and reads "I was worth the wait". YES you were baby girl, we love you lots and lots and lots!!!!

Where'd the week go?

I had great plans to post all kinds of pictures and the week kind of got away from me :) We had a great time at the party on Saturday. I have a couple pictures to share now and am waiting to see if we get some more from anyone out there!

First, our costume contest winners. YES we make you dress up when you come to our party! If you don't you get a diaper. Or a quick peek in the costume bin and funny hat, right Heather? ;)


Okay from left to right, Ilona, whoo hoo my birthday pal, she won the scariest costume - she was in a black cape (that covered her head too); she said I seem to have lost my head and now I found it - that was the talking head in the glass bowl, haha!

Then in the middle is Kathy who dressed as a clown with a rubber chicken she kept wacking people with - she won the funniest. That wig was a HOOT!

Then comes Eric who won most original costume - he was dressed as Hulk Hogan and yes ladies that is his REAL body. He is a workout fiend and weightlifting champion, I'll post more on him later. Lookin good tho ;)

We tried to get a picture of Gabrielle and I - but she really wasn't too thrilled. Lots of people and not a good nap for the day; then I put her in this weird costume. haha! We went as Little Miss Muffet and her spider. Thank you Bethany for the great idea!!! It was fun for her first Halloween party, next year will be even more fun for her.

We're thinking about having a costume contest for the kids next year - we had quite a few and they were having a great time. Something to think about for next year.

Here's a few more shots of some family all dressed up:

If anyone wants to share more pictures, send them my way!