Holiday Cards

I love holiday cards! It is so fun to see the cards start coming in the mail and to touch base with so many friends and family. It is so nice to see what everyone has been up to during the year when you can't keep in touch as well as you'd like. Okay so I've never actually sent out Holiday cards before but I've always wanted to and this year  I have decided to use Shutterfly.com. They have some pretty awesome products and Christmas cards.  I have made a few books using their site and they turned out so great with such high quality. They really take the stress out of finding, designing, and printing all your holiday cards. The hard part is picking your favorite from so many different designs. One of my favorite Photo Christmas Cards is this little number. Click here to check out my other favorites. I love them all! Now I just need to decide on a family picture that we all look good in. Which shouldn't be to hard considering my last post.

Shutterfly is doing a sweet deal right now for bloggers: Bloggers get 50 free holiday cards. To sign up visit here You need to see all the cards. There are so many to choose from. You can also go to shutterfly.com and see the fun possibilities for books.

Family Photos

We finally got our family pictures taken. My friend DaNae took these pictures for us. She was a little nervous about how they would turn out as she had never taken pictures for a family before but I love them and I think she is a natural with the camera. These are a few of my favs . . .  

There are so many more that I liked. I'm so grateful to have a friend in Atlanta. DaNae's husband goes to school with Christopher. They have two little kids, one is Reeses age and then they have a 4 year old Ella who Reese is in love with. Whenever they are together Reese follows her around repeating "Ella, Ella" its really sweet. I'm so glad we are here in Atlanta together going through the same thing for the next two years. Thanks DaNae!!

Halloween

Thanks to both Grandmas Reese was a big hit at all Halloween festivities that we attended
Grandma Jones pretty much made the Peach even though I like to tell people I helped, I really didn't do much. and Nana Dougherty found the sweetest bug costume! Reese had a lot of fun this Halloween. She is such a social little thing. We took her to a fall festival and she wanted to pet and chase every dog that passed. Seriously she is obsessed with "puppies" as she would say. She starts to pant and bark every time she sees on or thinks she hears one. Its really cute. And at the trunk or treat at church. Christopher and I could barely keep tabs on her. She was everywhere. Even when we went outside to do the trick or treating and it was dark out she took off running to the one car that was playing music and wouldn't leave the area around that car. She didn't care who was with her. She just wanted to dance. She has got some pretty good moves too!

Christopher and I dressed up as trees (of the peach variety), but nobody really knew what we were. A lot of people thought Adam and Eve and maybe we didn't make the best trees but we tried, really, that's all that counts. This picture below was the best we could get of all of us. She is pretty much against taking pictures these days. She will not hold still for anything. I don't know I guess it has something to do with that fact that she is 1 or something like that.

HERE and HERE are two videos (b/c they are so much better then pictures sometimes). One is of Bugs dancing at the trunk or treat. Its kind of dark but still cute. And the other is Reese trick or treating with her friend Ella. She is obsessed with Ella. Its kind of the sweetest things I've ever seen. And Ella the four year old is so sweet to love my little bugs back. Maybe Reese needs a sibling!

Buggies Birthday!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!

Our sweet little Bug is 1. I really can not believe it has been a year but sure enough her birthday has come and gone. We had a little birthday party for her. It was fun to have some of her friends over to our house. We have made and reconnected with some really great friends here in Atlanta. We did a little bug theme for the party. We made butterfly pasta salad, ants on a log, grape caterpillars, butterfly pb&j (I forgot to take the foil off of the sandwiches before I took pics, I always forget something)and my mom made this awesome bread that was in the shape of a caterpillar and we had subs out of that. It was so awesome and I didn't get a picture of it. Lame. Anyway here are some pictures. It really was a fun little party and Reese was so happy the whole time. Oh and the cakes are in the flower pots. Bugs got her own and then I made mini little dirt cakes in the small flower pots for all of the kids. It was such a cute idea I found.

Bugs is def. a one year old. She is walking and running all over the place, and she is talking like a maniac. She does some good animal impressions too her best ones are the cow, monkey and doggie. She dances and twirls on command. She gives big opened mouth wet kisses and she blows nice dry kisses. Her favorite thing to say is Hiiee and she says it just like that. My favorite thing is that she just started saying "Hi mommy" it seriously is the cutest thing ever! I have tried to capture this on video but she is getting wise to the video camera and chooses not to respond when it is on now a days. She loves Elmo (why are all kids obsessed with this red little monster?) and she loves watching Kung Fu Panda. No idea why but one night I put it in when she was teething and we were up all night and she will just sit and watch it ever since. Not sure if its a good or bad thing my one year old will sit and watch movies. Maybe we need to get out more. Anyway she has her own little personality and it comes out more and more everyday. We die over her everyday!

My mom and sister Emily came too. I loved having them here. bugs loves them both so much. Especially my mom they are best buddies and have been since day 1.

Labor Day or is it . . . Memorial Day?

This Labor Day was so nice here in Atlanta. We went to the pool and got to hang out with some friends from back in MI, who live here now. Here are some pictures and a VIDEO from the weekend. Please ignore the fact that I don't know which Holiday it is, it's kind of embarrassing.

Buggy left her sunglasses on the whole day at the pool. I was so excited and thought she would wear them all the time now, but of course it was short lived. The next day at the pool she wanted nothing to do with them.

I also have to tell you that we tried to buy her baby sunglasses but her head was so big that none of them fit so she is actually wearing little kid sunglasses. I need to get her those glasses that strap around the head.

Oh and I have to share this cute story. So, I don't know where she gets this but every time we are reading with the bug and there is a baby in the story and on the page she will bring the book into her chest and hug it and say some form of "awww". She doesn't have any baby dolls yet to do this with, so I'm thinking she just learned it from me doing it to her so much.
She is the sweetest thing and she is just a little sponge lately. She is growing up so fast. I can't take it.
Here is a little VIDEO of her reading with her dad.

Summer

So since this last post we have been very busy. We have been back to Utah for a wedding and family reunion. Then we came home to Texas packed up and headed north. We went on a big road trip to see the grandparents. We went to Iowa then to Michigan then back to Iowa and then we headed back down south to Atlanta, our new home. Needless to say we had a busy summer. Annabelle (this is what we have been calling our Reese its her middle name) met and played with a lot of her cousins. For the most part she was so happy and did great with so much transition. Just a few hiccups in her sleep patterns which have worked themselves out.

We took a lot of PICTURES from our road trips. These were some of my favorites but there are way to many to post all so you can see the rest HERE.

We've been in Atlanta for a little over a month now and we are finally starting to feel at home. Buggy (also a name we call the babe) is finally comfortable enough to roam the hallway alone. Which I can't decide is good or bad. And might I add the is roaming on two feet these days. She started walking in between Christopher and I about a week before she was 10 months. Now she is walking better and getting braver in her distances everyday. She just needs some teeth to go with that walk. We are still waiting on those.

It was nice having Christopher home with us for 3 weeks before school started. We went down to Florida to see his brother Ben and his family. We had so much fun and took buggy to the beach, which she loved so much. We also had my cousin Tyler and his family come for a weekend and we got to meet there little Camden who is the same age as Annabelle. We went to a Braves game and the Coca Cola museum with them.

(She loved playing in the sand and water)




Coca Cola Museum.


Braves Game. Turner field is awesome can't wait to go to more games here!
Here are some more PICTURES from Florida and our weekend with Tyler and Lynae.

Lately . . .

So Reese is 6 1/2 months now. She is getting so big. Her last stats were 19.2 lbs and 27 inches long. She still has rolls for days and she is still the sweetest little baby. She is sitting all on her own now and rolling all over the place. I am sure she will be crawling soon. She chews on anything that she can get in her hands. Still no teeth but I think they are coming. she loves when music is playing and she laughs all the time. We have been so busy since the last post, so here is a recap in pics.

Reese and I went to Utah for Scrapbook weekend and got to see family and friends in Utah. We had a lot of fun. Then my Grandparents came to texas for a week to spend time with their family in Texas. More Pictures from this trip here.

Christopher turned 27 and we ate one of the best cakes I've ever made!!

We celebrated Easter with the Zepp cousins. We will miss them so much when we move this summer.

After Easter Reese and I took another trip, this time to Michigan. We went to help my parents move from their hose in Saginaw to a new house in Midland. It was kind of sad packing everything up but this new house will be so much fun and new memories will be made there. More pictures from this trip here.

I'm 25!!!
Now we are home for a while and are loving this Texas Spring. Trying to get outside and enjoy the nice weather while it is still bearable. Texas summers are not fun. I am looking forward to a summer of not being pregnant though that will be nice! The babe is growing so fast so we are just trying to enjoy everyday with her. Here are a few pictures from Lately. And here is a video Christopher took of her the other day. It is pretty sweet. I love the play by play Christopher is whispering in the background. He is a great dad it is fun to watch him with her.