Christmas Pics

I hope everyone had a nice Christmas.  We sure did.  We had two really nice services on Christmas Eve and one on Christmas morning.  Later that day we drove down to Indiana and had Christmas celebrations with our families.  Thankfully, the weather cooperated and didn't cause us any trouble while driving.

Lena's Christmas Day dress.  She was pretty happy that morning.

That's my leg she's grabbing on to.  Whenever I try to take her picture, she comes at me because she wants me to hold her.

Christmas evening at Aunt Amy's apartment with Grammy Tammy and Roger, and Great-Grandparents Zink.  Aunt Amy got her a nice selection of pretty bows and hair clips.

Trying out some new hairstyles.  She's definitely getting enough hair to work with!

Dancing with Aunt Amy to some Christmas music.   Amy made us a lovely lasagna dinner.

A new coat and hat from Grammy Tammy.

Opening presents with Aunt Amy.  Her favorite part of opening presents wasn't the toy inside, it was eating the paper she just ripped off the package.

The little high chair seat Aunt Hilary got her for when she visits.  It is really nice and keeps her entertained.  Thanks, Aunt Hil!

Playing with Grandma Sheryl on Friday.

Time for more presents.  She got some fun bath toys from Grandma Sheryl and Grandpa Lee.

Aunt Hilary and Uncle Scott got her a pretty duffel bag with her name embroidered on it.  I didn't get a pic of it, but after she opened it, she looked at it and pointed to her name on it!  It was so cute!

Helping Mama open the great big present for her and Daddy.  It was a new garage door opener from Grandpa Lee and Grandma Sheryl.  Yay!

I think this was actually my gift, but I appreciated the help with pulling the bows off!

Uncle Scott got black vodka for Christmas!

Again, she loved eating the paper as soon as she pulled some off.

She really liked this book that she got.  She should have opened it last because we had trouble getting her interested in her other presents because she wouldn't put it down.  It does have lots of shiny colors on it.  Pretty!

Surprise!!

Lena with Grandpa Lee and Grandma Sheryl.  She's really into waving right now.

Lena with Daddy at Grandpa Brian's.

Lena had fun playing with Aunt Amy's friend, Heather.

Silly Grandpa Brian.  He is re-creating the look he chose for his new driver's license picture.

Naptime at Grandpa Brian's house.  So tired.  That is a blanket I made for her for Christmas. It says "sweet pea" all over it.

Lena with Grandpa Brian and Great-Grandma Marian.  Waving again, of course!

Thanks so much to all of our family for a wonderful Christmas.  Lena's first Christmas was really nice.  

Happy New Year, everyone!!

Climbing, Snow, Reindeer, Snow, Snow . . . oh, and did I mention snow?

If I didn't know better, I would think this girl was taking steroids.  She is freakishly strong and amazes us everyday with how physical she is.  Even so, I was astounded today when I saw that she was climbing up her baby gate.  Her friends Emily and Rebecca hung out with us today and they were with her in the living room while I was on the other side of the gate.  She spends a lot of time at the gate waiting for someone to come back to entertain her.  And today she stuck her feet in the little holes and up she went!  

This pic was taken this evening; earlier in the day when she first did it, she was a lot higher.  Then her feet were both up above the middle section where the latch is.  But I didn't have the camera handy then.  I don't know what we are going to do when she is able to climb over that thing!  At not even ten months, I thought we had a while before we had to think about that!

After three full days of not getting to leave the house because of all the snow, Lena and I finally went out shopping for a little bit today.  Here are some pics of what we got Friday through yesterday.

This is the view of our deck from the back garage door.  You can't see the floor in this shot, but the snow comes up over my knee when I stand next to it.

Our deck. 

 

Can I interest anyone in a barbecued snowball?

The reindeer were back in Middleville tonight and we braved the cold just long enough to get a pic of Lena with one.  She wasn't too sure about him, but didn't cry.

Park bench in downtown Middleville.

Our little snow bunny.  She is always such a good sport putting up with Mama and her "photo ops."  :)

So they said on the news tonight that we have gotten 44 inches of snow this month so far; 54 inches for the season.  We are supposed to get another maybe 6 inches tomorrow into Wednesday.  Where the heck are we going to put it? 

Snow, Snow, and Even More Snow!!

No church for Lena and me this morning.  It's too cold to take her out.  We are getting another 4 to 8 inches today, with 40 mile-an-hour winds and wind chills between -10 and-20.  Not a good day for Baby Girl to be out!

I tried to take some pics of how much snow we have on the ground, but it was snowing so much it kept getting on the lens.

Hopefully we can get this all out of our system and will be snow free on Christmas Day in time to drive to Fort Wayne.

White out

We are truly snowed in today! We are getting 1 to 2 inches an hour. Yay for lake effect snow! We are enjoying a nice day at home today.

The view from our front door across Main Street.

Looking west on Main Street.

I almost couldn't open the screen door, the snow was so high.

Our porch bunny. She's dressed as an angel now, but all you can see is her little halo! Someone dressed her Sunday morning.

After it was all over, we ended up getting 8 inches of snow. We are forcasted to get another 3 to 6 by Monday and another 1 to 2 by Tuesday. There's a Michigan winter for ya!

Grandma's Visit

Grandma Sheryl came to visit us!  Tomorrow is her birthday, so we were so glad we were able to spend some time with her to celebrate. She drove up last night just in time for a wonderful Advent meal at church. It was a lovely sit-down meal served family-style. The basement was decorated so beautifully with pretty tablecloths and real dishes and icicle lights! I'm glad Grandma got to enjoy it!

Today we went to Grand Rapids and took Grandma out to lunch and did some shopping. She opened her present at lunch.

Silly Grandma wearing the ribbon on her head.

Lena was being so cute at the restaurant! She waved to every person who walked by our table! I just missed the shot of it in this picture, but it was adorable!

We got Grandma a double-lamp book light. She thought it looked like bug antennae.

Nice pic of Grandma and Lena.

 

Grandma did a lot of this when she was here: hugging Lena. She is pretty darn huggable!

Thanks so much for visiting us, Grandma! We had lots of fun with you. We hope you have a wonderful birthday tomorrow and we'll see you next week for Christmas!

Holiday Open House

Today we hosted our holiday open house. We are going to make it an annual event; trying to schedule it on or around St. Nickolas Day (Dec. 6.)  We were going to do it last weekend, but I wasn't feeling well so we postponed it a week.

If you look at where each party guests has their gaze focused, you can see who the life of the party was!

This is the Santa dress Grandma Sheryl got for Lena. Too cute!

She really likes that ornament!

I think she almost had it pulled off the tree this time.

Thanks so much for the cute dress, Grandma! We can't wait to see you this week!

Holiday Pics

Today we took some pictures to put in our Christmas cards.  Not sure yet which one we will go with, but I guess I better figure it out!



Lena got to open her very first Christmas present tonight.  She had lots of fun pulling the paper off.  Luckily, Emily was there to take it out of her mouth when she proceeded to eat it.

She got some neat puzzles.  One is farm animals and the other is food.  What a nice gift.  I'm sure she will enjoy them very much.

Tonight I broadened my cooking horizons a bit by making a Moroccan meal, complete with main dish, vegetable, and dessert.  I will post the recipes on my cooking blog when I get a chance.