Life at the Little's

Saturday, December 26, 2009

Christmas Eve

We spent the morning and afternoon of Christmas Eve in Hamilton, which is where both sets of my grandparents live. We stopped by to see GranDottie on our way into town. Kate had a great time removing and replacing the candles that looked like apples, while we all just sat and watched. She can be pretty entertaining at times. Here are Kate and GranDottie..all smiles!

Don't you just love this one? I sure do!

Kate is holding on tight to the cool bear with sunglasses and a guitar that GranDottie gave her:

We left GranDottie's and headed to the Hall's to eat and celebrate Christmas with my Dad's side of the family. A rare moment caught where Kate is sitting (somewhat) still in her daddy's lap:

Brayden is growing so fast and just getting cuter and cuter! (He is my first cousin's little boy and the only other great-grandchild on the King side.) Kate warmed up to him and he was very patient with her :)

"Whoa, Whoa, nobody asked me if hugs were alright!"

Look at this smile - ADORABLE!

Me with the cutie pie:

Kate and Brayden playing:

I could just eat him up!

He can even strike a pose :)

Kate thinks babies need a pacifier at all times. She just needs hers when she sleeps, but she really needs it then. That's something we'll tackle at a later time..

Kate even helped me feed him. I think she'll be a great big sis one day:

Benjamin wanted to hold him, too. Doesn't he look good holding a little boy? Brayden was great the whole day and let everyone hold him that wanted to.

Our fam on Christmas Eve:

Grandmother and Grandfather King gave Kate this really cool riding train with all kinds of neat gadgets and buttons. She really likes it and called it her "choo choo!". I can't wait for her to play with it at home.

Playing hard:

We ate delicious food and played an exciting game of Dirty Santa with my aunts, uncles and cousins. When we left Hamilton, we headed to meet Mummi and Doc in Florence for some Japanese food. They have a Christmas Eve tradition of eating Chinese (think "A Christmas Story"..Farararara rara ra ra!), but this year they mixed it up a little and had Japanese. I like it better, so that was fine with me. Doc, Mummi, Benjamin, Kate, me, Sarabeth, Brett and Brett's parents all ate together and it was so tasty. Kate hated when the grill lit up with fire and started crying, but who can blame her. Hopefully she'll continue to be afraid of fire :) After dinner, we went back to the Little's and put cookies out for Santa!

Then, it was off to bed for miss Kate to dream of sugarplums..etc, etc. while the rest of us played a few rounds of Catch Phrase. I used to hate that game, but I love it now. Here is the engaged couple...getting married in 5 months! Brett and Sarabeth:

Bonnie and Josh came over later after a full day of celebrating with Bonnie's family. Bon was worn out, but still smiling :)

Josh is ready for Waffle House. Really ready. And he's showing of Mummi's second coffee pot

that she got from Santa.

I posted more pictures earlier today, so be sure at look at Christmas Eve-Eve if this is your first look today. Even more to come..

Christmas Eve-Eve

We had another great week in the Shoals, this time with lots of presents! The three of us headed up there on Tuesday and we had such a fun time with our families. Benjamin, my dad and I went to the shooting range Tues. afternoon and I even managed to impress my husband with my clay shooting :) Wednesday was another lunch trip to Trowbridge's and then we headed to my parents' to do Christmas with my immediate family. Here are Cory and Kate, very excited about Christmas:

Aunt Karen and Kate:

Kate in a basket at Christmas:

Look familiar???

Mommy and her gingerbread girl:

Am-mom (I can't figure out how to spell that right) loving on grandbaby:

These are the King kids... Josh and his wife Heidi:

Cory and his wife Karen:

Laura(that's me) and her husband Benjamin:

Kate trying out her new Sesame Street doctor kit..how cute is that cookie monster stethoscope?

Mom and Dad opening their gifts, with a little assistance:

We only had about an hour together, but it was great having us all in the same place at the same time for Christmas. This was only the beginning of our Christmas fun!!

Our best friends have a pug named Maggie, and Kate loves that dog. She wants her leash on her all the time so she can "push" her. Well, for Christmas, our friends gave Kate this stuffed pug that Kate, not surprisingly, calls Maggie (she actually says "Maddie"). The dog barks and pants and wags it's little tail. Do you think she likes it?

More Christmas photos to come..stay tuned!

Saturday, December 19, 2009

Christmas Is All Around

We spent most of this past week in Florence with our families and had the best time! We got into town on Tuesday in time to eat dinner at Casa with my parents. We had a great time there, then headed to Deshler's gym to watch Mars Hill play Florence in basketball. Benjamin and I (and Kate) were pulling hard for MH, but Florence ended up winning. Kate loved watching the game and especially loved the cheerleaders (must get it from her mama).

Wednesday, we had lunch at Trowbridge's and headed over to my parents' for the evening. We enjoyed a delicious dinner and went to church with them. Kate was very tired..she doesn't seem to have time to nap during the day when we're up there..so we headed back to the Littles, but I don't think she actually went to sleep until around 11pm that night. Phew.

Thursday was the day Benj and I were going to celebrate my birthday! Sarabeth was busy making my caramel birthday cake, but still offered to watch Kate while we went out for a light lunch (Trowbridge's again...we love it). We strolled around the mall for a while and went back to the Little's to relax until our dinner at George's Steak Pit. This is an expensive treat that Benjamin and I have saved for my birthday and our anniversary. It's by far my favorite "nice" place to eat, and I've only ever been there with just him, so it seems very romantic to me, too. I got the Double Delight: 5 oz. filet and jumbo fried shrimp...yummm. Then we went back to the Little's for birthday cake - Thanks again, Sarabeth!!

Friday was our day to head back home. We packed up all our stuff (after Kate woke up at 11am for the second day in a row), and dropped Kate off with my mom. We were having a Christmas get-together, so Mom offered to let her spend the night and bring her to us Saturday. Very nice! I miss her so much, but it was great to not have to chase her around all night. We had a great week and I loved my birthday celebrations! 26 is going to be a good year :)

My two best buddies..

Doc may not eat a lot of sugar, but he doesn't mind giving it to this little girl. :) Here she is spinning away in the Little's kitchen - this was probably around 10:30pm, an hour and a half past normal bed time:

Getting ready to enjoy Mommy's birthday cake. Kate started saying Mommy this week instead of Mama. It's so cute!

Doc, me and Kate:

Our little family:

Big girl sitting on the stool by herself:

After being gone all week, we had tons of mail when we got back. I was so excited opening Christmas cards and birthday cards!! Our card holder is full:

I even had to put some on the fridge..love it!

Last night we had the Christmas get-together I mentioned earlier. We have to limit the number of people we invite, because our townhome just doesn't hold that many people. We decided to use the clubhouse where we live this year to give us more space, but I wasn't sure how many could fit comfortably. It had plenty of room, so we'll definitely invite more folks next year if we're still there!!

I made Taco Soup and cheesy baked potatoes. It turned out well and Bonnie's cookies, cake and sugared cranberries were a hit! Beth, Andrew and Chip enjoying the food: