Let it Snow, Let is Snow, Let it Snow...

Brian got to take a good amount of time off work this holiday season and we have absolutely loved it! I love having him home and spending time as a family. Day to day life gets so busy and chaotic, it is refreshing to have the opportunity to relax together and have no schedule to follow or places to be. We were able to spend a little time outside...enough to get a picture or two and play in the snow for just a bit. Don't you love the pink camo snowsuit Jared and Steph got her?

Family Time

After we celebrated Christmas morning with Stella, the rest of the Christmas festivities began! We headed to Grandma and Grandpa Butcher's house Christmas afternoon where of course Stella was showered with gifts from her grandparents as well as her uncles. She just flashes her smile and it melts their hearts. Her smile said it all. She loved her blocks, books, a beautiful blanket (one that I would like for myself...you can see her sitting on it in the picture below), and baby doll. She loved her stuffed moose and looked so cute in her pink camo snow suit from Jared and Steph. She loved reading her Santa Claus book from Tyler too! It was just too much fun!


After spending time with the Butcher's on Friday we joined the Ringger's on Saturday. Busy, busy, busy! Again, Stella loved her Christmas gifts as she was showered by her grandparents! She got new bath toys (fishing ones from Grandpa Ringger). She (and I) was also surprised when she opened a Baby Stella Doll! I looked all over for one and wouldn't you know that Brian and my mom were in cahoots the whole time!?!?

She thinks it is hilarious to tickle the baby's feet...

The Gongaware's got her a ball popper. She loves it! Every time we turn it on she squeals and her arms flap a hundred miles an hour!

And I was also able to convince Brian into posing for some family pictures. He didn't love the idea, but he had to admit some of them turned out pretty good :)

Merry Christmas!

Christmas has always been fun. I love every minute of it. Decorating, music, snow, gifts, family, etc. However, it is even more fun spending it with the little person you brought into this world not even a year ago. How can she bring tears to our eyes and not even realize she is doing it? Sure she is young enough that she won't even remember it, but I will!

I will never forget...

....her fun bedhead and huge smile as we ate breakfast....

....or her lack of interest in her Christmas donut.....


...the first Christmas card I recieved as a mom...


...watching her with her daddy...

Christmas Eve

Stella set out cookies for Santa and his reindeer on Christmas Eve....

But before she went to bed, she decided to sample a few herself. Just to make sure they were good.....

Well, a few turned into a lot and before she knew it, she had made a mess!

Suddenly, from the rooftop she heard such a clatter! Yikes! She is going to get caught eating Santa's cookies!!

First Shiner

Stella lasted all weekend with her wild boy cousins without getting injured. After being home for an hour she gets her first shiner! She was standing on the laundry basket and went to move to the other laundry basket and missed. Face planted into the laundry basket. Sat there for a bit. Didn't cry. Kept playing. We didn't even notice it until later that night. First of many, I am sure.

Fun and Busy Weekend!

Well, we finally got to meet Cousin Amelia this weekend and she was absolutely perfect...so, so pretty! I couldn't keep my hands off of her, and as you can see above, either could Stella! She loved the dark hair....you always want what you don't have I guess.

Stella was pretty tough this weekend with her cousins. They loved her to pieces and wanted to hold her all weekend. They still think she is Baby Stella. This weekend we upgraded her name to Cousin Stella. They were quite determined to hold her still though!

Baby itch? I walked in the room to catch Brian just looking at Amelia....so sweet. We realized this weekend that our baby is quite a baby anymore :(

First snow to play in, and she loved it! She took right off crawling everywhere. Who would have guessed....she hates the grass, but loves the snow!

As she was crawling she thought she would give it a taste...oh dear. I knew it would end badly....

But actually it didn't. A little whining and surprise look. After this though we thought it was time to go inside and warm up :)

Just having some fun :)

Hanging out watching some TV...who wouldn't enjoy that?

First ponytail! Although you can barely see it in this photo...

Ahhhhhhh!

The first snow always brings some craziness. But seriously, on a Monday? Lima Road started construction....right before winter begins? Why would anyone begin major road construction now? Then we ran into pile up after pile up on I69 South. Ugh....happy Monday!

But we all made it safe and sound to our destination....which is the important thing, right? So we will just continue to be thankful for that because we all know how easily it could have been us along side the road or in car accident. Try to focus on the positive :)

Happy Birthday!! (Posted on the 3rd, Bday on the 4th)

Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday dear mo-om,
Happy birthday to you!!

Love you!

Happy Thanksgiving!

So much to be thankful for. It is hard to know where even to start. Sometimes I feel like we get so caught up in the day to day tasks that we forget to stop and be thankful….we need Thanksgiving to come around more than once a year!

We are thankful for:

• A God who is awesome and who is shows us unconditional love and forgiveness. Who could ask for more than that?
• A country where we are free to live how we want to live, believe what we want to believe, and say what we want to say.
  
• A family who loves each other no matter what. Provides each other with love, encouragement, and total support.
  
• A daughter who we love more than we ever thought possible. God gave us a beautiful little person who teaches us something every day. We have become better people after having her. She has reminded us that God is in control and to hand over all of our worries to Him. How can such a little tyke do all of that?
  
• Friends! Friends provide us with laughter and good times! They are there for us through the good and the bad.
• Each other. When I saw Brian 10 years ago I couldn’t have imagined being where we are now. We have grown together throughout the years, and I wouldn’t change a thing about that journey!

Have a Happy Thanksgiving everyone....and remember what you are thankful for!

Acting Silly...

How are they so easy to entertain (sometimes)?

Weekend

I don't know how time goes so quickly, but it sure does. Before I knew it my blog has gotten a bit out of date. The last time I was on here was Halloween and here it is mid-November! So I did a couple posts tonight.

I just thought this was a cute picture. And the videos below are just clips of us having a fun, laid back Sunday afternoon. Stella was in a good mood, which means we were in good moods also :)

ND vs. Navy

Last weekend we attended the Notre Dame vs. Navy game. We couldn't have asked for better weather. However, we could have asked for a better game outcome. Dustin and Emily were able to come with us....woohoo!

Happy Halloween!

We had plans to go out and about this weekend, but Stella is still not back to her old self from being sick last week. And since it was kind of chilly outside, we decided just to stay home all nice and toasty. It was nice and Stella got some good sleep in, so hopefully she will stop coughing soon!

We did venture over to our neighbor's house to give their kidos a trick-or-treat goody bag. We got Stella a costume and just had to show it off a little bit!! We ended up staying there most of the night as Stella was having a ball playing with their toys and watching their kids run all over the place.

Sick Baby

Stella was sick this weekend. She has the works....runny nose, horrible cough, fever....all of it. It was not fun to see her struggle through this! The doctor said she had something viral, but it didn't look like influenza....so that was good. Hopefully she can stay healthy for awhile now. We are like hand washing and sanitizing nazi's in our house! So if you come over be prepared to wash up!!

Daddy felt so sorry for her that he even gave her HIS remote control. Stella has one from old TV but she insist on having his.

Dad, please don't make me unload the dishwasher tonight. I don't feel good!!

Today she was just beginning to want to play again....in short spurts of time. She really enjoys her barnyard.

Stella Update

I think we have almost talked to everyone, however for you extended family members who check the blog and haven't heard from us lately, here is a little update about Stella.

We had another echo this week and we were praying for good news...and we got some! Stella's heart showed some new tissue growth that shows potential...by no means are we out of the woods yet, but at least we have potential, right? So we don't have any surgery right now!

Now we just have to get through this crazy flu season without her getting too sick! Her cardiologist told us to be careful about where we take her this winter. Hopefully she is able to get over the flu viruses but there is one (RSV) that is really bad for heart patients to come down with. That is one big reason he didn't want to do surgery and have her in the hospital now through March. Any virus she gets can be bad news. The doctor said to keep her covered, think about where you go, and use antibacterial stuff like crazy. Remember the episode of Seinfeld with the "Bubble Boy"? I wonder if they would let us borrow their bubble for Stella this winter! LOL...only kidding of course. We realize she is going to get sick here and there, but why not try to avoid it, right?

On top of the regular flu and H1N1 vaccines, she also has to get monthly, kind of like booster, shots (Ugh, poor girl. More shots!) so if she does come down with something, specifically RSV, she is hopefully more able to fight it off. The season for this virus is November-March...that is a long time! But we are happy for the good news for now. We have a check up in December and another echo in March where once again we, well they, will be making a decision about the next step.

We are so fortunate to have the babysitter that we have. She is right in Ossian and only has 4-6 kids. For awhile we were considering a daycare...can you imagine the germs she would pick up there?!? Our babysitter is kind of like my mom, clean crazy! She has disinfectant wipes, sanitizes as often as a person can, and has those kids using antibacterial pump all throughout the day. If any kid shows any flu symptoms then she calls to have them picked up right away. Also, I think all of the kids there have either gotten or is getting the regular and H1N1 vaccine. I love how God leads you in the right direction when you are making decisions!!

So I don't know how "out and about" we will get this holiday season. Hopefully we will get to see everyone at least one time or another at some holiday function, but we probably won't make them all for sure. Not that we don't want to see everyone and we don't want you to see Stella...but it seems like a silly risk to take at this time!

Thank you everyone for your thoughts and prayers!! Keep them coming please!!

Fun Filled Weekend

Saturday night we enjoyed the company of several of our friends. Our house was filled with noisy little kids ranging from 3 months to 2 years! It was so much fun. We all got to watch the ND game (wished for a better end result), ate tons of food, and played a little Wii. Too much fun. Sunday was spent cleaning up, napping, and spending some time with Stella outside. It was a beautiful day. Micki, do you recognize the coat? I love it on her. I think the hat came from you guys also....

Seriously Mom, more pictures?

She didn't know what to think of the grass. She refused to put her hands down and crawl. She would try it and then pull them back right away.

She is just getting too big too fast!!

Handprints

We have finally officially finished Stella's room. This weekend we added her little handprints to the wall!

Fall Pictures

This weekend we attempted to get some fall pictures of Stella. She was somewhat cooperative...some of the time. The majority of the time, however, not. But oh well, it was fun. This was our first attempt at getting some with some apples....pretty fall like, huh? And we even got a half a smile.

Then we quickly learned that Stella is terrified of the pumpkins. She hated them when we had them inside the house, and couldn't stand to be near them. Oh great, my plan for pictures of her with the pumpkins quickly went out the window. Anytime she saw she was getting close she began crying...

However, we did manage to get one great picture of her with a pumpkin AND smiling. Success!!

I convinced Brian that we should attempt to paint instead of carve our pumpkins this year. I loved it! I think they turned out great and it was so much fun (and easier!)

I had to laugh at this one. It was towards the end of the weekend and looks like she is praying, "Please God, let this be over with soon."