Christmas 2009

What a wonderful Christmas!!!! We drove to Houston on Wed. to spend the holidays with my family. Claire was so excited to be with her Grandmom and Pop-Pop and Aunt Alli and Uncle Joe...and the cat! Apparently it snowed here in Dallas while we were gone, which is awesome, but I wouldn't have missed this Christmas with my family for anything! We went to church on Christmas Eve, then the elves got busy putting together toys for Claire. I was so excited to see her reaction in the morning. I get the Mom of the Year award for forgetting the battery for the video camera so we have nothing on video! It's ok because she came down the stairs a little grumpy on Christmas morning! She quickly warmed up and spent the day playing with all of her new things. Her favorites included chap stick, tearing the paper off of the crayons and her art table. We got my parents a Wii and Wii Fit so we all played that a lot for the rest of the weekend. It was a great day...Santa was very good to all of us. Brad and I decided not to exchange gifts this year and instead we bought 4 wheelchairs for children in Iraq who need them. On the way home we drove through College station to visit Brad's grandmother. We are so blessed with a healthy, loving, happy family. Merry Christmas everyone!!

Party!

It's the week before Christmas so we had some parties to go to! On Friday morning Claire and I went to the Stroller Strides Christmas party. It was so much fun that I didn't get any pictures, but we exchanged gifts (I ended up with a really cool ring!) and the kids had a blast playing. Of course there was a ton of food...I can't wait to see how much weight I've gained since my last Dr. appointment! That night I went to an ornament exchange party with my college friends in Dallas. I haven't laughed that hard in a long time and Brad was nice enough to babysit Claire so I could stay out late! So much fun! They went to Home Depot while I was gone and Claire got some balloons...which made her hair stand straight up the next morning! Now we are getting ready to go to Houston for Christmas on Wed. Merry Christmas everyone!!!

White Rock Marathon

Today Brad ran in his second marathon! The weather was perfect for the runners...nice and cool and much better than last year. Mom and Dad are here to cheer Brad on so we all piled into the car early this morning, dropped Brad off at the start line and then went to get coffee and bagels before going to our first spot to cheer Brad on. I made a sign again for Brad to motivate him and so he could see where we were from far away. We saw him at the 3 mile mark, then ran to the car to go to the next spot. We ended up cheering him on at 7 different locations and were there at the finish! He completed the race in 4:12:14 and ran the entire 26.2 miles! Claire was amazing and thanks to my parents and brother for being there to support him. Congrats to my friends who ran the relay too!

Museum, Tree and Sign for Brad

On Sat. we went to check out the new Ft. Worth Children's Museum. We had so much fun that we bought a membership! So if anyone ever wants to meet us there I can get a guest in for free!!! I think we will go back next week...Claire loved to run around and explore...Brad might have had fun playing with some of the exhibits too ;) That afternoon we went to get our Christmas tree. Claire had zero interest in helping decorate. Oh well, it looks nice and she doesn't bother it. Next week brad runs the White Rock marathon. I made a big sign for him last year with Claire's picture on it to cheer him on and motivate him. I'm doing the same this year...to all of my friends running in the race, look for this picture at various points along the route and Claire and I will be there cheering you on!!!

Snow!

It's Dec. 2nd today and when we woke up it was snowing outside! I let Claire go outside and play in it until her hands froze. I tried to get some good pictures...maybe even one for a Christmas card but she wouldn't stand still or look at me. I can't blame her, snow is so much fun! BTW, Claire is 22 months old today!

The Gaylord Texan

Brad, Claire and I went to The Gaylord Texan Hotel for the second year in a row to go see Santa! We didn't bring her stroller, we just let her run around for about 2 hours. There is so much to see there. She was not scared of Santa at all...we got a great picture. But for Claire, the best part of the day was seeing "the Tin Man". There was a guy painted silver to look like a statue and since Claire is obsessed with The Wizard of Oz she saw him and couldn't stop talking about the tin man! There were a ton of Tech fans that were staying there for the game tomorrow so that was fun. We had hot chocolate and let Claire explore...another great day!

Sleeping Beauty

On Friday I asked Brad to keep an eye on Claire while I took a shower. When I was done getting ready I found them on the couch...she was sound asleep on him. She would NEVER in a million years fall asleep on me, but there must be something about her Daddy that makes her want to curl up and take a nap. It melted my heart when I saw them. I love them both! A side note: notice her red shoes. She is really into The Wizard of OZ at the moment and loves to wear her red sparkly shoes. When she puts them on she says "I just like Dorothy!"