2009

I can't believe it has been over a month since my last post. December came and went before we had time to turn around. Now, we're already a week into January and I'm still finding it hard to sit down and blog. Well, it's not that I don't have time, it's just that I've developeed a little bit of an addition since Thanksgiving and I'm putting that ahead of blogging, checking email, taking care of my kids (only kidding), etc. My mom (I'll just blame it on her) introduced me to the wonderful world of the Baxters, a series of books by Karen Kingsbury, and they are a little bit addicting.

Christmas was great. We went to Florida to visit all the family. Everyone was there and it was wonderful being able to spend Christmas with both sides of our family. Everyone always thinks that having both sets of grandparents in the same town would be a bad thing, but I love it. Especially when they are only a short 2 minute drive from each other. Sometimes it does get crazy running back and forth, but I think it is well worth it. Chip's brother, sister in-law, and their girls were all there and we were able to spend several days with them. I think that was Andrew's favorite part. All the girl cousins to run around with and I have to say that they really all play so well together. Except for a minor argument about the responsibilities of the dad (when they were playing house) they all had a great time. It is rather amusing to hear a 4 and 5 year old debate what the "dad" is supposed to do. Andrew was sure that he was going to work and his cousin was sure that today was a family day and he was staying home with the family. Audrey enjoyed all the action too. Although, she sometimes takes a back seat and just prefers to watch the action, she did spend a lot of time running around the house after the older girls and getting in on their games.

Andrew got a lot of Thomas and CARS stuff for Christmas, which has kept him very busy. Audrey got a lot of dress up clothes (she loves the shoes) and a little indoor trampoline. She loves it and spends a lot of time on it everyday. In fact, it helps Andrew get the wiggles out too. I challenge him to go 5 minutes without stopping and he loves it.

We really did have a wonderful visit and it's always hard to leave and get back to "real life" with work and school and everything else.

As far as 2009 goes, the kids are now both back at school and they are starting a gymnastics class this week. Hopefully it will be a lot of fun for both of them. Chip is taking an 8 day class this January and takes his final this Wednesday morning. After that he starts a new semester on the 23rd of January. Also, we have found a church in Raleigh that we really enjoy and are looking forward to getting more involved this year and connecting with some other families.

Below are a few pictures from the holidays. We hope your 2009 is going well.

Andrew's favorite way to get around at NeNe's house.

Our family picture at the Summeys' house.

This is a rare occasion...all 4 of us in a picture, looking at the camera, and smiling.

This picture was our Christmas card picture and actually has an interesting story to it. We took the kids to the seminary one day in December and took about 200 pictures of them all around the grounds trying to get a good one of them both smiling, with their eyes open, etc. There are a lot of benches around the seminary and we took pictures with them sitting on several. This just happened to be the picture we chose. If you look closely, you can see the words on the bench. I just knew it said "In Honor of ...... Knott". I obviously didn't know that person and couldn't read the writing under their legs. I sent a card to Audrey's Sunday School teacher at our new church and come to find out, that is her parents' bench. I couldn't believe that. Of all the pictures we took and benches to sit on, their bench was the one we picked and the best picture. Audrey's teacher and her daughter (who teaches the class with her) are really sweet and have just loved on Audrey and helped her transition to a new church, so her family has meant a lot to us in these past few months. And to think that they are sitting on the bench dedicated to her parents...it's a small world.