Tuesday, December 31, 2013

2013 Year in Review in Pictures

January 2013
Spent the weekend in Charleston celebrating Luke and Tina's wedding
February 2013
Family camping trip
March 2013
Weekend at Edisto for Trenholm's birthday
Weekend in Charleston for Leigh Anne and Cameron's wedding
April 2013
Getting our new boat
March of Dimes March for Babies
May 2013
Celebrating Owens' 30th birthday
Morgan Kate's dance recital
June 2013
River Trip - 1st of the summer
Daddy finishes radiation
 July 2013
Our annual trip to Folly
My hunk of burnin' love turned 34
August 2013
I celebrated my #33
Our baby girl turned 5
September 2013
Travis and I ran our first 5K
October 2013
Annual trip to Sky Top
November 2013
Mountain trip to celebrate my daddy turning 60
LOH3's grand entrance
December 2013
Merry Christmas!

Monday, December 30, 2013

Christmas 2013

Christmas Eve started off perfectly. Coffee. PJs. Christmas lights. TV. Relaxing. I was in heaven. My morning got even better when Owens called and said that he and Trenholm just couldn't stand it. They needed to get out of their four walls and they wanted to be at "home" for Christmas. They were going to stay Christmas Eve night with Trenholm's parents and come to my parent's on Christmas Day. We were all SO excited!
We also had a special visit from one of my oldest friends, Michael. His parents and my parents have been friends FOREVER. Seriously. And we've been friends since we were old enough to know what a friend was. MK adores him!
Christmas Eve night we all headed to Mammie's for our family dinner. Both of my grandmothers are there, my dad and his three brothers, and all of their families. We were only missing Owens, Trenholm and Loitton, as well as Luke and Tina who are also expecting a baby any day now. It was a full house!

MK and Jillian were excited to sit at their own little table together. Cuties!
My cousin Will is a nut! He will randomly grab people's phones and take "selfies". I love him!
 My little family of three on Christmas Eve in front of Mammie's tree.
Before heading back to my parent's house we rode through the lights at the Gardens. It's always so beautiful!
Our girl is a sleeper. She can sleep 12+ hours a night and she can sleep late. By about 8:30 or so Christmas morning my daddy was tired of waiting. He began ringing bells and saying, "Ho, ho ho!" as loud as he could. Finally, he and my mom came into our room dancing and playing Christmas songs until MK  got up. 

She was so excited to find her own real guitar...
 and a pink BB gun. She was one happy camper! She got so many nice things! 
Later in the day Owens and Trenholm arrived with Loitton. We were all so, so excited! I let my mom and Mama Jean love on him lots that day, but the next day…he was all mine.
 He napped on my chest for well over an hour. Heaven!
 Is he not just THE cutest?!?
Christmas night my parents cooked steaks, potatoes and salad for everyone. It was so yummy! We were there (obviously), my parents, Owens, Trenholm and Loitton, Mama Jean, Kyle, Jessie, Hunter, Triston and Avery. It was SO nice to have everyone there at the same time!

Thursday, late afternoon, we headed back to our house. MK was one tired little girl! 

Sunday, December 29, 2013

Pre-Christmas 2013

I certainly can't let the month of December pass by without sharing about our Christmas. I'm really going to work on updating this space more often. Really. I am. Promise. Even if my mom and Owens are the only two people left reading - I will update for the two of you. 


We started the month of December by celebrating sweet McNary's third birthday. It was so much fun and McNary had a special guest - Santa! MK is a big fan of Santa. She gets it honest. I'm an even bigger fan. 
Initially, MK wanted a jeep for Christmas. The only issue - she already has a jeep and it works perfectly fine. Yes, it has some wear and tear which is mostly our fault because we've left it out in the rain, but we've promised to paint it and it will be good as new. After it was established that Santa doesn't bring gifts you already have (even if he did last year), she then wanted a guitar, cash register and BB gun. She really stuck to that list.
Socks, our crazy elf, was back and one night he decorated our garage door. MK was very surprised!
 
The Friday before our break started, MK had her school program. It was absolutely precious! Travis and I were both able to attend and my parents came as well. 
Friday by lunch time I was feeling kind of tired and achy, but thought maybe the work week was just getting to me. By Friday evening I felt terrible. Saturday morning I started running a fever and could not get out of the bed. Travis convinced me to go to Urgent Care, so I did. After being there for two hours and only wanting to lie down on the floor because I felt so awful, I found out I had the flu. Yes, the flu. The start of my Christmas break and I have the flu. I was so disappointed. So sad. So angry. But almost too exhausted to even care. I came home, put on my PJs and crawled back into bed. After a few days of Tamiflu I was feeling better. Thank goodness. However, it was very short lived because on that Wednesday, after a dentist appointment, I found out that I needed a root canal. I.Thought.I.Was.Going.To.Lose.It. And I may have once or twice.

Despite my bad news on Wednesday, MK had great news. She had a terrific checkup at the dentist and to treat her we took her bowling. She had the best time. We had the best time. It was nice to get out of quarantine and live a little.
 MK did not understand why we needed to wear "funny shoes".
By the end of the first week of our break I was feeling more like myself and actually able to get out and finish our Christmas shopping. I might have also made a few stops at Starbucks. My favorite.
By the Friday before Christmas, all of our shopping was complete and all of our gifts were wrapped. It felt SO good!
Saturday evening we headed to my parent's house for the holidays. My mom let MK open one of her gifts - the game HedBandz. We all loved it and spent hours playing it that night.
Owens and Trenholm had planned not to come to my parent's house. They weren't going to travel for Christmas because they wanted to keep Loitton at home and away from germs. Yes, they had their baby and yes, I have lots to catch up on. (Story to come soon.) Of course, we were super sad they weren't going to be home for Christmas, but definitely understood their desire to keep Loitton at home. I kept them posted on their gift status by sending them text updates of things I found under the tree. 
During our time at home we went over to Mammie's house to help prepare for Christmas Eve dinner. While there we had to sample some of her baked goods. Her wreath cookies are a BIG hit in my family. Mammie makes them every year and makes about 140 of them. It's crazy!
 My mom and my uncles always joke about who gets more wreath cookies.
We also helped Mammie make candy. Will and my mom had it under control, I just made a mess. 
A few nights before Christmas we took MK and Hunter's annual PJ picture. I can't wait for Loitton to be in the picture next year! The top picture is this year, the bottom is last.


We also baked cookies while we were at my parent's house. I should say we attempted to bake cookies. They definitely did not turn out like Mammies.
I had two "helpers" for the decorating part. The only problem - they wanted to eat more of the decorations than actually put them on the cookies.
 See…these are not very pretty. Or tasty.
 More to come about Christmas Eve and Christmas Day...