Christmas Day

We went to get Bastian out of his crib Christmas morning and he had managed to take his shirt off. He was quite proud of himself!


Santa brought Corbin a guitar, which he had really been wanting. Now we just have to teach him how to play it!


Santa put all kinds of snacks in our stockings. I guess he knew we would be taking a long car trip to Atlantic City, NJ the next day! Once Bastian saw the granola bar, he didn't care about anything else. We had finished stockings and moved on to presents under the tree and Bastian was still working on that granola bar.


Hero with a new set of Pet Shops, a whale and a fish.


Naomi, Dave just couldn't contain the excitement when he opened up your package of bag clips! :)






We finished opening our presents under the tree and prepared to have breakfast with Dave's family, then we exchanged gifts with them.



Here we are trying out Guitar Hero, which Dave got from his parents. It is a lot of fun! Dave and I have spent a few nights together playing it.


And for the finale...............Dave's family had gone in together and bought our kids a nice swing set. I evacuated the house with the kids on Christmas Eve, so Dave and his dad could put it together. It was dark when we got home and we had also closed all the blinds and covered the back door window with wrapping paper. After we finished exchanging gifts with Dave's family we told the kids they had a big surprise and to rip the wrapping paper off the back door. They were so surprised and happy. They love the swing set! It will be real nice when we have grass grown or mulch laid down and the kids no longer come inside covered in mud!

Our 11th Anniversary

Dave and I decided we would like to get away for a night this year for our anniversary. With baby #4 on the way we knew it would be our last chance for a while. Dave's parents were willing to stay the night with the kids, so we made our plans. We went out for an early dinner and headed over to the Bed and Breakfast around 6pm. What a beautiful house! Our room consisted of a large living room with 6 windows across one side of the room overlooking their private lake and Pilot Mt., a large bathroom with a whirlpool tub and a beautiful bedroom with the most comfortable bed I've ever slept in! In addition there were two fireplaces, one in the bedroom and one in the living room. They delivered a wonderful breakfast (so large I couldn't finish it) to our bedroom. The people there were some of the nicest you would ever meet! We really had a wonderful, relaxing stay!

The Scenic Overlook Bed & Breakfast

The Living Room

The Oh So Comfortable Bed

The Large and Spacious Bathroom

My Super Cute Husband and the Delicious Breakfast

Me and Dave with Our Gorgeous View

Nana and Opa Come for a Visit

Nana and Opa made a special visit to NC for Hero's baptism. We were all so excited they could make it! It had been over 18 months from Nana's last visit when Bastian was born and the first time Opa had ever visited us in the 9+ years we've been in NC. Nana was here for a week and Opa was able to stay for 2 1/2 days.


Opa's famous reading of "How the Grinch Stole Christmas!" with all the great voices (it is the story Opa read to us every Christmas Eve growing up).


We made a trip on the way to the airport to Duke University, Dad's alma mater, to visit the campus. It gave the kids a chance to run around after a 1 1/2 hour car trip and we got to see some of the beautiful architecture on campus.



Nana used to make gingerbread houses with us every year and I thought it would be a fun thing for the kids to do with their Nana. Nana applied the frosting and Hero and Corbin put on the candy. They did a great job and had a lot of fun!





We went with Nana to eat lunch at Hero's school.


Corbin took a picture of me and Nana at the airport before she had to board her plane. We loved having Nana and Opa visit and hope they will both be able to come back and visit when the baby comes in June!

Hero's Baptism

What a special day for Hero! I can't believe she has grown so much! She is such a wonderful, beautiful girl!

This is Hero at home before heading to the church.


Hero is enjoying her cake after the baptism wearing a necklace her friend, Morgan, had made her for the occasion.


Hero is here with two of her friends, Morgan and Kaelyn, who sang a song for Hero's baptism. They did a beautiful job!

After Hero's baptism we all headed over to a restaurant called Kimonos for dinner. We enjoyed having some family time with Dave's parents and my parents who were able to visit from out west for Hero's special day.

Bastian is enjoying eating a lemon and making lots of fun faces for us!


The kids always enjoy eating at Kimonos, because they can watch the chefs at work. The chefs always like to entertain the kids by throwing vegetables at the window, squirting oil on the window or making flames shoot up.