A Disney Weekend!

We had a great time this last weekend. We took Ani, Ruston, and Brad (Ani's best friend) and headed for Disney. We stayed the weekend and hit Epcot as well. We had a great time and really enjoyed being there with our friends. As you can see Ani loved the characters. Ruston didn't mind his "first" kiss either! It was so amazing to watch Ani with the characters. You could see in her eyes that she really believed that who they really were dressed up as. I loved it, it was one of those great mom moments. 

The kiss, the hug, the exhaustion, the friendship!

That about sums it up.

Happy New Year!

One of the neat things about where we live is the big Hilton hotel and restaurants across the street put on a great fireworks show for New Years. Our subdivision fills up with cars that drive down to see it. All we have to do it walk out our front door. The show is about 20 minutes and is beautiful. The best part is we don't have to get out and drive or fight traffic! I hope everyone had a safe holiday! 

Last room!

Well, since the house was already a mess, we decided to spend the New Year's weekend redoing our room. Finally, all of the nasty carpet is out of the house. That only took a year! Ani was a big helper! The pieces of flooring were just about as big as her. She was so proud of herself. "Look Momma. Look what I did!" 

Ahh, to fall asleep anywhere any time

Is he just adorable. The swing doesn't work anymore - I guess three months of him sleeping in it all night with it moving was enough. Fortunately he is now sleeping well in his bed. We put him in his swing to sit up and play since he wasn't sitting up by himself yet. After a couple of little fusses this is how he ended up! Too cute! 

Momma, Santa Came!

Boy did he ever come! The kids got more presents than they ever needed. Santa even ate all the cookies that Ani and I made the night before. Ani had a great time opening presents for brother too. Ruston had a good time too. It wasn't long after we opened the presents that he was ready for a good long nap. It was just too much. We hope that you all had a wonderful day as well. We missed you. 

Christmas happiness

Birthday Bash!

The three amigos! It was Brad's birthday (in yellow). Ani and Austin had a good time helping him open his presents and eat pizza and cake. Yum! These three go to school together and are really good friends. They ask to play together all the time. Austin is always telling everyone that Ani is his girlfriend! He even kissed her at school one day. We are keeping an eye on that one! 

Weekend Warriors!

OH, my. Now you might think that remodeling a room over Christmas isn't a smart thing to do - you would be right! We had to do it sometime though. Ani's room is getting the very nast carpet removed, a new wood floor and new paint. She had a great time helping us move everything out of her room and she was a GREAT helper! I can't wait to see it done. I will post pictures when we get it finished. 

Wonderful Friends

We made a very quick run to New Jersey just before Christmas. I was able to see a great friend, Joy, and her family. The last time I was there Joy and I were both about 6 months pregnant with our first babies. We now both have two! Her sons are amazing. Tyler, the oldest couldn't wait to see Ani and had a blast playing with her. Jake the youngest, tried to keep up with the bigger kids the best he could. Joy says Jake doesn't go to just anyone, so when he ran up to me and hugged my legs, my heart melted. It made the 2 1/2 hour flight each way worth it. It was wonderful to meet her kids and her mine. I wish we lived closer so the kids could play. We think Ani and Tyler would be really good friends. I hate that I didn't get a picture of the two of us together, maybe next time. Hopefully it wont be so long! Love ya, Joy! 

Night, Night fingers

Isn't it cute! He loves to sleep with these TWO fingers in his mouth. It is always these two fingers and always his left hand. I have dubbed them the night night fingers. It is a dead give away when he is getting sleepy, there goes those fingers in his mouth! 

My big helper!

It was so much fun having my little helper decorating the Christmas tree with me. She unwrapped the ornaments and handed them to me. She was so careful and so proud to be helping! I am guess that next year I will have another little helper, except he is going to be taking the ornaments back down and not being so careful! 

I'm too cute. . .

Oh yeah, he's gonna be trouble. . . . Do you see those blue eyes. . .? 

My poor sick baby!

This was the second time Ruston was sick during our outage. The first time was a bad cold, but this time was an infection with 103 degree fever. That is why he is in his chair without any clothes on. I took him to the doctor the day after this picture was taken to discover he had an infection in his blood. We caught it quick and his doctor gave him a shot of anitbiotics which helped him feel better fast. It is such an awful feeling when your babies hurt. . . 

Beautiful Babies

Ruston loves to sit up now and Ani just has to have her picture taken whenever I take a picture of him! Poor guy. He will never have pictures of him without her! 

I'm still here!!!!

Well, I bet you were all thinking I was never going to put anything on this blog again! Well, here I am. It has been such a busy couple of months. We had a refueling outage at work, which means we had to work a ton. Virgel was on night shift and I was on days. We were both working 12 hour shifts which meant Virgel didn't see the kids or me very much. It was hard on them. Ani would just cry for her Daddy. They were extra tired with spending more time at the daycare than they should. Uncle Richard was working at the plant for the outage. I asked my Aunt to come back down here to stay so I didn't have to get the kids up at 4 am every morning. It was really nice of her to come especially since it meant that her Thanksgiving ended up to be just another day with everyone working. So, Thank you Aunt Sharon. AND Thank you April, Denise and Tiffany for having your mom here with us over Thanksgiving instead of there with you where I know you wanted her. So, Thanksgiving for us was a bust. No turkey, except what they fed us at work. I felt horrible that Ruston's first Thanksgiving was non existant. The plant is back operating and we are now back to normal hours. It took Virgel a whole week to get back to feeling awake during the day after 6 weeks of night shift. He never wants to do that again! We are both off work for the week and anxiously awaiting Christmas. No I haven't sent out my cards yet, Yes they are coming. Please be patient. I want to have a picture of the kids to send out, hopefully tomorrow. . . . Maybe next year the cards will be on time! We have decided to replace the carpet in Ani's room this week and paint it. So, we are keeping busy even off of work. I hope Virgel gets to go fishing one day, but the weather isn't looking to good, it is just too windy which makes the water really rough.
Ani has been so much fun as we get closer to Christmas. She keeps telling me ALL the stuff Santa Claus is going to bring her. I hope he is pulling an extra sleigh, he's gonna need it! The purple cell phone is the most interesting demand! I never dreamed I would have to explain to a 3 year old why she can't have a real cell phone! I can't wait until she is 10!

I recieved wonderful news during the outage. My two aunts, Aunt Lynda and Aunt Sue are flying in in February to see me. I can't wait. It has been MANY years since I saw either one of them. I was a teenager still. So they will get to met my wonderful husband (no one tell him I said that!) and my two beautiful children. By the way, I love this picture. They were having the best time laying in the floor playing together. I am so glad Ani adores her brother.

I miss you all! Hopefully you will hear more from me, I would love to hear from you, leave me a comment or two when you are logged in . . . . .