New amber teething necklace

I was so sad last summer when we lost Carrie Ella's amber teething necklace.  It was a gift from a childhood friend, and it just suited her.  Remember?

 

I asked my sister Cynthia, who has her own jewelry business,

The Impish Grin, to custom make CE a replacement.  It came out even better than the original. I love it!  Looks great on CE too. 

 

More cuteness for Daddy

Picture for Daddy

Sean left for MWC in Barcelona Saturday. Last night when I put her down she asked me to take a picture to send to Daddy.

:-)

That's a mighty fro. 

Houston

2/14 delayed at Sea-tac

2/15 Water fountains. Very unsure to soaking wet.

Wagon ridin' with Emaline. 

Valentines

Carrie Ella got a sweet valentines gift from her Shelley. A balloon, some great new books and best of all pj's with ice cream cones on them! It came with another shirt that says "all it want is ice cream." Very fitting.

Today we're off to Houston for the weekend to visit Aaron, Christie and finally meet Emaline!

Snow

We we're excited to see the snow coming down last night and even more excited to get out in it this morning. CE is so reluctant to try new things, but she did have fun...

Luckily a nice neighbor lent us their sled.

Lazy weekend begins

Thought I posted this Friday, but there was an error....

Thomas trains

More trains arrived today (Talking Toby and Percy) per the great piggy bank purge.  

Me: "Which one do you want?"

Carrie Ella: "I want all of them!"

Go Seahawks!

This is what Super Bowl parenting looks like.

Piggy bank

After 2+ years of putting change in her piggy bank we emptied and took it to a Coinstar machine today. 

$181.13!

We gave her some cash to spend (the rest goes to savings.)

She bought a talking Thomas train. 

Time to start saving again! 

GO SEAHAWKS!!!

Catch up post...CALIFORNIA

I've been procrastinating...between vacation and the holidays, it felt like it took a really long time for life to settle back down to normal.  And then when it did I felt overwhelmed by the idea of doing a catch up post.  But, at last, here I am...hey its only February 1st!

We had such a fun trip to Cali in December.  It was so nice to see the Grossman's and Maloney's so close to the holidays.  I wish it happened more often.

Sean and I are so incredibly thankful that we had a chance to sneak away to Mexico for a few days on our own.  I was in tears as the plane left LAX, but it didn't take long to relax into the Mayan Holidaze groove.  I knew Carrie Ella would do just fine - but I was also worried how the Grossman's would do - they've got their hands full with three - to think they agreed to add a toddler to the mix is just mind blowing.  But they did - and it was so nice to spend the time just the two of us, away from the house, work, every day stuff...

 

 

As excited as we were  to have that time together, I think Sean and I were both even more excited for the Grossman/Maloney's and Carrie Ella to have a chance to spend some quality time together.  She is shy and a bit attached to us in new environments - this was the opportunity for everyone to really get to know her, and she them.  And it sounds like they did! We didn't take a ton of pictures on the trip, but here's some....

Traveling is a different animal these days.  She has her own seat and she loves her headphones and mini iPad.

Arrived and the kiddos settled right in with each other, having fun and fighting! 

 

 

 

 

Uncle Dan trimming the tree....

 He done good!

Yummy bird for pre-Christmas Christmas dinner.

Snow in Topanga.

Trying out the Grossman's potty.

 

At the train museum.

Carrie Ella was pretty anxious about riding but big cousin Matthew took good care of her.  Giving me a toothache...

Can't wait to get back to California again sometime this year.