Tea Anyone?

Kathleen loved having tea on her new blanket with the stuffed animals Grandma Luann sent for Christmas. Thanks Grandma Luann!!

A visit from Aunt Mo

We so enjoyed our visit this Thursday from Aunt Maureen (aka. Aunt Mo). She stayed the week with my parents in Davie County and came on Thursday with Mom to see where we are living in Henderson. We met up for the afternoon at the NC Museum of Life and Science in Durham. Thank you for taking the time to come play! We love you.

Hi Fish!

We now have some beautiful fish living with us in the parsonage! Calvin and I were excited to get Kathleen a fish tank this month and one of the Gillburg UMC church members gifted us with a dozen fish to populate the tank - mostly Guppies and two pretty larger reddish orange fish. One of the guppies was pregnant when she came to come live with us, but has since had 7 babies and so far as we can tell 4 have survived. I was able to see her giving birth due to the fact that we came home late Friday evening the 14th from my sister in law's graduation from law school. It was really beautiful to see the momma swim around the tank and then go to the bottom corner to drop of 2 - 3 babies at a time in the rocks. The were born live and just laid there for a little bit to get their barrings the began to swim. They were so tiny and their bodies were clear so all you could really see well was their eyes. Kathleen loves watching and feeding the fish. We say hi and bye to them now with Rascal's greetings as we come and go from the house.

Yay Aunt B.!

Congratulations to my sister-in-law who graduated from Charlotte School of Law this past Friday. 

A well deserved honor and nice celebration. 

This year's Christmas Card!

Photo Card

View the entire collection of cards.

This one.... is Out of Here!

A little fun with Pop Pop and fall leaves over Thanksgiving.

Happy Halloween!

Today Kathleen was a Bumble Bee. She were her dress and tutu all day at school. At 4 p.m. all the parents showed up for a costume parade. We played in hay inside a giant tire, took a wagon hayride and marched with our friends around the play yard. Kathleen was so sad to leave her friends at school but we headed home early for spaghetti dinner at the church and the chance to show off Kathleen's cute costume to the ladies of the church.

Halloween Costume

So I had amazing mommy plans of making this cute bumble bee Halloween costume for Kathleen and we headed to Walmart for a yellow pillowcase + black ribbon. With no such luck on a yellow pillow case we headed to the halloween section of the store to see what was available as far as wings and antennas go. To our delight we found this bee costume for Kathleen that means now sewing for Mom!

The fun part of this story is how Kathleen helped us to choose the bee costume over the lady bug and pirate options as well. She kept going for the bee costume first and threw it in the cart, but then grabbed the lady bug and put it in the cart as well and said "more" with her sign for more as well. She was asking for more costumes.

Daddy's comment is that we know we're in trouble with a little girl that loves shoes and costumes.

The pirate was a close choice with the fun foam sword. Kathleen was actually pretty good ad sparring with Daddy and squealed with delight when she was poked in the belly with Daddy's sword.

Hill Ridge Farms

This afternoon was the start of fall break at Duke so to celebrate Calvin and Kathleen met me at Hill Ridge Farms. The weather was a perfect 73 degrees and sunny and the lines weren't too long for any of the fun attractions on the farm. Kathleen started off by riding a pony. This was her first time riding a pony and she Loved it. Then we played in the corn pit and talked to the animals. I was so impressed that when Kathleen saw a turkey with the goats an hens she yelled "Turkey!" all by herself without prompting. Next it was off to master the toddler hay maze, ride the train, take three trips down the giant slide, relax on the swing set, and take a hay ride to the pumpkin patch where we picked out a couple pumpkins and rode back to the farm. After such a fun afternoon on the farm it was off to dinner at The Olive Garden. Kathleen was such a pleasant and well mannered date at dinner; I think this may top the best family date ever list. Here are some pictures below of our adventures.

(Take a look at this blog post from 2011 to remember what Kathleen was like this time last year.)

View from the driver's seat

Since our move to Henderson, I am now commuting 45 miles/50 mins to get to Duke's campus for work. Kathleen has stayed in her current school KinderCare Learning Center on 15-501 for 3 days a week. It has worked well to keep school the same for her while we settled in to the new home and church communities. At the end of the month she'll be moving to The Little School on Duke's campus for school Monday-Wednesday. So with the change in our schedule the question that I have received most often over the past two months has been, "How's the commute?" My answer is, "We're workin' it out, some days better than others." Most mornings we sing and read books on the way to school. Here is my most common view from the driver's seat. (On the way home Kathleen is so tuckered out from the fun day at school she falls asleep before we hit I85.)