Christmas Morning 2009

Christmas morning!!! Nanny and Papa were with us as well as Grandma Judie and Grandpa T John. We had lots of family fun!!!



Grandma Judie and Grandpa T John taking it all in!!!




John and his loot!!!



Jim and John opening their joint gift. It is a world atlas puzzle ball. Too cool!



Sarah and her loot!



Matthew and his loot! His stocking is almost bigger than he is.




Nanny watching the festivities.


Santa was good to everyone this year. John received a ripstik. So far is has been very challenging for him. Hoping for warmer weather soon. Sarah received a razor scooter. She loves it! Matthew recieved a 16" Lightning McQueen big boy bike. He needs to continue practicing. He will be riding it soon.

January Challenges

Each month at Gotta Pixel, there are several challenges in which to participate. I love these challenges. They are fun and at times very challenging. Each one comes with a set of rules that are to be followed. These are the challenges that I have participated in so far this month.

The first challenge is called an element challenge. In this challenge, I had to create one digital scrapbook page and use beads in the layout. Here is my completed page:


The next challenge was by the numbers challenge. In this challenge we were to use 1 photo, 1 paper and 10 different elements. Here is my completed page:


For the next challenge, we were given a template. This is the simply sketchy by Laura challenge. From this template we were to create a unique page. I used a photo from this Christmas Eve for this challenge. Here's mine:

Pumpkin Carving!!

What fun we had carving our pumpkins this year. All of the kids (including Jim)participated. Matthew created a robot pumpkin. John created a scary pumpkin while Sarah created a smiley pumpkin. Look at us working hard.

Braves Baseball!

We love going to Atlanta Braves baseball games!! It is such a fun family outing. Turner Field has lots of FUN activites for the kids. I personally go for the food. I love to eat at the ballpark. There is nothing better than hot dogs, peanuts and nachos. OK, maybe ice cold beer. This was the Braves last game of the season. They were playing the Washington Nationals. We left the game after the 12th inning. It was tied 1 - 1. The game finally ended after the 15th inning with the Braves losing to the Nationals 2 - 1. Oh well, there is always next year. John is already planning on spending his birthday at the park.

Happy Birthday!!!

On Sunday, I celebrated my birthday.  It was a wonderful day.  We went to the movie and saw "Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 3D".  The movie was very funny and everyone enjoyed it!!

Jim made me his top secret brownies.  They were deliciously YUMMMMMMY! 

Here is a photo with me and kids.  Look at all of those silly faces. 

Football!!! Are you ready????

And it is that time of year. Yes, my friends, college football has started again. Jim does such a good job brainwashing our children. On the morning of the first OU game, the kids all got dressed in their favorite jerseys. It makes Jim so proud to see all of his little fans. Josh came over to watch the game with us that evening. Even though OU lost their opening game, we still had a lot of fun. Here is a photo of the "kids".

Matthew's First Day of School

Matthew started Pre-K on August 17, 2009. I can't believe how quickly he is growing. When did my baby get so big!!!

He has been very excited about school this year. He loves each and every minute. He is making friends and learning a lot.

Here he is on his first day of school. Matthew loves music. He loves to sing and play instruments. He has two guitars that he carries around the house with him for when he has the urge to "rock" out. Hence the shirt.

Here are a few more shots....

World of Coke and Our Last Hurrah!!!

At the end of July, Nanny and Papa came and stayed a week with us. We had great plans but the weather did not cooperate. So we scrapped all of our original plans and made new ones. All of our new ones included indoor activities. We went to the movies and saw Ice Age 2...Dawn of the Dinosaur. I would highly recommend this movie. It was very funny. We went *GASP* shopping. We went to the World of Coke. The World of Coke has been relocated to downtown Atlanta in Centennial Olympic Park. The new museum is fantastic. It has a great 4D movie. The kids LOVED it!!! The sampling room is always a favorite. They have over 60 different fountain drinks from around the world. You can drink as much or as little as you want. There are no limits. You will however succumb to the sugar and stop. On the way out, we were each given a small glass bottle of Coke to take home with us. Matthew could not stop talking about his "beer". He couldn't wait to get home to drink it. He wanted it for breakfast the next day. Finally, we purchased ice cream and created Coke floats. The kids loved them. It was a success!!!!

Fourth of July.....

Each year we attend the annual Peachtree City Golf Cart Parade. It is so much fun. The kids had a wonderful time and it was a perfect day.

Here are the highlights.

xoxoxo,
Debbie

June 2009

Wow!!! I can't believe the summer as flown by and school has begun. I haven't updated our family blog in months.


Here are some photos that summarize what we did this summer....



In June, we took a trip to the beach. We spent one week in Gulf Shores, Alabama. This was my kids first trip. Needless to say, they LOVED every minute of it and can't wait to return.









We just generally had a wonderful time. We ate and played and enjoyed our family!!!!

xoxo,
Debbie

Easter Sunday

Easter morning...the Easter Bunny was very good to us this year. Each kid got assorted chocolates, a webkinz, and a pair of summer pj's. It was all so exciting and fun. After the festivites, we got dressed up for church.

It was chilly on Easter morning as we all stood outside for a family photo shoot. It is very difficult for us to get a family picture. Here is one...enjoy.

Right before our photo shoot. John and Sarah both picked some flowers from our yard to take to church to flower the cross. They picked some of the beautiful azalea flowers that are shown in this picture. This is the prettiest time of the year in Georgia. You can tell it is spring when the azaleas start to bloom. I only wish they lasted longer.

John flowering the cross.
Sarah flowering the cross.

Hope your Easter was blessed.....Debbie

Braves Pre Season Game vs Detoit April 4th

We decided that as a part of John's birthday weekend we would take in a Braves game. It was a beautiful day to be outdoors. It was sunny and 74. Although the Braves lost, we had a wonderful day at the ball park. We met our friends Mark, Kelly, Jack, Abby and Uncle Josh at the game. We enjoyed hot dogs, peanuts, sodas and beer.

Uncle Josh with Abby on his shoulders on the BIG coca cola chairs.


John getting ready to run the bases. This is great area at our ball park for kids. Our kids ran the bases at least 50 times. They had so much fun.....

Matthew taking in his first major league baseball game.

The kiddos...John, Matthew, Abby

Matthew prepping for the big run of the bases. You can see Jack and Abby right behind him. The man at the first base was fantastic. He was so great with the kids. He had nicknames for all of them. He called Matthew "robodog" because of his shirt. He was very kind to each child that ran the bases.

Our day at the game was a success. Everyone had a great time!!!!

Debbie

John's 8th Birthday!!!

We recently celebrated John's 8th birthday. Wow, how can he be eight? He is growing into such a great boy. We had a small party at home. All he wanted for his birthday was some Pokemon trading cards and brownies. Jim and I decided to surprise John this year with a Nintendo DS for his birthday. What a surprise it was!!!

Getting ready to open presents. Why is dad making us pose for photos?????

John with his new pokemon cards. He LOVES these.....

John posing with his new Crimson Red Nintendo DS. He was so excited. It was not a gift that he expected to receive.

The aftermatch...all of the kids checking out John's new goods.

Debbie

March...another month of adventure

We started off March in a very unique way.....it snowed. On March 1st, it snowed in Georgia. We have had the strangest weather this year. Georgia is usually very mild. We do not tend to have any extreme temperatures. Snow is almost unheard of in this area. We have lived here for almost 9 years and this is the second snow. It actually snowed so much that they cancelled school. Here are some highlights.Watching the snow fall from the front window....so exciting.Sarah with her snowball.
Jim and John playing in the snow.

Matthew loves a mohawk. One day before school, I asked Matthew to brush his teeth and comb his hair. When he returned, this is what he showed me.....

Look at my mohawk Mommy. I did a great job. Isn't is super cool.






We finally had a warm sunny day and the family headed to our neighborhood lake for an afternoon of fishing.


The fish were biting and we had a great time. Sarah caught 2 fish, mommy caught 1 fish and daddy caught 1 fish. Not a bad day. PS - we don't keep the fish. We are strictly catch and release.


And lastly, the neighborhood planned and Easter egg hunt and lunch at our clubhouse. Jim got nominated to dress in the costume and be the Easter Bunny. We all had a lot of fun. Don't you think that Jim makes the best Easter Bunny ever. What a great sport he is. This is why we love him.

Jim the Easter Bunny

Suess Kids with Easter Bunny

Debbie with Easter Bunny

xoxo,

Debbie

Wow!!! I have been such a slacker....

So, it has been over two months since I have posted anything to our family blog. I assure you that we have been busy. I will try to catch you up.

In February,

We celebrated Jim's 42nd birthday. He started the day by attending "Dads and Donuts" at the elementary school with John and Sarah.

Here they are ready to go to school with their daddy. Matthew HAD to get into the photo.

On February 15th, Sarah lost her top front tooth. She had been holding on to it for a very long time. She was quite scared of having it pulled. Doesn't she look great toothless.

Then on February 18th, we had a large hail storm at our house. It was amazing. We have never seen anything like this before. Hail is not at all normal in the state of Georgia. We all stood in the garage with the door opened and watched it fall.

The hail was quite large and imparted a lot of damage to most of the houses/cars in our neighborhood and surrounding area. There are only a small handful of homes that are not currently receiving new roofs. We happen to be one of them. We got a brand new roof on our house last spring and it held up well. We were lucky and have no damage to report.

This is the view from our front door. As you can see the ground is covered in pea sized hail.

Finally, on February 27th, the kid's school held it's first annual Father/Daughter and Mother/Son dance. We had a wonderful time. They served us a fine dinner of Zaxby's chicken, green salad, potato chips and chocolate pudding. Enjoy the picture of Jim and Sarah at the dance.

xoxo,
Debbie