Thursday, December 23, 2010

December 18/19 ~ First round of Christmas!

We have a big extended family and are close with them all so we usually have multiple family Christmases each year. It takes a lot of planning to be able to make sure we can hit them all! It adds a little more stress to the holiday season, but seeing and spending time with our family makes it worth the hassle.

The blizzard a few weekends ago forced us to miss our first family Christmas with my Dad's side of the family and we had to reschedule for after the 1st of the year. But last weekend (12/18 & 12/19) we did my mom's extended family (aunts, uncles, etc) Christmas on Saturday and immediate family (siblings) Christmas on Sunday. It was a great time and we ate a lot of great food!

 Aris pillow pet from Laura - at first she was more interested in the tag on the head

 Getting ready to demolish presents

opening a present from Grandma B - a photo cube!


All our Christmas cookies!

Ari with Uncle Matt & Aunt Mahlory

December - Christmas photo op!

Since we've never had a professional family picture taken, we decided to do one for our Christmas card. We had been referred to an amazing photographer for Ari's 9 month pictures so we booked an appointment with her and couldn't be happier with the results! Her name is Aleah Clements and her photography business is called "Created by Me Photography" - we highly recommend her!








Monday, December 20, 2010

December 11 - bLiZzArD!!!

Saturday the 11th we had one of the biggest blizzards in 20 years - nearly 2 feet of snow! Jordan spent a majority of they weekend plowing, but we saw him for a little bit. We were pretty much snowed in and couldn't go anywhere so when daddy was home for a little while we decided to make the best of it and get out and play!


Snow princess!!

December 9th - Putting the Christmas tree up!

We spent the evening decorating our Christmas tree - Ari had a lot of fun taking all the ornaments out of the boxes. She definitely liked tasting them!




December 4th - Baby Carter

A few weeks ago Ari and I got to go hang out with Baby Carter (he is my friend Chelsey's little boy). Chelsey and her husband Mike went to his work Christmas party so Ari and I came over to play. Carter was rockin the Bumbo seat while Ari played with his toys. She had a blast! Carter was infatuated with the Christmas tree the entire night!


November - Happy Birthdy Canon and Ashton!

We had a birthday party for our nephews Canon and Ashton the weekend of Thanksgiving. Their real birthdays are in the begining of December, but we decided to have the party since Jodie, Chad and Ashton were home for the holiday. Ashton loves firetrucks, so we had a firetruck themed party!
The Fire Chief!

Canon and Ari! Ari LOVES Canon - he can always make her laugh
One of the birthday boys! Ashton with his firetruck from Auntie Jana and Uncle Jim.
Ari loved the firetruck Grandpa and Grandma James had gotten for Ashton...

November 26th - 10 Months

We have been taking pictures of Ari in this chair since we brought her hom from the hospital! This is her 10 month pictures!

Thanksgiving in Iowa

This year we went to my Grandma Marie's in Iowa for Thanksgiving. We hadn't been down there for 4 years so it was fun to get to see everyone again and introduce them to Ariana. My sister Holly drove from Kentucky with her 2 kids. Ari had a great time playing with her cousins! It was a quick trip - just 2 days - but we had fun!

Madison feeding baby Ariana...
Ari and Madison playing in the kitchen...
Me and my babe!
Our little turkey!
Dylan!!

November - Lunch with Lori

My cousins Lorraine, Michelle, and Ari and I went out to lunch with my Aunt Lori. We went to Bucca De Bepo in Maple Grove - the food was great! It was nice to get out and hang out with just the girls. Ariana was having issues getting her puffs in her mouth with her hand so she just resorted to licking them off the table...



Me, Lorraine and Michelle
Lorraine and Michelle and our AMAZING dessert!

Sunday, December 19, 2010

November - Date night

Grandma and Grandpa James babysat while Jordan and I went out to dinner with friends. We met our friends Tim & Lindsay and Alex & Bonnie at Redstone American Grill in Minnetonka and had a great time. The food was very good. We decided to try to go out as a group either every month or every other month and try a new restaurant each time.




October - Halloween

Ari is our little "bug" so we dressed her up as a litte bee. She was so cute with the little stinger on her bottom! We took her out to a couple of the neighbor's houses, and then came home to pass out candy. Ari had the best time playing in the candy dish!