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Friday, June 8, 2012

summer fun...

just a few cute summer pics...

I caught her all-of-a-sudden lying down with her book and reading to herself.
I love how she loves books so much!

One of her FAVORITE things to do is to play with the water hose

"Here, Daddy, you take a drink!"

Thursday, June 7, 2012

Mexico con mis amigos!

Last week, we took our first vacation without Lucy and joined our best friends on a trip to Playa del Carmen, Mexico. It was W-O-N-D-E-R-F-U-L!!

We have been sharing life with these couples for over 7 years, and it was a joy to be able to go on vacation, kids-free, all together!

The Treadaways, The Pokludas, us and the Saugiers

Waiting to leave DFW at 7:00 am, Friday morning

Simon and Katrina, enjoying a little coffee in the terminal

The view from our room....AMAZING!

So happy to be on vacation!!

What I did most of the time...

We loved lying by the pool all day long!

The ferry that took us to Cozumel for the day. Not a bad ride out, but we all were feeling not-so-great on the way back, due to strong winds and choppy waters....no bueno, amigos. As JP said about our Cozumel trip before leaving, "There's a 60% chance that it will be the best day of our entire trip and a 40% chance that it will be the worst day of the trip." The 40% was the trip back on the ferry, no doubt.

The side of the resort

The resort

beach!

white sands, blue water

The resort was all-inclusive, and it was so wonderful to be waited on the entire time we were there. I should teach Bella how to make and bring me coffee whenever I want it....and to say, "It is my pleasure," after she serves it to me.

We were able to do some interesting shopping while in Playa del Carmen- there's nothing like walking down slightly-sketchy streets, being offered cigars, then when you say no thank you, you don't smoke, you are offered marijuana, crack and ecstasy...quite a jump from a cigar. And no, we did not buy any of it.

We had a ton of fun with our friends and made some great memories- like joining water aerobics at the pool and having to carry a very large, older Mexican woman on my back across the pool in a race....interesting. Our group likes fire, so whenever there was a dessert that had the option of being set on fire, we were in....bananas foster, Mexican coffee, and crapes flambe.

We also had some alter-egos popping out- Simon bought himself some trendy sunglasses and a Fidora. Mike, mistakenly, grabbed my khaki pants that were lying on the couch at home, and packed them (the men had to wear pants and closed-toed shoes to dinner). When he opened his suitcase and realized the only pair of pants he'd brought were mine, he was quite baffled. He ended up running to and from the hotel in the 20 minutes before dinner to the above-mentioned-sketchy-streets and finding some white linen pants. Totally not his style at all. And kind of Yhani-ish (Imagine some Grecian man playing a sax on a beach with his white linen pants flowing with the wind....).

Lucy was well-taken care of by both of her grandparents while we were gone- she stayed the first two nights with Oma and PapPap and had a great time! She even proved her Mommy wrong by showing Oma that she does, in fact, like bananas. Oma gave her her first bites of chocolate and even gave her strawberry ice cream as an afternoon snack- that's what grandparents are for, right?

She spent the next two nights with Grandmommy and Papi and did well- she got to play with her cousins a lot, see her aunts and uncle and even see GG. We were sent several cute pics of her to tide us over... I missed my girl!

We were so very thankful for our families who took care of our sweet girl while we were gone. When she woke up on Wednesday morning to me getting her out of bed, she looked confused and stared at me for a while, like, "Wait. Where did you go, why are you not my grandparents?"

Sunday, May 27, 2012

Liz knows stuff...

Liz graduated from UNT two weeks ago! We are so proud of her and are so excited about her new job next year! She will be a fantastic teacher!

"WE <3 LIZ !!"

I found this cute idea on Pinterest....came out pretty good, if I do say so myself!

Fun teacher gifts

The parentals

While waiting 2 hours at Cheesecake Factory for dinner after graduation, we noticed that it was also Prom weekend and there were tons of fancy-dressed high schoolers waiting with us. We decided to do our own awkward prom group shot....

More normal sibling shot

Marcos and Liz

Alex and Lane...so sweet.

The next day was Mother's Day. I hosted a lunch at our house- so fun to have everyone at home!

GG, Grandmommy, Paige and Lucy

We also celebrated all the spring and summer birthdays- Alex, Elena, Liz, Grandmommy, and Cameron!

Cousins who love their paci's...and each other!

Square One Birthday Party

We hosted our playgroup's first birthday party a couple of weeks ago. Our church has a great ministry for new moms called Square One- you basically meet new mommies that have babies around the same age as yours and eventually form playgroups.

I was so blessed to have met these moms and their sweet kiddos- I vividly remember bringing Lucy to Square One when she was 17 days old- we were all bleary-eyed, sleep-deprived mommies, trying to figure out how to nurse while using nursing covers, trying to figure out why our babies wouldn't sleep, just trying to make it those first few months without going a little crazy.

We've loved being able to play together with our friends this past year on an-almost-weekly basis.

Here's our birthday party:

Lilli wants out!

Lucy and Luke

She was tired so she just laid down. Again, theme of birthday parties is that she doesn't nap well and isn't in a great mood.

All of our friends playing!

Getting a ride from Luke and Presley.

Houston

A couple of weeks ago, we made the trip down to Pearland (south of Houston), to spend the weekend with some of Mike's roommates from college and their families! We were able to stay with James and Betsy and their sweet girls, Grace Anne and Abigail, and then David and Shelley came on Saturday and we got to meet baby Coraline!

We had a great time seeing everyone, getting to hang out and play....

loving her new Etch-a-Sketch she got for her birthday!

Shelley and Coraline

Dave and James

Grace Anne holding Coraline

Abigail!

loving spaghetti for dinner!

sweet sisters

Ladybug birthday party!

So, I'm embarrassed at how late this post is... but better late than never! We celebrated Lucy's first birthday the Saturday after her actual birthday. We call Lucy "Ladybug" and so I thought that a ladybug-themed birthday party would be fitting! I got a ton of ideas off Pinterest.... as Alex and Elena said, it looked like Pinterest exploded in my house. :)

I had lots of help to pull off the party and couldn't have done it without everyone's help!

Warning- there are a ton of pics in this post....enjoy!

The Friday night before the party, Liz, Alex, Elena and Mom came over to help me ice and decorate 50 cupcakes and the smash cake, as well as finish her picture banner....

Liz wasn't quite sure about this....

Yes, that's Alex sniffing glue in the back...

Elena's cyclopes bug

The birthday banner- it had each month's monkey pic. So fun to see how she's grown!

The smash cake, made by yours truly! See the two teeth on the bottom- supposed to look like my ladybug!

The day of the party, we had fun! She hadn't napped well that day and wasn't in a great mood (aka- not wanting anything to do with cake or presents), but we still had fun having our families and close friends with us to celebrate her first year! Honestly, I think it's more of a celebration for the parents making it through the first year...but that's just me. :)