Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Birthdays, Halloween and a New Pair of Shoes

Well, I figured I would recap on some of the big events from the past couple of months. Hope you enjoy!

I realized that I never did a post for Tison's 1st birthday from September. Time is flying by too quickly. Below are a few pics from his birthdays......we celebrated here and then up in Gainesville. I can't believe he is one. Maybe I never posted because I was in denial :)

We stripped him down to his diaper to eat his birthday cake. It makes for an easier clean-up.

Then the birthdays that follow Tison's are Paul's and mine in October. Paul and I usually celebrate our birthdays together since they are only a couple of days apart. It was my 30th and Paul's 31st. What fun we had! We went out for a nice dinner at Del Frisco's (for those of you that know how much I enjoy food-I was in heaven-mmmmmmm) and then after dinner we went to our friends Brenda and Joe's home for a surprise birthday party for me that my very thoughtful husband planned. He had a spread of wonderful food (that I could not touch because I was soooooo full from our YUMMY dinner) a beautiful birthday cake, and a room full of dear friends and family that we have made here. And to top it all off he planned all of this on his birthday. He is one of the most unselfish people I know. I felt so much love that night. Thank you Paul for a wonderful evening!

Then on my Real birthday my girls made me a very YUMMY breakfast. I have to be one of the luckiest people around. I love my kids!

I just had to stick this picture in because it looks like Tison is playing a saxaphone.

A few days after our birthdays comes Michelle's and she turned 4. She wanted a My Little Pony cake. You will have to excuse my poor decorating job. :)

The weather is so nice now so the children love to spend their time on the back porch doing all sorts of projects.
FALL PAINTING! (Below)
MASTERPIECES!

Michelle, Nicole, and Tiffany(a little girl I take care of everyday!)

Paul and I had a nice weekend a couple of weeks ago. We were supposed to go on Wednesday October 24th-Sunday the 28th to Paul's bosses cabin in North Carolina with a group of couples from work. We were looking sooooo forward to it since in the last 7 1/2 years we have not really gone away for a few days without little ones in tow. Well that Monday Michelle came down with a serious case of strep and we were unable to go with everyone. When she seemed to be doing much better. We took the kids to G'ville for a Friday and Saturday night stay at Mima and Papa's and a fun filled weekend with their cousins Joseph and Millie and we headed to Disney Friday night.....alone. It was soooooo FUN and much needed after being to and from the Pediatricians office and Hospital the whole week. Thank you Mima, Papa, UNCLE CHRIS, Uncle Joe, and Aunt Lacy. The pic below was taken on "Thunder Mountain".
Below are pics of the kids from halloween. Tison was a pirate. I had so much fun making his costume and Elmer's gluing fake hair to his chin.

Michelle was a 50's girl and Nicole was Barbie. We had a pot luck and went Trick or Treating at my Aunt Gail's house which has become a tradition every year since we moved here!
On November 2nd Tison got his 1st pair of shoes. It took him a little while to get used to them, but he is doing well walking in them.

Face Painting and Pool Fun at KK's Birthday!

Weekly Occurence

Most every week Paul is out there working hard mowing our lawn after work. I used to mow the yard before I had Tison ( I love to do it!), but for some reason I have gotten used to Paul doing it. I go through phases. So I may be out there mowing again one day. While Paul is outside the girls are usually out there playing as well. Tison loves to watch them from the sliding glass door. These pics were taken back in August when Tison was still crawling (NOW HE'S WALKING-YEAH!)

GOOD LOOKIN' #1!

GOOD LOOKIN' #2

I thought this was too precious! (Tison and Nicole)

Nicole was trying to make him laugh and he was!!

Kindergarten

It has been a while since we posted so I thought I would put a picture of Nicole's first day of school. She started kindergarten at the end of August with one teacher. Then 2 weeks later they dissolved her kindergarten class and she was moved to a new class with a new teacher. That was a little bit of an adjustment for her since she had made friends in her previous class. She loves her teacher though, but still has more friends from her old class than her new one. I felt so bad for her and the other children in her first class because they had spent the first 2 weeks making friends and then they were split up and put into classrooms with children that had already had time to get to know one another. Nicole is a real trooper though and is doing so well in school. We couldn't be more proud of her!

So Much Has Happend

I have been so bad about updating our blog in the past few months and I apologize for that. I've been completely consumed with the responsiblities of having 3 children (with the youngest into everything and anything) and we have been traveling every weekend to this place and that place since the middle of June. Finally we are home and I can get organized again or as I say "reclaim my life".

A lot happend for our family in the months of March, April, and May and June, July.
Paul finished 2 beautiful homes, Nicole got her ears pierced, we had a new niece-Millie- (on my side-#5 of the grandchildren) and two new nephews-Justin and Ian (on Paul's side-#'s 28 and 29 of the grandchildren). Tison got his first 2 teeth in April and he is sitting and crawling (he has 6 teeth now and we will be celebrating his 1st Birthday next month), Nicole danced for the Mayor and finished Pre-K, the girls got their hair trimmed (Nicole got hers chopped off), Memorial Day in Rockledge with the Waters clan, Tison tried to color himself blue, we visited the Orlando Science Center, we went to a friends birthday party, we stayed on the beautiful Island of Marco down near Naples,FL with my family for two whole weeks, we went to family reunions in Statesboro, GA and Savannah, GA over 2 weekends with Paul's family. Life has been treating us well and we feel truly blessed to have such wonderful and fun children. They keep us smiling and laughing on a daily basis.

Paul finished building his 3rd and 4th homes and they turned out beautiful like always. Just a little note......the homes he builds take at least a year to complete. They are very large. Here are some pictures of house #3.

This is obviously the front of the house.

These are the built-ins in the den/library.

This is the ceiling detail in the master bath.

This is part of the master bath.

This is the fireplace in the great room.

This is the master bedroom and master closet.
Paul is thoroughly enjoying his job and will be completing house #5 in the next couple of months.

The following are pictures of all the events I listed over the last few months.

Nicole during her classes tap dance performance for the mayor

Our "little hams" after the tap performance

Nicole with her Pre-K teacher Ms. Copenhaver

Tison trying to color himself blue with blue tissue paper he got into in a matter of seconds. Everything seems to enter this boys mouth!

The girls just love their baby brother!

OLE!
Nicole's Before Pic

Nicole's After Pic (Did Shirley Temple enter the room? :) )

Michelle's Before Pic

Michelle's After Pic (Just a trim)

The 2 good lookin' men in my life!

Pool Fun at BamBam's birthday!

Memorial Day picture at Brian and Bridget's in Rockledge

Memorial Day munchin' with the cousins

What a bunch of CUTIES!

Nicole after her dance recital

Building castles in the sand with Dad

YUM, YUM, YUM.....Why don't they bottle this stuff Mama?
(Like I said, everything enters his mouth)

The kids had so much fun on Marco Island with their cousin Joseph

Napping after a full day in the sun!

Fun with "Mima" Lowry

The beautiful Gulf waters! One of our favorite places to be! When we arrived on the island the girls were asking us if we could please move. They said "We want to live by the ocean". Wouldn't we all?

We enjoyed magnificent sunsets...which I went CRAZY taking pictures of.

Well this is the end of a very lengthy post. Thank you for baring with me. I promise the others will not be so long.