Week Fifty-One

Merry Christmas!!

This week, 2 huge things happened:

1. We closed on our "old" house and our "new" house!!!

We are now proud second time homeowners of what we hope will be our "forever home". There will be lots of pictures of our new house posted in the coming weeks as we get settled in and then bring home a baby (!!??) but for now, behold the beauty that is the new house keys.

2, CHRISTMAS!!! This was the first year that Nora actually asked for things for Christmas, and between us and Santa, we really wanted her to have it all. I know in coming years, Santa and we will need to pick and choose from her list, but this Christmas felt like a "big" one for more than one reason, and since Nora is such a good girl, Santa really delivered. She had a really fun Christmas morning opening and enjoying her gifts, and for that reason, it was a lot of fun for us, too.

Christmas Eve at Bo and Lea's house:

Christmas Eve at home:

Christmas morning at home:

Christmas afternoon at Dede and Grandpa's house:

It's hard to believe that this time next year, we will have 2 little girls opening presents on Christmas morning. We're feeling very thankful as 2014 is coming to a close.

Weeks Forty-Nine and Fifty

Lately, Nora has been fussy about going to dance and gymnastics class. Something she used to love has now become a struggle. I think a part of it is that there has been a lot of turnover in teachers. Since the summer when her beloved Miss Sara moved to Florida, there have been 5 or 6 different teachers come and go. Nora is definitely a creature of habit, so I'm pretty sure that has contributed.

I was very close to canceling her membership to The Little Gym altogether after the 3rd week in a row of her refusing to participate, but after talking to a few people, we have decided to try her in the gymnastics class only starting on January 10th. I hope she warms back up to it because when she loves it, she reeeallly loves it!

On this particular day when she refused to dance or play, we left early and stopped by the most amazing food truck in the word-- The Poutinemobile! This is quite the find in Knoxville since poutine is a French Canadian dish. It's authentic poutine made by a couple from Montreal. This is not an everyday treat, but I'm so glad it is here for an every once in a while craving.

Nora was pretty excited about it, too!

Something else we did this week in preparation for Christmas is put together and decorate our first gingerbread house. It isn't pretty, but someone was pretty proud of herself.

Weeks Forty-Seven and Forty-Eight

This week was Thanksgiving week, and right now, we have so much to be thankful for.

We are thankful for this little face that we can't wait to meet in just 6-7 short weeks.

We have this sweet face that was SO excited to make banana cream pie for Thanksgiving dinner.

We have each other, and that is no small thing.

Also, at long last, we finally have something else big to be thankful for. We sold our house!! And we bought a new house!! Well, fingers crossed, if all goes well, all of this will be finalized in a few short weeks. We should be closing on both houses on December 31st. Just in time for a really BIG new beginning. I don't want to share a picture of the house yet and jinx it, but we are just so excited. We believe it is the perfect house in the perfect neighborhood to raise our family, and if we have it our way, it is the house our kids will some day "come home to" when they are grown and out on their own.

Here are a few more Thanksgiving pictures of Nora and her cousin Naomi who I *think* she has finally stopped calling "baby Naomi".

And is there any better way to end Thanksgiving week than to "deck the halls"?

Nora has created her Christmas wish list for Santa. She wants:
- An iPad
- A fairy (??)
- A trumpet
- A violin
- A flute

Really? A trumpet, violin, AND flute?? Oh, Nora, if Santa fulfills your wish list, it will be a very noisy Christmas.

Since we are moving right after the holiday, we are keeping it simple. Just our small artificial tree decorated with generic ornaments that Brad picked up at Target (because ours are in storage and it was too much trouble to try to find them right now). No garland, no snowman candles, no lights outside. But we have our little tree, and we are looking forward to a very Merry Christmas and a huge, life-changing New Year.

Week Forty-Six

Here Nora is on her way to dance class this week...

And here she is being much like a teenager when I asked her to smile for the camera after dance class while visiting Dede and Grandpa...

So, do I need to hang a sign around her neck that says, "I dressed myself!" or does that pretty well go without saying?

Week Forty-Five

This week, Nora had a chance to visit again with some of her Texas cousins. Dan and Jenni were in town with their boys, Caleb and Caden. Penny and Bill are always so gracious to open up their home whenever there is a chance for family to get together. This was also Naomi's first real chance to get down and play with (around?) this particular group of cousins. It's fun seeing her start to get in on the fun, too!

Week Forty-Four

This week was real Halloween, and it was a blast! I was worried because Halloween evening was kind of cold and rain was in the forecast. We considered skipping out on the traditional door-to-door trick-or-treating, but I'm glad we toughed it out because Nora had SO much fun.

Penelope's parents (Michelle and Nate) invited us to Trick-or-Treat in their neighborhood because the roads get blocked off to cars and kids come in from all over. People set up tables in their driveways, and kids are everywhere. It reminded me a lot of what Halloween was like in my neighborhood when I was a kid, and I so enjoyed watching Nora enjoy it to the fullest.

The three amigos getting ready to set out on their Halloween adventure

Scooby and Butterfly on their way down from their first house

You can see that Nora is wearing more layers than she was at Boo at the Zoo... Brrrr!!!!

Penelope and Nora several paces ahead of us, heading to their next house

This was Nora's reaction after almost every house- pure joy. It was awesome!

As we moved from one house to the next, Nora had a cute little pep in her step, and loudly sang the "trick or treat" song from Little Einstein: "We are here to trick or treat, trick or treat, trick or treat. We are here to trick or treat, so Happy Halloweeeen!" She used her manners at each house, saying "trick or treat" and then thanking them.

While it was a little cold and a little drizzly, the big rain held off until just as we were leaving our last house of the night. Then the skies opened up and it poured. We had to try to run back to the house, and Nora was getting kind of upset, but thankfully Brad saved the day and met us with a big umbrella. Once we got back to the house and dried off, all was well again. The girls all played nicely together for a while longer while the adults relaxed, and then we headed home and crashed for the night.