Some more misc. pictures

Charlie and Grandma on the train!

Gracie relaxing downtown!

All four kiddos waiting for the train!

The kids got these cute mosaic crafts for Christmas and had a blast working on them!

AnnaClaire did a bunny, of course

Gracie made a fairy

Charlie made an airplane

and Kate made a teddy bear!

On Sunday, the guys took Gracie to a nearby college for a women's basketball game!

Gracie's team played a scrimmage at halftime of the game...

She did great and had a lot of fun! The actual game was exciting, too, with a win on game ending 3 point shot.

Charlie is sporting a new hat that he loves! He's pretty cute in hats :)

And then there's our princess Kate who is rarely seen around the house without her princess outfit on. Oh, my beautiful girl!

A White Christmas!!!

So I guess it wasn't a completely white Christmas since it didn't start snowing until 8 PM on Christmas Day, but it was perfect for me! There was nothing like driving around with 2 of my friends that night to look at Christmas lights around the city (a Christmas night tradition) in the SNOW! It was beautiful! We woke up to a nice little winter wonderland with about 3 inches of snow, which is good for us! The kids all LOVED the snow and had a blast sledding, building a snowman, and making snowballs with some of our neighbors! It was an absolutely perfect day... have I mentioned how beautiful it is to see Christmas decorations covered with SNOW? This is a completely new phenomenon for me and I just loved it :)

Happy 2011!

 

The boys and I started the New Year festivities off early with a trip to Ashe*ville to see our favorite band, The Av*ett Bro*thers!

I cannot believe it is already 2011! A lot of exciting things to happen this year, including my graduation!

Obviously 2010 was an amazing year in our family, as we went from being a family of 7 to a family of 9 in June as we met Charlie in Chongqing, and Gracie in Nanjing a few days later. 

And there was nothing like celebrating the new year than making new, lasting traditions with the very two who have defined this past year. Mom picked up smores stuff, party hats, and sparklers and there was a little party in our backyard (a couple of hours early, of course) with smores, and all kinds of little fireworks... confetti poppers, sparklers, and the little popper things. They all had a blast and even said that it was better than Christmas!

We celebrated 2011 some more in the morning with doughnuts! Going to get doughnuts is always a hit at our house and Saturday morning was no different!

Our New Years weekend has been memorable and fun, and I will be the first to say that I'm SO not looking forward to heading back to school tomorrow. 

Happy New Year!!!

And I'll try to be a little better of a blogger this year... starting with pictures from our White Christmas (sort of) and some other random pictures from this past week! I'll post them soon!!