As We March Into 2012...

May we all find Joy in the Journey :)

...Yet I will rejoice in the LORD; I will be joyful in God my Savior."
Habakkuk 3:18
  

Happy New Year!

A Budding Picasso?

Audrey painted this masterpiece, titled "Naynay's House."

I think it just might be the  most beautiful painting ever since Katie's rendering of "The Duck" back in elementary school. 


* * *


I'm so excited because my brother and his family are heading this way and we will all be celebrating Christmas together this weekend.  I love it when my brother, sister, and I get together and sit around making fun of our parents...and children...and other assorted memories :)


Also, I'm finally making my Christmas cupcakes ;)


It's gonna be great!




Hope y'all have a great weekend!

The Laziest Christmas Ever :)

Over the weekend we found ourselves marveling at how un...frenzied things were.  Of course the kids had plenty of visiting and partying to do with various branches of their families, but somehow even that seemed to be spaced out a bit better this year.  I'm sure part of it had something to do with the fact that it was weekend and Kate & Jerm had a bit more time before rushing back home.  But a lot of it was just attitude.  Katie brought all of her gifts still in their Amazon boxes & wrapped while we visited.  We didn't really have any last-minute shopping to do so there was no rushing to Target for...whatever it was that we forgot.  And there wasn't even any colic-y hollering.

Of course for me the lazy was all about the utter lack of baking and what-not.  I made lasagna on Christmas Eve and breakfast a couple of days, but other than that I abstained from my typical kitchen madness.  


I'm ashamed and embarrassed to admit not one cookie was baked...and perhaps even more shocking?  There was not a Christmas cupcake to be found.



That's not to say there wasn't guilt aplenty deep in my heart-of-hearts, but frankly I just didn't have it in me during this plague-y season to deal.  


So I didn't.


And we all had a blast repeatedly declaring it our Laziest Christmas Ever.

In the nicest way possible :)

  

Happy Thursday!

* Pix by Katie because, you know, dead camera!

Who Cares About the Weather When There's An Armful of Baby Boy?

A few years ago I did a number on my fickle back and spent the month of December lying on a heating pad watching every cheesy Lifetime Christmas movie ever produced while my children did my shopping and running and fetching for me.  That was "That Christmas My Back Went Out."



In the future, when referring to December 2011 it will likely be referred to as 
"That Christmas I Hacked up a Lung."


I'm just a sentimental fool.


After picking up the nastiest fluish/respiratory plague EVER from my (fortunately) beloved family in early December, I seem to have  permanently moved under the weather.  

We'll just say I've been a bit on the droopy side this month.


Fortunately this was also the year that I was freakishly organized in the gift-giving department and had my shopping done insanely early (for me).  Many, many years I have literally done my shopping once it hit the December 20s, but this year I had 99% of it done the weekend after Thanksgiving, and I did it ALL online.  It was so liberating to have it all completed, and was a relief since I ended up not feeling well.  


Because of my accidental foresight this ended up being one of the most stress-free Decembers ever!


Anyhoo, Katie & Jeremy & the babies headed to town on Friday for the whole weekend, so I packed up the car with the gifts and food and Christmas books and clothes and assorted paraphernalia so I could join them at Kari's house for the next few days.  This was basically the first time I'd ventured forth into the madness for a couple of weeks and I was ready to pretend I was ALL BETTER and enjoy some family lovin'.  


But first, I had a couple of little stops to make. After locking my keys in the car at Toys R Us, schlepping across tarnation to Red Robin while stopping every few steps to double over with the violent coughing in the spitting rain without a jacket (a proud, proud time, folks), I warmed up with some nice family time with my sister & her crew.  It ended up being one of my favorite parts of the weekend ;)  The boys were all happy and sweet and well-behaved and Shayne was appropriately sheepish about letting me see his new pierced ears (yikes!) and I got hugs from every single one of them.  


And Kari brought me an extra key to my car!  


Two stops and about a hundred hours later I made it to Kari's,
and before I knew it I had an armful of sweet baby boy, 
and then an armful of sweet little girl, 
and then another armful of sweet baby boy.

That evening they went to their dad's for a few hours and I had to work, but after they got home we had a lovely time just sitting around and being together.  


And in my humble opinion, together is the very best way to be.

The View From a Three-Year-Old

Alternately titled:  Important Stuff to a Preschooler


I'm very sorry to tell y'all that my beloved secondhand Sony point-and-shoot has died. Expired. Passed on.


It may or may not have a little something to do with sharing said camera with small children.  
I refuse to say because even if that is the case it's my own dern* fault and I don't care to publicly acknowledge my foolhardy ways.


This is a particularly upsetting turn of events because, you know, CHRISTMAS, and also Peyton will be joining us in January, and also HOLIDAY SEASON and perhaps most importantly of all what WILL WE DO here at AB-Inc without my many subpar photographic stylings?  I've been perusing the worldwideweb in search if the perfect free super-cool camera but they must be all gone due to the holiday gift-giving season.  I'll keep looking, but in the meantime we may be a little picture-poor around these parts.




Anyhoo, in light of my recent loss I though it would be a perfect day to take a look at some of the alleged camera-dropper's work.  She's a cute, little budding artist is what I'm saying.  (These were taken a couple of weeks ago before The Incident.  Because of course after The Incident NO MORE PIX.)

Audrey's shoes!

YOUR backyard friends, the BackYARDigans!

Self-explanatory

Owo's bed!

Audrey's bed!

Home Sweet Home

George.  There's a story.  I'll tell ya later.

Naynay!  (What can I say? Sigh)

Happy Tuesday!

*Sorry about the cussin'.  I won't make it a habit ;)

And Now, We Sleep!

Happy Monday :)

Merry Christmas!

We're hoping you all have a FABULOUS weekend reflecting on all Jesus has done for us. 


I love you!

p.s.  I pulled out the Christmas playlist I made for ya last year and put it at the bottom of the page.  You can click on the pop out and leave it playing as you make those sugar cookies.  Only if you want, of course ;)

Merry Merry Happy Happy!!

 

The Many Faces of Audrey Faith

Alternately titled:  Just Another Hour or Two in the Day of the Life...

This child's imagination is SOARING and we're just happy to be along for the ride.  I wish I'd thought to start photographing sooner because I missed the pirate and a couple of other fascinating people ;)


Happy Wednesday!

Meet The Granddog

Kari and Drew had yet another plumbing catastrophe at their (wonderful!) home and found themselves waterless for a few days, so they came to stay with me while the City dug up their front lawn and made a big mess.  I was sorry for their suffering but thrilled as usual to spend some time with them in a low-key, hanging-in-the-jammies sort of way.


I have to say, though, that the best part of all was my nice visit with my granddog, Hiro.  

I've long mourned my somewhat fractured and distant relationship with him because, as y'all know, I'm all about family, and we kinda got off on the wrong foot last year when I was granddog-sitting 
and I thought he was trying to eat me.  


But that's all behind us now.  


We were pretty much joined at the hip during his visit, and now I'm pretending we're best buds.  

Unfortunately it may be temporary as he tends to get a bit cranky and territorial and all GRRRR when in his own backyard, but we'll see.  


Either way, how could you not love this sweet boy?

I'm also pleased to report that Kari and Drew again have water at the turn of a faucet and are also able to flush willy nilly.  


And all is once again right with the fam.  


Thanks Hiro for not giving up on us!

The (Other) Tree

Do you remember way back a couple of weeks ago when I experienced much angst over the whole real tree versus fake tree dilemma?  

If so, you probably recall that I eventually opted for a live tree.  Which turned out to be not so live and started raining needles about 10 minutes after I strung the approximately 2000 lights all over the blasted thing.  Two days later I couldn't even breathe for all the allergic-reaction-ness going on, and by weekend I hated the sight and smell of both the tree and the needles piling up at the bottom, not to mention all that lovely greenery I had cut up and placed in pitchers all throughout the house.  

 

So after much griping and deliberating and encouragement from Kate I dragged it out of the house, vacuumed like my life depended on it, and set up exactly one-half of the old fake tree.  And for the next 24ish hours my living room looked a bit like this.

 To fully appreciate the joy of the mess might I remind you that I work at home....usually on the couch, right in the middle of the mayhem.  So I just tripped over stepped around said mess and took care of business.  


And naturally I didn't get stressed or cranky at all, nor did I bemoan my bad decision-making or loss of that thirty bucks that I went on and on about ad nauseam.




And a mere three-ish days later my living room looked a bit like this

At the time I was really frustrated and cranky, and frankly a little discouraged about the whole disaster, but now midway through December I'm hearing of friend after friend having dead tree issues, including a couple who have dragged their old fake standbys out of storage.  Misery loves company & all that, ya know.


Anyway, other than the fact that it is in the wrong kind of stand and is leaning precariously to the left,  putting me in a constant state of fear of the whole thing landing in the floor, I have had Christmas tree peace for a good two weeks now.


And that, my friends, is that.

Look Who's Walking

I meant to share this with you days and days ago but was too busy blowing my nose and coughing a lot.  (true story.)


Anyway, I'm sorry for the dizzying effects, but my mad photo-taking skillz evidently are surpassed only by my mad movie-making skillz.


No matter.  I'm thinking my mom is gonna love it ;)








Have a great night!

But Just Look At Those Eyes!

So I thought maybe I would get back on my bloggy track this week.  Last week I found myself completely buried under all manner of life, and when all was said and done there flat out wasn't time to sit down and write, which made me sad and I missed ya.  So I posted that yummy picture of Owey on Sunday and half-constructed a couple of posts in my mind...and then all coherent thinking went right out the front door.  I don't even want to tell y'all that I've been under the weather again but I've been under the weather again.   


way under.


Far enough under that I lost the will to blog.




or open my computer.




or wash my hair.




or (GASP) have a Pepsi.




sigh.


I promise I'll be back soon because quite frankly I miss you way more than is probably healthy ;)


Have a good day, y'all!