Happy Birthday to You!

On Sunday, our little girl turned 3! We had a fun time celebrating "zoo" style this year....complete with monkey and lion cupcakes and a trip to the zoo. Here are some pictures from our festivities.

Celebrating with friends at the park.

We are blessed that we have great friends with wonderful kids for Sunshine to build friendships with. They had a great time playing at the park.

San Antonio Zoo over the weekend.

Riding the train at the zoo. It's a great little train ride.

Two-miles long through their beautiful park!

On her actual birthday we had a family party at our house. Sunshine and

her cousin enjoyed playing with all her new gifts, including a new lego doll house from Grandpa and Nini. T & Sunshine are the lego builders around here. Yesterday the doll house fell off the coffee table and came apart. I need to work on my lego skills. As I was trying to put it back together Sunshine kept telling me "that is not how it goes". She is a blast and I am so thankful to have her as my daughter!

Playtime, Gardening, & The Pink Posy!

Sunshine has spent a lot of time playing with her stuffed animals and dolls recently. They have story time together (on carpet squares, no less), take naps, eat snacks, visit the restroom, etc. It's so fun to watch her play and it keeps her entertained. Here she is reading during their snack time.

She came up with the idea that they all needed their own little blanket. We use 12th man towels for blankets and construction paper for carpet squares...isn't this just adorable?!??

The family gardening project has begun for the year. T tilled the garden last weekend and we put in some late broccoli and cauliflower. It amazes me how much things have greened up over the last week. I told T the anticipation of flowers blooming is almost better than the actual bloom itself. My roses are just taking off and the red bud trees are on full display.

I've also been keeping busy with a new at-home business, The Pink Posy. Here are a couple pictures of some spring hats I crocheted recently. I am blessed to have a cute little model:). I have a page on facebook too. If you are interested in a hat, please e-mail me (thepinkposy@gmail.com).

A little bit of snow and Honey

Snow and Honey?!!? Yes, we got a little snow and we have a new puppy named Honey. Sunshine loves both. Sunshine, Honey, and I played in the snow Friday morning.

Here is our sweet little pup, Honey. She is about 11 weeks old now and is spending more of her day outdoors. Sunshine adores her and I think the reverse is true as well.

Hmmm...

This picture pretty much summarizes how I've felt about blogging lately. After Christmas, life seems very normal- so not too much to report on. We've been to some Aggie basketball games. Sunshine can sing both the Spirit of Aggieland and the War Hymn, so that helps keep her attention during the games. This past weekend we attended the Fort Worth Stock Show. Sunshine said her favorite part was "seeing a turkey"...you just never know what will get her attention.

A new element in our daily routine this year is preschool. Since I will be homeschooling her, I thought we should go ahead and get started with preschool work. She seems to be enjoying it and is very good to remind me that we need to "do school" in the mornings. I am enjoying it too.

I promise to be better about posting over the next month. Thanks for reading.

Christmas Cookies!

We've been doing some baking for Christmas around our house. Sunshine defiantly enjoys helping out in the kitchen and was excited to get to decorate cookies with her cousin one morning. I think the amount of sprinkles they consumed were equal to amount they put on the cookies. It was a lot of fun!

Red sugar tastes great!

Cheese!

Working on their cookies.

Showing me their messy hands and faces.

Mmmm!

November

November was a busy and fun month. At the beginning of the month we held our annual grad student party. We ate, had a campfire, and made 'smores. It was a lot of fun and I know Sunshine really enjoyed all the attention that everyone gave her. We had a early frost so we cleaned up our garden and harvested the rest of the pumpkins. I am excited about starting a spring garden early next year. Our winter garden is not going so well right now, so I am thinking about just taking a break from it until it February or so. But, garden fresh salads would be great- so I may change my mind.

Loading up the pumpkins!

This year we spent Thanksgiving with my family. Sunshine and I went early so that we could attend my cousin's wedding in Dodge City. It was great to see everyone at the wedding and I am so glad that we were able to make it. We spent most of our time at my Dad and Mom's. We had so much fun and made so many great memories! I did get to visit one of my roommates from college while we were there. It was great to see her and get our kids together to play!

We helped my mom prepare Thanksgiving dinner. Sunshine "helped" in the kitchen and my mom was very gracious to let her.

Helping Grandma with the cranberry jello.

My mom enjoys playing the piano and Sunshine enjoyed sitting beside her and singing. They sang/played hymns and Christmas carols multiple times. I loved it.

My Dad took Sunshine for a ride in the combine. She loved watching the auger come around to the side of the combine and hearing Grandpa honk the horn.

Thanksgiving day with the cousins! This is 4 of the 5 cousins. They are a blast!

We ended our trip with dinner at Puffy's Steakhouse (one of our favorite local restaurants) with 2 of my sisters. My mom watched the grand kids and we enjoyed the time to ourselves. Thanks Mom!

Country Fair

Last Friday we attended the Country Fair at our church. It was a lot of fun and Sunshine was especially happy because her cousin came too! Here are some pics from the evening.

Ready to play with the water guns!

They had a photo booth, which I thought was a great idea. The veterinarian and the ballerina liked it as well because they got a prize just for sitting there and smiling!

Exiting the bounce house