Merry Christmas, Happy New Year and I'm still a slow-poke!!!

 Well, the holidays have come and gone and what a wonderful break it was! The kiddos were out of school for almost a month and we were able to fit a lot of fun family times into those days!  Still recovering from my foot surgery, (have finally been able to start light exercise this week!), I was still moving around pretty slow, but that didn't keep the fun away.

We kicked the break off with making and decorating cookies.  Sam and Lily always love this and they were very delish!

Does this batch make you smile or what?!?!

My family came to celebrate the weekend before Christmas!  Sam and Lily love having all of their "Givens" cousins under one roof!

Some of John's family comes over for a Christmas Eve and Christmas morning celebration! And once again, I barely have any pictures to show.  This is Sam and Lily before the Christmas Eve service.

And the Christmas morning walk!

It was so fun to decorate the new house! 

We headed up to our cabin for New Year's Eve, then onto Chattanooga to celebrate a late Christmas with all of John's family.  I felt lucky that we got to stretch Christmas out to a 3 week celebration!

Zac is a great traveler except for one thing...he somehow thinks he's a lap dog.  And whose lap does he tend to sit in?  Well, let's see...

2013 was a great year full of some wonderful changes for our family!  We are so excited to see what lies ahead in 2014!

Happy~

Laurie

Alive and kickin' (well, not really kickin'!)

One day I hope to NOT start my blog with "I know it's been a while...", but with the way our lives go, it looks like that is going to be the norm for a while!

Since school started, our weekends have been packed with sports for both of the kiddos!  Lily is loving her soccer team "The Jolly Ranchers" and Sam has enjoyed his 2nd season of lacrosse on the Milton Eagles.

October brought our annual trip to St. Simons with John's parents.  It was 5 days of perfect weather and lots of fun!  As I look back at the pictures from past visits, I laugh because they all look the same except Sam and Lily Clare are a little taller and have on different bathing suits!  We stay in the same house and set up at the same sandy spot EVERY year...I guess we are creatures of habit!

There is something about fresh salty air that allows brothers and sisters get along!

Sam did a little beachfront lax practice!

John made friends with Mr. Heron as he threw him the minnows he caught in his net!

What...they are still getting along?!?!

October also brought us to our first Girl Scout camping trip.  Lily Clare and I ventured south to Luthersville, GA to Camp Serendipity.  (Kinda makes you think of a spa in the woods with massages and pedicures for everyone, right?!?)  Nope, none of that....but we did have a good time!

Lily learned how to make friendship bracelets; of which, I was a pro when I was her age!

She got to try her hand at leather stamping.

We hung out by the campfire - complete with s'mores,

had some time to horse around,

and even got to go kayaking without falling in!

Then came Halloween!  Sam was able to dress up for school and who do you think he went as???  Hint - Quack, Quack!  Duck Dynasty's Willie!  The beard was a big hit!

Lily was allowed to dress up as a character from a book and she chose - Willie Wonka!  She was proud to be the only girl dressed as a man! 

We were invited to trick or treat in our old neighborhood and the kids were so excited to be able to go be a part of the fun!

Sam was some kind of purple, disco "morph-man" and Lily was adamant on being a mean, green witch.

And we couldn't let the kids have all of the fun...so John and I went as Flo - from Progressive commercials and Mayhem from Allstate commercials.  We were awarded 2nd place, beat out by Woody and Little Bo Peep from Toy Story!

And where can you find me now????  Right here:

I had foot surgery on Thursday and have been laying on the sofa since.  Zac is protecting me and I'm full force in magazine reading, tv watching and Pinterest pinning!

So yep, we're alive! (I'm just not kickin'!)~

Laurie

Rolling into "8"!

This past week, my precious girl turned 8!!!  I just can't believe it that this little nugget:

has been a part of my life for almost a decade!  She is such a happy soul and makes us laugh daily...actually, more like hourly! 

Lily was very successful at stretching her birthday out for a week!  We first celebrated at our favorite Mexican restaurant on Saturday....

Feliz Cumpleanos, Lily!

Then we celebrated on the 16th at home with what else, but...take out Chinese!

She wanted me to surprise her with the desert, so I made her favorite "petit fours" (I use that term very loosely!)

The birthday week concluded with her big celebration this past Saturday with her friends at the skating rink!  

This blonde haired cutie is Abby.  She and Lily Clare have been friends since 3 yr old preschool.  But even better, they share the same birthday and were born in the same hospital!  So, we can only imagine that they were next to each other in their incubators starting their friendship!

Girl fun! 

Lily requested a red velvet cake...complete with cream cheese icing!!!

Such a fun time and such a sweet group of girls!  Happy Birthday my sweet Lily!

May all of your birthday wishes come true~

Laurie

P.S.  The birthday princess was brought back to reality when we went in for her dental check-up.  Someone needed a couple of teeth pulled to make room for the adult teeth coming in.  Guess who?!?!

Back to the Books

August 12th was the dreaded day....the First Day of School!  But to my surprise Sam and Lily Clare were bright eyed and excited to start their new adventures!  Sam started middle school this year and Lily Clare changed schools because of our move.  (I must add that she LOVES her new school and is so happy we moved!)  Phew!!!  And it's the best of both worlds, because we are still only a couple of miles from friends, so the friendships continue!

My pretty miss!

Sam came out to tell Lily goodbye for her first day!

My handsome boy!

We've had a few glitches with the buses - and by glitches I mean that Sam was told that his bus didn't exist and I had to go pick him up on the first day and Lily Clare's driver missed our house and Lily had to stay on until the route was completed.  But, they both laughed about the incidents and were not bothered!

And the bus stop is a little different this year....while for the past 6 years, I've had the company of my sweet friends, now my mornings are spent with these ladies:

They haven't given up any good gossip or new recipes, yet...so, we'll see if they warm up over time!

It's been nice to get back into a schedule and now I'm in full force on finishing the unpacking and decorating. (Don't tell anyone, we are already counting down to the first three day weekend!)  :-)

Shhhh~
Laurie

What filled our last days of summer?

 We picked a lot of these:

Which ended up in this:

I cut open one of our jalapenos and had a nice little surprise!  Who knew we could grow such happy veggies!

John hung a swing in one of our trees and the kids love it!  So much so, that we probably need to hang another one, so they won't fight over it. 

And in case you haven't been outside in a while, well...there's a 99% chance that it's raining!! And really, you can only stay inside for so long. So the kiddos decided to take their crazy selves outside and play in the rain! (It was actually a fun thing to watch!)

And Zac just lapped it up!

And of course we had to take a final trip to the lake! Which included a hike to our favorite swimming hole!

And our last hoorahs included a couple of trips to Six Flags and a trip to the skating rink.  (Hmmm...look at the girl to boy ratio -- Sam is a smart guy!)

Farewell Summer, it's been fun~

Laurie