Merry Christmas

We Wish You A Merry Christmas and A Happy New Year.....

Merry Christmas friends and family. We sure hope you all had a wonderful Christmas. We sure did !!! Had to be the BEST Christmas in my books. Being a parent sure puts a whole new spin and adventure to the whole Holiday Season. I can not wait for the years to come when the magic of Santa comes to life in our home. Although, Hunter was too young this year Greg and I still played out our roles to the fullest. From the shopping, to wrapping and hiding gifts, stuffing the stockings, baking the cookies, eating the cookies and sneaking the gifts under the tree after everyone has gone to bed. I think this dress rehearsal went pretty well- might need to make a few modifications to next year ( like start shopping and wrapping much earlier) Overall, we had such a great time with family this past week, it was one Christmas I didn't want to end.
Trying to get a few good shots for our Christmas cards... Not to bad for the first attempt of the day.
Santa made a stop at the Garvey's. The view of the tree from the stairwell. ( If Hunter was old enough to coming flying down the stairs at 3:00 am this is what he would've seen).

All the stockings were hung with care.

What's a Holiday without a goofy Family Photo.

Us ladies were pleasantly surprised when the guys offered to clean up the kitchen after dinner. Yes, girls that's right... we were told to fill up our wine glasses and go have a seat in the living room. Jealous !!!!!! what a great ending to a wonderful day and dinner. Thanks guys, and you all did a good job ( so far nothing has come up missing)

Wishing I would have taken a picture of the table before dinner, kind of a sad photo...... 6 VERY full adults, one messy child and a whole lot of dirty dishes... but boy, was the prime rib tasty !!

Christmas morning, Hunter decided this was his moment in the spot light and took his first few steps while holding onto the gift above. What a bitter sweet moment, super excited for him, but sad that my little guy is growing up so quickly. But the best part was his Grandparents got to share in this milestone with us. Priceless memory for all of us.

Hunter, just like his Daddy got his first train set for his first Christmas. I have a feeling in the years to come, we will have to set up several tree's in order to accommodate all the different train set's. It was fun to sit back and watch Greg playing with Hunter and the trains. I can only imagine what Christmas time will be like once Hunter has an understanding of trains. Chug-a-chug-a-chug-a-chug choot choot...... whoot whoott...... Maybe I need my very own train set....Just kidding, I think we will have more than enough for all to play fairly.

Greg, Grandpa Garvey and Hunter playing with the train set.

Out to dinner, after a fun filled day of shopping in Fredericksburg. Great way to end a super week with family.

Grandpa Steffen helping Hunter walk around the family room with his new toy from Santa. (sure wasn't expecting him to start walking so soon, Yicks..... am I ready for this crazy adventure to being)?

Santa brought Greg his shirt and my Dad got the same one for his Birthday. Two Pea's in a Pod, is all I have to say. I'm taking beats as to which one will cause the most trouble by wearing this shirt. It's a tough call, could go either way........

Santa also brought Hunter a little scooter. And it sure didn't take to long for Hunter to figure out out how this thing works. He LOVES being pushed around the house, and making frequent stops for interesting items to put in his trunk (which he's holding open, to show you) What fun, we've been having discovering his new toys and what lessons we can start to teach him. He's now clapping his hands, waving hello, and from time to time will sign "more" usually meaning more food. This was by far the BEST Christmas, and it was so awesome to have family with us. Thank you to my parents and Greg's Dad and Stepmom for making the loonnnngggg drive to Texas to spend the Holiday's with us. We love you all, and miss you terribly. Merry Christmas and Best Wishes for a Healthy and Happy New Year !!!

Twas The Night Before Christmas

OH MY GOODNESS MOM ~ we have a ton of errands to run this morning.

Eating breakfast at Panera before a little Christmas shopping

It's hard to believe that Christmas has come and gone already. Seems like it was yesterday, when I looked at the calendar in July and thought to myself "Is it Christmas yet?" The weeks leading up to Christmas were extremely busy for us. We had my parents coming in from Arizona as well as Greg's Dad and Stepmom from Illinois, to help us celebrate Hunter's first Christmas.
Not only were we excited about the Grandparents coming to visit, but Hunter also figured out how to get up on his hands and knee's in preparation for crawling. Although, he hasn't totally figured out the process, he's getting really close.

Christmas Eve, cooking,cooking, cooking and more cooking..... then church for an hour and half. ( Really not sure what they were thinking by holding such a long service with little kiddo's present) However, Hunter did amazingly well during the entire service. We had the diaper bag loaded with snacks, juice,books and toys. Along with our plan for a quick removal of a screaming baby. Which I might add, we didn't have to use. After church we came home and started our Christmas traditions as a family. Hunter got to open his "first" gift from Mommy and Daddy. His Christmas Jammies. Then Grandpa Garvey read "The Night Before Christmas" from the same book that he read to Greg as a young child. Pretty cool tradition to keep going.

For almost 10 months old, Hunter figured out the riping of paper pretty quickly. But wasn't sure what to do with the treasure once all the paper was torn off.

Modeling his Christmas Jammies, before heading off to bed so Santa could make his grand entrance.

Twas the Night Before Christmas, and all through the house........ thanks Grandpa Garvey for reading the story to Hunter for the first time. He may not remember the moment, but Mommy and Daddy will always remember that special part of his first Christmas.

Ready or Not Santa is on his way. Greg and I had such a good time playing Santa on Christmas Eve. We placed all the gifts under the tree with such care, rearranged the living room to make sure there would be plenty of room for the coming morning festivities, hung stockings for our parents and filled stockings for the dogs and Hunter, along with leaving cookies and milk for Santa. Playing Santa is alot of work...... Growing up, you never realize how much planning,shopping, sneaking around and late night wrapping went into making Christmas morning so magical. I'm thinking I need to start now for the coming year.

I think Santa liked his cookies. One tradition that I have with my Mom is making sugar cookies (and not just any sugar cookies, but my Aunt Sue's famous cookies) together whenever we are together for Christmas, and this year was no exception. This year we had some special help from Greg's Stepmom Judy. The three of us spent a WHOLE lot of time in the kitchen and it was awesome sharing recipes, traditions and stories. Thanks ladies for making my Holiday so special !!!

Thanksgiving Weekend

Wishing you all a very Happy (and slightly belated) Thanksgiving.... I had every intention to get this posted on Thanksgiving Day, but the time got away from me. I'm still amazed at how fast each day goes by. On minute you're thinking Wow, it's Monday already, and the next minute it's Sunday.... Or in my case, I eagerly await the arrival of Christmas decorations at Hobby Lobby in July, and it seems like such a long time before I can start pushing my luck with Greg and dragging out my own decorations. And Bam... here it is already Thanksgiving.. Gobble Gobble

(Hunter~ taking a little nap before the "big" Thanksgiving feast)
This year Greg's Mom, Rose came down for Thanksgiving. It's been great having her here with us. We've gotten a few outings by ourselves, while Grandma stayed home and watched the little guy. Although, it was strange walking around a store without Hunter, it was a nice break. We even got to go see a late afternoon movie yesterday. We felt like 2 kids in the candy store. Movie theater popcorn and a couple of hours of just us. How easily you forget, what life was like before kids.

(Sierra was little jealous of the napping ~ and decided to join Hunter)

Gobble Gobble ..... Hunter was super excited about his Thanksgiving Dinner. (Turkey with Rice and vegetables)

What's a Thanksgiving Day ~ without setting up and decorating the Christmas tree... The week leading up to Thanksgiving I slowly was pulling out decorations. (didn't want to put Greg in to shock) So the icing on the cake was decorating the tree. Can you believe Christmas is less than a month away. We joined the "crazy" people on Thanksgiving night and ventured out to do some "black Friday" shopping. (sort of) We hit the road that night after putting Hunter to bed, we had our game plan (where we were going and for what) Got to our first stop Toys-R-Us, which opened at 10:00 pm, when we got close, and I mean close, traffic stopped.... people were running down the sidewalk to get in line. That would be the line that wrapped around the building, with about a 100 cars in front of us waiting to get in the parking lot. Greg looked at me, and turned the car around and said "I'm NOT waiting in that line" so we headed home and jumped on the computer and found what we were looking for online (same sale price) Lesson learned, stay home on Black Friday and shop online, so much easier.

We skipped the leftover's the day after, and had Fondue for dinner. Alot of prep work, but we all had a great time cooking our chicken,steak and shrimp right at the table. We also had mushrooms,zucchini and onion rings. Along with the chocolate fondue for dessert- with strawberries, banana's, marshmellows and rice crispy treats. YUM-O !!!!!

We found a place not to far from San Antonio with an amazing Holiday light display. It's on 12 acres of land, with millions and millions of lights. So worth the drive, and is a sure fire way to bring in the Holiday season in style

Alittle Hunter highlights...... he's mastered the arm crawl, and is now quick to get away from you. He loves the dog's hard chew bone. And will crawl over anything to get to it, including just taking it right out of the dog's mouth. The dog's have been amazing with him. He's pulled a few tails, poked some eyes, pulled their ears and taken the bone... With NO problems from the dog's !!!! He also has his second tooth breaking through on the bottom !!!!

We hope you all had a great Thanksgiving, we did and can't wait for Christmas !!!

~
Happy Holidays

We Have a Tooth.....

That's right folks.... Hunter has his first tooth !!!!! If you look close enough, you can see it on the bottom right of his mouth. Our little trooper did amazingly well with cutting his first tooth. We had a few sleepless nights along with a fever, but overall he was in good spirits.( 1- in and 20 some to go) He now loves to play with his tooth by running his tongue over it and letting the drool run..... Or biting down on his spoon and holding on for dear life.

Yep that's a Santa hat... Mommy is counting down the days until we can officially dig out the Christmas decorations without making Daddy to mad. (T-minus 3 days ) I've promised (this year) that the tree won't go up until Thanksgiving Day, but everything else is fair game.... So I thought by taking a few cute pictures of Hunter in a Santa hat and emailing them to Daddy at work, might ease him into the thought of Christmas. (still working on him) My thought is if Santa has made his grand entrance, it's time to decorate. And he made his grand entrance in Galveston yesterday, by jumping out of a plane and landing on the beach. ( only in the South will you see that) So falalala, jingle jingle, let it snow.... it's time to deck the halls !!!!!

We are super excited ( or at this time, I'm super excited) about this Christmas. Not only is it Hunter's first Christmas, but we will get to spend it with family. Which is one of the hardest parts about living so far away, spending the Holidays without them close. (not to mention the snow)

Hope this finds you all doing well ~ Hugs, The Garvey's

Trick ~or~ Treat.... Hunter's 8 months old

How much is the doggie in the window? Happy Halloween ( a little late).

Our little Hunter is 8 months old and growing and changing with everyday. With each new day brings us a new adventure, some good and some not so good.

We just returned from a short trip to Chicago where we said good bye to Greg's Grandma who passed away right before Halloween. Although, the trip was emotionally draining, it was so awesome to be back up North during the Fall. The tree's were spectacular, Goebertt's Pumpkin Patch was just as I remembered, and the apple cider doughnuts were AMAZING !!!! The only thing that we were missing was the snow.....

Brrrrrr, it's cold out......This dancing pumpkin had Hunter's attention for several minutes. He was so intent on pulling it's nose off. Our little man is definitely from Texas, does not like to wear coats, hats, socks or shoes.But he was a trooper this morning at the Pumpkin Patch, not only was it about 40 degree's, but we had to stop at every attraction for a few pictures.

8 months and growing like a weed....
~ 17 pounds and 28 inches long
~ First tooth is making a grand appearance
~ Sitting up all by him self
~ Starting to make an attempt at pulling up on something
~ Does not like it when you take a toy away from him
~has gone from sleeping all night - except for maybe 1 night a week, to only sleeping the entire night 1 night a week.
~One quick speedy little roller.... don't blink or he'll be gone
~Loves playing peek-a-boo
Is 100% boy- loves playing in the dirt and will roll over anything (even if it hurts) to get what he wants
~LOVES watching Toy Story
~ LOVES his vegetables, not much of a fruit eater anymore.
~Does not like having to wear a coat
~Overall, one happy little guy !!!!

Well, hanging out with Greg's family we got out to enjoy the beautiful afternoon sun at the park. Hunter had so much fun on the swings. So much different from the swing in his room. He actually enjoyed the park. Lots of BIG smiles and a few giggles.
Thank goodness we have a park at the end of our street....

Never to old to have some fun at the park.