Fun with Aunt Karen!

Whew! Vera Kate is getting spoiled by all her visitors!! But we sure LOVE it!!! This morning when she woke up I know she was sad that it was just her, me, and Bax in the house!! HAHA! Thankfully Annie came to the rescue and came to play while I had my doctors appointment! :) Anyways, this past weekend was action packed with lots of fun with Aunt Karen! There were countless hours of Lego time, dance parties in Vera Kate's play room, many many rides in Vera Kate's car around the house, bubbles blown, and lots more!!! Thanks Aunt Karen!!! Vera Kate HAD A BLAST and so did her mom and dad!!!
This morning when we walked into her play room she of course wanted her Christmas tree plugged in and she pointed to the radio and said DANCE! HAHAHA!! We had to turn on the music!! This girl loves some music!!

Aunt Karen let Vera Kate open a Christmas present early!!! WOW!!! A princess tent!! SOOO FUN! I know there will be endless hours played in there!!

YAY!!!!!

There is even a side window for Bax to look out!!

After bath time Saturday night we enjoyed some funny laughs from Vera Kate! She wanted to sit on the couch by Aunt Karen like a big girl! It was hilarious! She kept crossing her leg just like Karen! Oh my I cant even describe how funny it was! We were all laughing so hard we were in tears!!

Loving it!!!

A deep BIG girl conversation!! Notice Vera Kate's crossed legs!

HAHAHA!!

I mean she seriously would pick up her leg and cross it like a big girl! It was the funniest thing ever! She is A MESS! ALLLLLL GIRL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And she wants to be just like the BIG GiRLS!!!

Reading a magazine in their PJs!

We had a great time! Come again soon Aunt Karen!

ZOO Lights!!

This past weekend Aunt Karen came for a visit and we had soo much fun! Vera Kate is getting spoiled by all of her fun visitors!! HA! On Saturday night we decided to go to ZOO lights!! I was sooo excited about taking Vera Kate and I was happy that Karen was here to go with us!

You can barely see us! But it is Annie, mom, Aunt Karen, Papa John and Vera Kate posing in front of the poinsettia tree!

Brian joined us in this pic!

Vera Kate was a little stiff in all of her warm winter garb! It took her like 15 minutes to loosen up and enjoy herself! She had to get used to the thickness! HAHA!!

But once she was used to her winter garb she was excited.. looking around and pointing!! She LOVED the lights and fun Christmas sights!

Papa John and Vera Kate checking out the sights!
The ZOO crew!
The fam!

PJ and Annie with Vera Kate!!

We had soo much fun and LOVED the zoo lights!! Didn't see any animals but oh well we saw lots of fun Christmas lights!! We did see Claus but we only waved from a distance this time:))) Cant wait until next year to continue a new tradition!!

Fun, Fun at Christmas!!

We have been enjoying the last couple of weeks of Christmas fun!!! We have had a couple of super fun visitors and have enjoyed doing Christmasy things!!!

Vera Kate LOvES to visit Meme and see Claus!!

Last Monday night was the Hernando Christmas parade! It was amazing and long! Brian and I really didnt know what to expect since this was our first year to attend the parade! So we thought we will just go see the parade and then come home and eat and do whatever. Well as soon as we arrived we realized this was a little bigger deal than we thought. Every one in Hernando and the surrounding cities came out for the event and there were like a million parade entries! Well at least next year we will be more prepared! Thanks to the Dalys (Vance, Kim, and Aaron) for letting us sit with them and enjoy their chairs and hot cocoa they brought! They are Hernando experts! Thank goodness for friends that help us out!! HAHA!!!

Getting ready for the parade!

Waving to Claus!! Btw... Vera Kate calls Santa Claus... Claus!

On Tuesday we had a special visitor come!! Special K!!! We always LOVE when she get done with exams and can come stay and play with us!!! We had a blast and Vera Kate LOVED having a playmate!!

Getting ready to make our gingerbread house!!

Watching dad intently!!

Vera Kate did a great job of putting the little candies on the gingerbread house!! She was very precise and loved being able to do it herself!!

Our gingerbread house!!

Wednesday I needed to finish up some shopping so we ventured to Memphis! Thank goodness we got done and at the end of the day I told Kayla that we should go to Bass Pro and see how Vera Kate does with Santa aka Claus!

So we get to Bass Pro and all is well! We even get to where the line starts and tell Vera Kate that Claus is up there and ask her if she sees him! She of course does and kinda starts doing a little happy/excited to be here dance! I think to myself... hmmm.. this may go better than expected! Well.... the closer we got the more Vera Kate started backing up and reaching for us... UP... UP.. UP she kept saying! HA! Well you probably know how it turned out....

BEFORE

AFTER....

Hey! At least we have the memory!! We will look back at this pic and laugh in the future! Sweet Kayla took one for the team and will always be in our Santa Claus picture collection!!! Anyways, Claus obviously is more fun from a distance!!!

Trip to the Coast

We had been planning a trip to the coast to attend a wedding for a long time! However I didnt think that I was going to be able to go but just for the weekend! But I got the house together and decorated and presentable in record time and therefore Vera Kate and I were able to join Annie for a visit to Memaw's the whole week before the wedding! It was super fun and Vera Kate LOVED visiting Memaw and our family! We got to see Uncle Stu and Aunt Kacie lots too!!

Vera Kate and Memaw had lots of fun floor playtime! However I must tell you that Memaw no longer wants to be called Memaw. Yes after 30 years she has decided that she wants a new name! HAHA!! So we decided on JuJu(her name is Julia) and Vera Kate loved it!! She kept saying JuJu, JuJu!! So it stuck and Memaw (to Vera Kate at least) is now JuJu!!!

On Saturday we headed over to Gulfport for Meagan White's wedding. It was gorgeous!! We had a blast! Vera Kate was a dancing machine at the reception! I seriously dont know where she got her moves!!! I think it must be a recessive gene!!! HAHA!! Wish I could post a video because it it HILARIOUS!!!

Sorry the pic is a little dark! I was using my iphone! Forgot the big camera:(

The fam minus Brian and dad! They stayed up north!

It was a super fun week! I LOVE when Vera Kate and I get to visit our family on the coast! We ALWAYS have a blast!!!!

The Infamous Christmas card!

Well as every one knows the Christmas card session can be quite the adventure!! Our photographers for this wonderful event were just so great and were quite humorous themselves! We had Papa John for lights and entertaining and Annie for camera and music!! HAHA!! I wish we would have had a video!! Anyways, after 400 attempts the very last pic was the one we chose!!

Merry Christmas from the Rays!!

Our fabulous photographers!
An outtake!! Vera Kate was DONE!
The star of the photo shoot!

On to Christmas and the PERFECT tree!

We continued our tradition of visiting the Merry Christmas tree farm to find the perfect tree!! It did not disappoint and Vera Kate LOVED running around the farm to find the perfect tree!! We rode the tractor hayride out to the farm to pick our perfect tree!!

Excited about finding the tree!!

Hmmm... which one should we choose??

Found it!!!!

The little man cutting down our tree!!

YAY! Heading home to decorate our tree!!!

Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving this year was little different!! We moved the week of Thanksgiving so it was a little out of the ordinary Thanksgiving! But we had a great week! Brian was off all week and we had a great time moving and enjoying family and our new place! Thanksgiving day we headed over to Annie and Papa John's for a yummy Thanksgiving lunch!! Thanks Annie! It was super yummy!

The little turkey!

Uncle Stu came on the Friday after Thanksgiving and thankfully after 15 months of being a little unsure of Uncle Stu... Vera Kate now has a new best friend!! She loves saying STU! And thanks Uncle Stu for reading her Mad for Maroon and Joy to the World book to her 1000 times!! I am so glad she no longer cries at the sight of her fun loving uncle!

Oh and I must document that for the first time in our lives Brian and I braved the Black Friday crowds for a new TV! Yes, Vera Kate spent the night with PJ and Annie and Brian and I left the house at like 10:30 pm to stand in line for a store opening at midnight! It was quite the adventure and at first we didnt think we were going to get the TV we were there for. However thanks to the good Lord for intervening and we got the TV! So I will say that our black Friday experience was not awful but I will probably not do it again unless we are needing a huge appliance or electronic of some type!!

Finishing up FALL!

We finished up FALL and football season with lots of trips to Starkville!! Like always we had tons of fun seeing our friends and family!

Uncle Stu and Aunt Kacie were able to come to the Alabama game! We had fun hanging with them for the weekend!

Visiting Bully at the DG house!

Little football player!

Seeing our furry friend one last time before football season ends!!

Once again the weather for the EGG BOWL was a little not so inviting!! It never fails!! So Annie, Vera Kate, and I headed over to Kayla's while the boys braved the weather elements!!

Thankfully the BULLDOGS were not phased by the weather conditions and the EGG stays in Starkville!!! GO DAWGS!!! Now on to the Music City bowl the DAWGS go!!