Progressive Dinner

We had our 4th annual Christmas progressive dinner with our neighborhood!  This is something we look forward to doing every year.  We are always the first house and get the drinks/alcohol.  The same house also always keeps the entree and the appetizer and dessert house usually gets mixed around each year.

In the past, we have done a specialty cocktail and have had beer/wine for everybody.  We've done bourbon cider, pomegranate cocktail, holiday punch, and bourbon tasting.  This year, we decided to do a red wine tasting.  None of the ladies were pregnant this year, so we could all enjoy!

Derek and I went to our favorite wine bar the night before and tried a bunch of wines for the tasting :)  We came out with our 4 favorite.  We then snuck a boxed wine in the mix by pouring it in an empty bottle to see if anybody could spot the cheap-o.  Honestly, it may have been the one with the most gone lol.  BUTTTTT, the 3 of us that drink red wine regularly could definitely spot it!

Kind of hard to see below, but we have a piano player and a singer in the neighborhood.  At the entree house, they always sing Christmas songs for us :)

And the best part of the night was scaring the crap out of Derek...the creepy mustache makes it that much better!!!

2016

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Cookies with Santa

 Last weekend, we enjoyed Cookies with Santa at Charlie's preschool.  We were very excited to go to a function at her school!  Besides drop-off and pick-up, we don't get much interaction with her experience at preschool.

The children all sang Christmas carols to kickoff the event.

 While waiting to see Santa, we decorated a "cookie" (really an Oreo that we brought from home because we knew she wouldn't be able to have a cookie due to her egg allergy), put together a bag full of Reindeer Food, and made an ornament.

Charlie promised us that she would sit on Santa's lap this year (post coming soon about this over the past couple years) and she would be brave. As soon as it was her turn to go up and talk to Santa, she wouldn't get close!  When we told her she needed to tell Santa what she wanted for Christmas, she backed in, inch-by-inch, slower than ever lol!  She told him she wanted juggling balls for Christmas which was a new one for Derek & I as we hadn't heard that one yet.

Leni went to Santa just fine!  This made Charlie get closer to Santa :)

All Leni wanted to do was look back and stare at Santa!

 Such a fun experience we were all able to do together!

Ohio Renaissance Festival

SO, I'm back at the whole blogging thing if you couldn't tell.  I have to say, for about the whole first year, I didn't think twice about not blogging.  And then this spring happened, and I thought taking blogging back up all the time.  I would go a little while and then just dismiss it because I didn't know how long the interest would last.  But then I thought, oh well!  It's my blog and if I want to do it, I should.  If there are lull times, then that's okay too!

Anyway, I'm super excited to be back.  

The past weekend we met my family at the Ohio Renaissance Festival which is exactly what you would think.  Definitely not a place for little Leni as there were loud noises everywhere (think cannon booms, jousting screams, bagpipes, etc.).  Leni gets very upset by loud noises, especially when she is eating and/or tired.  So while our Charlie Girl enjoyed every second of her surroundings, we left after a couple of hours to get the little babe home.

We met my brother and his family, who were in town from South Dakota, and my mom and her new boyfriend (yes, a lot of new news around these parts).  

We haven't seen my brother in a year and half so it was so good to see family and have Charlie play with her cousins!

My brother Cadet

A little background before continuing: I grew up on a farm in South Dakota with horses (we at least the first 5 years of my life).  Because horses were a big deal in my family, we always did rides, etc. SO, it was my goal this summer to get Charlie up on a horse because she seemed old enough.  Fast forward, I failed miserably and didn't get a chance.  You can imagine how excited I was when I saw they had actual horse rides here.  Charlie seemed so confident and said she wanted to ride all by herself.  I really wanted to take a ride myself so I kept asking her to be sure...are you sure you want to ride all by yourself?  Can mommy ride with you? ...You get the idea

Charlie is very hesitant in new situations.  Derek and I thought there was no way she would get up on a big Clydesdale all by herself and let a stranger walk her around.  WELL she proved Mommy & Daddy wrong.  There is my little Charlie Girl riding all by herself.  Talk about a proud Mama :)  She asked two things when getting off the horse: 1) Can she ride again and 2) Can Daddy buy her a horse.  Yes on both accounts, my love :)

I told her if she wanted to ride again, she had to take me with her!

More pictures from the day:

My mom made these adorable flower crowns for the girls and Charlie wouldn't take hers off.  She fell asleep within minutes of getting in the car and it fell down while sleeping.  Great moment for Derek & myself to share a good laugh and snap a photo.

Everybody came over Monday night for pizza and the girls played all night!

Holiday Weekend Random

Hope you got to enjoy a day off yesterday!  I was very happy to spend the day home with Charlie.  We were snowed in all day but we made the most of it.  I have a bunch of randomness for you today...

1) First, can we please talk about how big my baby girl is getting?!  I mean look how tall she is (!!!)

2)  I'm obsessed with pigtails.  Yes, that's all I really have to say; but seriously, nothing is cuter than pigtails!

3) A huge shoutout to Leah for making this adorable Valentine's day shirt for Charlie.

4) We spent the weekend in Athens visiting Derek's parents.  We had a great Valentine's Day doing a little tour of Athens.  We went to Uncorked, a new wine bar, Thai Paradise for dinner, and then a local bar for darts.  Super fun night and so nice to enjoy a night out with his parents!

5) Anybody watching The Bachelor this season?  Chris is soooo boring to me...is it just me?  Anyway, I'm basically just reading Reality Steve and Sharleen's recaps instead of watching it but the girls seem a little crazier than normal this season, no?

6) I'm currently watching Friday Night Lights and loving it!  Anybody else obsessed with this show?

7) I have been eating horribly this winter.  I've decided enough is enough and I'm going back to cleansing.  I'm super excited and actually motivated to get back to how I felt this summer!

8) I just picked up this lip set from Sephora last week and I'm obsessed.  It is the perfect matte lip color that has lasting staying power.  I also like the option of using the pencil and gloss for a more nude color.

9) I'm going to see 50 Shades of Grey with a neighbor this week and couldn't be more excited!  Any reviews?

10) Any fantastic book suggestions?  I bought Andy Cohn's new book and cannot get through it...I loved the first one but this one is sooo boring!

Whew, didn't realize I had so many questions for all of you ;)  Hope you have a great week!

Weekend Recap

We had a lovely weekend and sadly I did not take any pictures (am borrowing for this post!).  Seriously, I need to get back on track with the documentation.  And not just using my iPhone.  I need to start using my camera again.  Maybe a new year's resolution?!

Friday night it was Lady's Night in the neighborhood.  We went to Cooper's Hawk and ended up at a local bar afterwards.  We had such a fun fun FUN night just chatting.  Loved every second of our conversations and haven't laughed that hard for a while (thanks Brittany). 

Saturday was a busy one.  I went over to Anne's house for a little cookie decoration party.  Loved everything about this ladies' get together.  I have no experience with cookie decorating so I had a blast.  My cookies did not turn out that pretty but it was fun to have some more girl time and have a few cookies to eat!

Thanks for the pictures Sarah and Anne!

That evening Derek and I went over to Miss Whitney and Kevin's house for a fabulous Ugly Sweater Party.  Would you believe me if I said that we knew nobody (except the hosts of course) and still had the most fun time and felt like we had known this group of people forever?!  It was a night filled with great food, fabulous(!!!) decor, competitive games of boys v. girls, white elephant gift exchange, and fun people.  Perfect holiday party if I say so myself.

Sunday, as you can imagine, was spent relaxing after a busy Friday and Saturday!  Derek and I finished putting up our outside lights.  This was a big deal because we have never done outside lights before.  However, considering we were the only house without lights...we had to get to it this year!  We need to do a little updating to the two trees, aka more lights, aka the ones that Derek did, aka he's going to kill me for calling him and out and suggesting more work, but I have to say I'm extremely happy with it!

Hope you had a great weekend! 

Weekend Recap

I haven't done a weekend recap in forever!  We have had so much going on lately; however, I usually don't get out my camera much.  This weekend I managed to have a few photos to share.

Friday we had pizza and a campfire with the neighbors.  I just love that Charlie is walking now.  She hangs out with all the kids and I cannot get over seeing that interaction.  We called it an early night because of our Saturday plans!

Saturday we headed up to Columbus mid morning.  Ohio State was playing UC---so we KNEW we would be going to this game.  It could have not worked more perfectly that Derek had off the weekend.  We had lunch at Harvest, which I highly suggest for all Columbus people.  The pizzas were delicious!

We started tailgating around 12:30 which was perfect for meeting up with everybody on our list.  Such a great opportunity to see and catch up with people we haven't seen in forever!

(not that great of a picture but I could resist because of the little photo-bomber in the back lol)

We couldn't wait to get back to our little munchkin!  Check out this adorable infant Nike hat I found at Kohls!  She loves Derek's hats, so I was excited to find one for her!

Sunday afternoon we were outside walking around with Charlie and she took a spill in a driveway.  Her first scrape :(  Charlie is such a little girl and milks pain for all it's worth (shots, falling, etc.).  I was really surprised she didn't cry much and then 5 minutes later I discover she was bleeding!  Luckily it wasn't worse!

Hope you had a great weekend!

Weekend Recap

Whew, we had another eventful weekend.  It seems now that we have Charlie and since Derek works every other weekend, we jam pack the weekends he has off.  I would be lying if I said I didn’t like it!  Here was our weekend courtesy of the iPhone…

First a selfie with the baby girl before heading out to the game… 


A view from our seats…


Picture time during the 7th inning stretch…


At one point, I look down and see all of these cans below us….ooops, hey it was all you can drink!


Doing a little bar crawl around Cincinnati after the game and trying to get a picture while “cheers’ing” (PS- I used the FaceSnap app for the first time and it was perfect to get pictures of us!)…


Getting breakfast in bed the next morning because as you probably guessed, we were not moving very fast…


Charlie posing for pictures while my Mom babysat her while we were out for the night…


Derek winning his daughter a prize at a local festival…


We were having a serious convo about our hats (aka, trying to get her not to steal my hat)…


Charlie enjoying her little playset we picked up for her this weekend at a garage sale…


Lastly, while I was enjoying season 2 of Orange is the New Black, Charlie was fascinated with our receiver.  She loved the volume button and repeatedly (all weekend) turned up the volume.  Oh the fun has begun…

And that was our weekend!  Hope you had a good one