GO TIGERS!!!

Happy New Year's Eve to everyone! Just wanted to let everyone know to cheer for the CLEMSON Tigers tonight (since it's tiger vs. tiger in the Chic-Fil-A bowl). We were lucky enough to run into the Clemson Tiger mascots yesterday at the GA Aquarium and get a picture with Mitchell and Amelia.... what fun!

Trip To Atlanta... part 2

On Sunday morning we headed to the Georgia Aquarium... what an amazing place! We really enjoyed seeing all of the different displays and learned a lot! Mitchell's favorite things to see were the different kinds of whales and sharks and Amelia's favorite were the otters. What a great visit... we highly recommend it!

Our Trip To Atlanta... part 1

We decided to take an overnight trip to Atlanta to have some fun! On Saturday morning we drove to Atlanta and started the fun in Centennial Park which was built for the 1996 Olympic Games. Mitchell and Amelia had been there once before a few years ago but didn't remember that trip. They had so much fun running around the park and reading the names on the bricks. They were thrilled when they were able to find the brick of their grandparents and other family! Luckily we had beautiful weather for this day! We then went and toured the World of Coke. Mitchell and Amelia's favorite part of that was the tasting room where you get to taste Coke products from all over the world... some of them were really gross! We ended Saturday with dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe, which was a fun new experience for Mitchell and Amelia. They thought that it was a "really cool" place! (I will have to add that picture to my next post... I forgot to add it to this one).

Christmas Eve and Christmas Day

We had a wonderful Christmas time here just relaxing and being lazy! After going to Christmas Eve service at our church we had a quiet family dinner and watched "Elf" the movie. Then we made sure to make Santa cookies before going to bed! Mitchell and Amelia kept up with Santa's travels on the NASA website to make sure that they got to sleep on time. Christmas morning was a lot of fun with lots of presents and a good breakfast together. We all got lots of nice gifts! Later, my parents came to visit and had dinner with us to complete the great day. We can't wait till next year!

Lunch is served!

This morning we got a little surprise from Amelia... she would be serving us all lunch. She gave us all a menu which we could order from and then she got to work! At about 12:30 we went to "Lola's Buffet" and were served a wonderful lunch by "Melissa". There were even a few surprises (hot chocolate for Mitchell)! Amelia did a wonderful job and it made lunch today a lot more fun!

Visiting Santa!

Friday night we made our annual trip to Phipps Plaza in Atlanta to see Santa. We have been going to this same Santa since Mitchell was 6 months old... so for 11 years! It's become a fun yearly tradition for our family... who knows how long it will go on? We had a great visit with Santa, had a nice dinner at Silver Spoon Cafe and then saw the movie "Alvin and the Chipmunks". It was so funny! Then of course we got a treat at Starbucks before heading home... what a wonderful night!

Christmas in NC

Last weekend we traveled to NC to have Christmas with Dave's parents and my sister's family. We all got some early presents and had some great quality time with family!

I Need A Little Christmas Vacation!

Mitchell and his principal, Mrs. Varela
Mitchell's homeroom teacher, Mr. Julian

This past Tuesday night we all went to see Mitchell in the 5th grade musical at the Oconee Co. Civic Center. What talent! We are always amazed at how one music teacher can coordinate 180 students at one time. The kids has all worked very hard and put on a great show for us! They made a bunch of parents very proud!

Christmas at church

Last Wednesday night we got to enjoy the Christmas program and banquet at our church. We always look forward to this every year because everyone is in such good spirits with the holiday and we get to see all of our wonderful children perform in their play. Mitchell and Amelia both had some lines in the play this year and worked very hard learning them... it showed! The program was great and even had a rap in it (hence, the sunglasses)! Christmas is getting closer, and this night definitely helped us remember the true reason for the season!

O Christmas Tree!

This entry is a little delayed... it's harder to keep this thing up than I thought! Hopefully I will get better at it soon. We had a wonderful evening recently putting up our inside Christmas tree and decorating it... with a few good snacks and Christmas music to go along with it! I really enjoy watching Mitchell and Amelia find the perfect place for each of their ornaments. Each year they get a new ornament that tells a little bit about their year. This year Mitchell got a golf bag ornament (he really enjoyed playing golf several times this summer, including a few small tournaments!) and Amelia got a "Beauty and the Beast" ornament since she was in that production this fall (she was a teacup in the "Be Our Guest" scene). The tree looks beautiful! Then a couple of days later we went to Jack's Creek tree farm to cut down our tree for the front porch. Bailey even enjoyed going to help us pick out our tree! Of course I forgot to take the camera with us, so the pictures of that tree are taken here at home. We are now totally decorated for Christmas... I love it!!

Christmas card pictures

I don't know about the rest of you, but the pictures that go out with our yearly Christmas card can be a little deceiving. If only you could catch the whole story surrounding that picture you would know just how much it means that you see an updated picture of Mitchell and Amelia each year. We had "picture day" recently and I have to say that it did go pretty well. We only got a few moans and groans about the number of pictures (and yes, Amelia kept an accurate count and didn't hesitate to tell everyone what it was), the detailed instructions such as "Mitchell, now you put your arm around Amelia... "you are brother and sister, act like you love each other!"... and "try to make your smiles look natural, not like you are in pain!"... I'm sure you all get the picture. But as you can see we managed to get some really great pictures of our beautiful children... the hard part is picking out which one to put on the Christmas card! Hopefully you will all get the card pretty soon and see first hand just how blessed we really are. And the picture is not really all that deceiving... Mitchell and Amelia really love each other and are great friends (at least 90% of the time)!

Thanksgiving in NC

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday time visiting with family in Greensboro and Winston Salem, NC. Mitchell and Amelia had a blast playing with their cousins... something they don't get to do very often. The neat thing is that it doesn't matter how long it has been since their last visit... they seem to pick up right where they left off! Plus, the kids are all old enough to play together without constant parental supervision so the adults were able to get some quality time in also! We are so blessed to have such a close family!