Happy Holidays!

Merry Christmas to all! I know it's a little belated, but with being away for the holidays last week getting a post up was difficult. I apologize for it being so long in between posts! But I think everyone has been as busy as we have, so you've probably not even had time to check.

For Christmas, we went up to NJ to celebrate with Evan's family. Everyone had a great holiday! We hung out during the day on Christmas Eve, and then went to mass in the afternoon. We then headed back to the house for drinks/appetizers, and then went to a cute Italian restaurant for dinner.

Natalie dressed up:

Pat, Kristin, and Ken Massimine with Natalie:

The Macbeths:

Natalie was not interested in going to sleep on Christmas eve, and instead had fun crawling around the living room, looking at the tree, laughing, and playing with everyone.

Evan then read "Twas the Night Before Christmas" to Natalie. He felt very honored, as it's tradition for his dad to read the story every Christmas Eve!

On Christmas Day, we had breakfast and then fun opening presents. Natalie wasn't very into opening the gifs, but she did have fun looking at everything, playing with toys once they were opened, and mostly ripping up wrapping paper & bows.

Natalie's Uncle Scott decided it was his mission to get as many bows stuck on Natalie as possible. I think at one point we had about 10 of them on there!

The weather was nicer on Christmas Day (although VERY cold), so we bundled Natalie up and took her and Calla for a walk.

During our time there, Natalie got much better at walking! She has even started to lose her fear of going downstairs, much earlier than I would've wished. We tried to get her to practice going down the one stair into her grandparents' family room, but she was hesitant to do it by herself. She did spend a lot of time standing and staring at the step though!

Natalie Walks - With Video!

After a week of trying, we got video of Natalie walking today.



So there we go. Our baby girl taking four or five steps, on her own.

Christmas is going to be fun!

Upright Natalie Videos

Natalie has discovered the joys of being upright. Tonight she took four or five steps on her own. Still, catching it on video has proven elusive, so until we get a really good video, these will have to do.

Here's Natalie cruising around my ottoman.



And trying to walk between mommy and daddy. This would've worked if we'd done it earlier in the day, but by the time we shot this video, she was tired.



And, just a video of me, Natalie and Calla on the couch that I just love.



We promise to keep trying to get a good walking video.

Natalie is walking!

Today Natalie took her first real steps!

This is the first "new thing" that Natalie has done that Evan saw first. He picked her up at daycare today, and she walked towards him! Then when I got home, she walked towards me! She can only take 3-4 steps before toppling over, but it'll come along. I'm just excited that she'll be toddling around for Christmas!

Happy Birthday to Natalie!

Today Natalie turns one year old. I can't believe she's a year already. Last night Evan and I were remembering heading to the hospital at that time last year, to spend the night before being induced on Dec 10. And at 2:30pm, there was Natalie.

Since Natalie's birthday fell on a Wednesday, we celebrated this past Saturday with family & friends.

We had a small party: us, my parents, Kathy & Eric (Natalie's godfather), Peter & Alison (friends) and their son Liam, and Natalie's babysitter Essie and her 3 kids.

Evan made a lasagna, and Essie offered to make the cake. She used to do that semi-professionally - here is the big cake for us, and Natalie's small cake just for her

The cake not only looked beautiful, it was delicious! Essie did an amazing job.

Natalie received lovely presents:
- books (including "Goodnight Moon", a classic!)
- a few toys (mostly involving animals that spin and move!)
- some clothing (adorable!)
- a puzzle (still a little young, but she likes to play with the pieces):

- probably other things that I'm not remembering.
Thanks to all who sent/gave her something - it was so sweet of you all!

Do you like the "bear" outfit above? It was really cold on Sunday so we put her in that to go run some errands. Natalie was great all day while we were out shopping! And she stayed nice and warm. Here are she and I in our hoodies when we got home:

I didn't get to see Natalie until about 3:30 today, but Evan was able to give her happy birthday wishes from both of us this morning (and I did over the phone). We both came home early today, and had a small party at daycare, eating the left-over cake from Saturday at Essie's house with all of the kids. Natalie had a great afternoon nap, then a yummy birthday dinner, playtime with Mommy and Daddy, and a nice bath. She went to bed exhausted. I think that's the sign of a good day. :)

First Christmas Lights

Near my parents' house on the Outer Banks is a house which, two years ago, was named as having the best Christmas light display in the country by the Today Show. We found out the day after Thanksgiving that he already had his lights up. So, Friday night we all headed over to see the lights!

Luckily, since it was so early in the holiday season, it wasn't overly crowded (but we still had to park and walk some). The guy lives almost at the end of a dirt road, so his house is very well placed for the display. I took a ton of pictures; some didn't come out well because of the lighting, but here are some:

It's hard to describe the sheer magnitude of decorations, and I didn't even show here his entire garage, which looks like 50 department store windows exploded inside of it. He must leave much of this stuff up all year; I can't imagine decorating this much each and every year. But it was very cool.

Thanksgiving fun

I hope everyone had a very Happy Thanksgiving! We had a great time at the Outer Banks. We celebrated the holiday with my parents, my sister Carrie, and my aunt Linda. And Natalie of course!

Natalie had a great few days. She got to eat a TON of new foods, including mini waffles that were fun to shove in her mouth:


And on thanksgiving:

Natalie ate a ton of foods! Sweet potatoes, macaroni & cheese, turkey, cranberry sauce, corn, mashed potatoes. She liked it all, except for the turkey, and she really liked her Aunt Carrie's home made mac & cheese. Oh, and her first taste of cheesecake went over VERY well. :)

As always, we have lots of pictures of family:

One fun thing we did was take the dogs to a big field near the high school. It's fenced, so they could run around and play ball without risk of running away. They had great fun! And it was an excuse to be outside, and take lots of pictures!

On Friday, we took Natalie to a different park where there were baby swings. She LOVED swinging!