2008 Top 8

Here is my top 8 list for 2008.... The best of our lives this year! Enjoy!!!!

8. Sophie. Ok, I know I complain about the dog a lot. But, she is so cute and a great addition to our family. Paul and I both had dogs growing up and we know that it is an important part of childhood. Noah treats Sophie like another family member and always includes her in his prayers. She can be awesome.... like after Noah is in bed she sort of knows it's her time and comes and snuggles with us. Plus, whenever I'm scared in this big old house, I know Sophie is here and will take care of me!!!

7. The Zoo. We fell in love with the Philadelphia zoo this year. Noah is so in love with animals and every trip we took was more and more exciting. I can't wait to do it again next year.



6. Babies. What a year for babies!! So many of my close friends had children this year and even some of my far away friends had them too!! I don't know if I can name them all! Cora, Cassidy, Amelia, Riley, Sullivan, Daniel, Adin, Owen, Gweneth, and I'm sure there are more I'm missing!!


5. 30. As you know I turned 30 this year. Gosh, when you're 15, 30 sounds horrid. But now that I'm here it's not so bad. It's great to not be dating, to own a home, to have some stability and purpose in my life. I still smile when I'm more excited about home furnishings than clothing but overall I'm enjoying this new decade. Many of my "older" friends.. haa haa, have said that the 30's are really great and I can't wait to see what they hold.


4. 2. So, everyone says that the twos are terrible. I actually think the 1.5's are more terrible than the two's. And I think if you have an angel baby the two's might look terrible. But if you have a wild, screaming, puking infant, a few tantrums seem like cake. I love that Noah can communicate and imagine and be sooo creative. He is funny and sweet and has his own personality that is learning and growing into our family. Two is awesome because you are still the center of their world and you get to introduce them to everything.... Hugs and "I love you's" and "I make you happy, Mommy?" are worth every ounce of my time and energy and even exhaustion!




3. Iceland. I absolutely love to travel and I would travel ALL the time if I could. It had been a few years since I was off of American soil and I was thrilled to see another country. We had such a fantastic time, the country was beautiful and of course it was great to see Len and Sandra.




2. Friends. When we moved to Oxford we felt that we would never feel at home. We both had so many good friends in our hometowns and it just felt that it would never be the same. For the first few years we were pretty isolated here, watching families walk past our house to the park. But 2008 was a record year for us.... we met so many people! I can't tell you the number of parties we had or went to, the couples nights, the mom's nights, and just countless phone calls, stories shared, and drinks toasted. We are so grateful that God has answered our prayers to feel at home in our town!

And the number one thing to celebrate about 2008:




1. We will welcome a new little one to our family in early July 2009!!! Yes!!! We are 3 months pregnant right now. We found out on October 30th and were waiting until Christmas to tell our families. You can look back at posts that I have finally made public that start back in late October. Yippeee!!!!!!  (ps.. if you are church folk, keep it a secret til we tell people ourselves!)

Christmas 2008

It always seems like we have a million Christmas celebrations, which is wonderful and exhausting at the same time!

We started with a wonderful Christmas Eve service at church and Noah loved all the singing and stories.

Christmas morning we woke up as a family and opened Noah's gifts.

We got him a great wooden kitchen play set because he loves all the kitchens everywhere we go. He got right to work making us sandwiches and eggs. He kept putting everything in the fridge and saying that it was cooking!




After some playtime we headed to my mom's house in Reading.


We had a great brunch and headed downstairs for more presents! It was quite a whirlwind but Noah did so incredibly well. He never got greedy and was polite and excited about every gift. I was also really happy with the gifts that he got... both in size and quantity. Lots of puzzles and challenging things for him. My brother got him this thing called a billibo which is a European toy that children are supposed to do whatever with... they can sit in in, use it as a hat, or twirl it. It was designed to encourage creativity among children. We all played with it....

We also got the Elmo Live which, I must admit, was much cooler than I had anticipated.

After my mom's we headed to my grandmother's house where he proceeded to be gifted with a keyboard and an indoor t'ball set.... the loudest and most dangerous gifts! yipppeeeee! My cousin Kris played ball with him forever and everyone loved watching Noah giggle with delight.

We left there and headed home for the day. Friday we got up and headed to the Waters house for Christmas there. Noah got a great easel and we had a really great lunch with them.

We left that house to go to my mom's family's Christmas! I know, are you exhausted? I am! My cousins got a new version of Monopoly that you don't have to use money for.. it's all credit! Noah thought it appropriate to come over and move all the pieces every once in a while and everyone called him godzilla.

We got home late Friday night and crashed. then we got up Saturday morning to go to Paul's sister's house to see their family and exchange gifts with them. Nina's boys are always SOOO good with Noah. They play with him and take care of him and it was wonderful!!!!!


We came home Saturday afternoon to be greeted by the FedEx man who brought Noah a gift that arrived late from my grandmother... his first big wheel. He loved riding it around the house!



Then today we welcomed our friends the Evans who we see once a year or so. We were glad to be at home! The kids played so well together but when it came for gift exchange time, the lion I got for Gavin scared him and he started screaming and then his older brother started chasing him with the RC car we got him which made him cry more... i definitely bombed in the gift department!

So, here we are, finally relaxing and basking in all that we know as friends and family. We are beyond blessed and so thankful for all that God has provided for us. It was a really, really great Christmas.