Moody weather

So yesterday morning we woke up (under 3 layers of blankets), and the house was blazing hot. Inexplicably we had a hot summer day - complete with humidity, sunshine, and warm breeze. We had to crank on the a/c in the car for the first time in months, and also got to leave the jackets at home. We even discovered what Atalie looks like without socks on! :) Well, this morning we were treated to an icy wind when we stepped outside. Throwing on our light jackets, we didn't realize the full extent of the cold until we reached our completely iced over car. With all our mightiest tugging, we only managed to get one of the four doors open (the back passenger). After scraping the windows in a few key places, in I went, scrambling over the middle console into the driver's seat. Gina, seeing my maneuvers decided to stay next to the baby in the back. Just a little unexpected to go from 75 to 20 in one day.

Anyway just to keep up with the tradition of posting Atalie pictures all over the place, (why stop now?) here's a new one.

And I can't resist posting this one.

Atalie's First Christmas

Sorry it's taken us so long to post pictures, our internet has been down for a while now. We had a wonderful Christmas! Atalie got to meet her Grandpa Holt and her Grandpa and Grandma Brendle, along with her Uncle John, Aunt Lisa, Uncle Nathan, and her cousins Michael and Chris! It was so unexpected to get to go down to Florida - we had a really great time! After all of this Grandparent time she's gotten she's even more spoiled. :)


Atalie with Grandpa and Grandma Holt



Her Christmas outfit from Auntie Ashley



She fell asleep in Aunt Lisa's arms --- See Lisa, you look gorgeous in this picture!



Grandpa Brendle showed her all around their back yard - the tree house, the swing, and even his woodshop... with all the tools to make a dollhouse :D



And Grandma Brendle showed her all of the beautiful pink flowers in her garden... We're glad she has Grandma to teach her how to garden because I have a brown thumb... to say the least!

And aren't the leg warmers from Grandma Holt just TOO cute!!

The latest happenings

Since we've moved into our new place, here is a quick rundown of what has been happening: Trying to get our TV and internet problems ironed out...apparently the cable company is upgrading the lines in the area which means we get internet for about 2 or 3 hours a day -- frustrating! We are putting the finishing touches on the apartment, where all our stuff goes, how everything is organized, etc...Gina rearranged the living room the other day while I was at work. She did tons of work and it looks great! It is feeling so comfortable and we are LOVING having a room for Atalie. We are working on getting her to surrender the paci. She is doing such a good job - it's day 3 of going cold-turkey and she was MAD at first, but she has really gotten the hang of going down for naps and bedtime without it...we are so relieved! Now when she is asleep she stays that way, instead of waking up every 10 minutes and crying inconsolably when the paci falls out.

Let's see...what else is new...

Another ice storm blew through the area this week, but it affected the Tulsa, OK area much more than over by us. There was only one morning when we woke up to icicles covering everything. It was beautiful and we didn't even lose power like everyone was afraid of. Nice! We have our Christmas tree up, finally! I have been slacking :) I wonder how long it will take for me to want to take it down... ugh.

Gina bought me a griddle for my birthday (not selfishly, I actually wanted one). When I was a cook at Kirby's cafe in Oklahoma, I actually enjoyed cooking stuff up, but all my experience was on the flat-top grill. Pans have always scared me! So I told her a while ago that I might actually want to cook if I had something that resembled what I was used to. I was so excited to get it! Lately I have been cooking fun breakfast stuff - eggs, pancakes, bacon... and yesterday I experimented with making a philly cheesesteak. I think it went well, haha.

So anyway, Atalie has been doing tons of cute stuff lately so we made a little compilation video for anyone who's interested. Hope you like it!

We moved!

Goodbye old apartment, we moved across town into a sparkly new (to us) 2 bedroom place. We are sad to leave the old place, but when push comes to shove we kind of outgrew it, what with the baby and all. The greatest thing about the new place is that it's all on ONE LEVEL! It is SO nice not to have to have twice the baby equipment (one set for the upstairs bedroom, one set for the downstairs living room). It's also nice to not have to climb a flight of stairs when we forget a burp cloth. We will post pictures soon, we are really close to having everything unpacked and in the right spot -- Gina has already done TONS of work on the place to make it feel like home. We just need a few more finishing touches...like a Christmas tree.