Easter 2016

I've said it before and I'll say it again. Holidays are SO much more fun with a child! This Easter was certainly no exception. We had a blast celebrating this holiday with our family now that we're back in Georgia and Peyton!

Our Easter festivities actually started the week before Easter. Last Sunday, Ryan, Peyton, and I went to an Easter egg hunt/party in Brandon and Rachel's neighborhood! The hunt was supposed to be on Saturday, but it was moved to Sunday due to weather (which never actually happened). Luckily, the weather was beautiful on Sunday, so the event went down without a hitch! And the Owens/Waylander clan was in town visiting that day and got to partake in some of the Easter fun!

Mine and Ryan's Easter bunny appetizer 

After the Easter festivities, the babies both took naps while the adults hung out by the fire pit. Brandon cooked up some pork on the Green Egg and we had ourselves a feast for dinner.

On Easter Sunday, the next week, Ryan, Peyton, and I all woke up in my parents house (we had spent the night over there because we were out at Top Golf Saturday night with friends) to a couple fun Easter baskets.

That is one LOVED little girl!

We all got dressed up and headed over the Pinetree Country Club for a 10:30 brunch buffet. Ryan and I felt so lucky this year because we got to spend our Easter with our ENTIRE immediate family, which is pretty special. (Minus my dad, who signed up to work a swim meet not realizing it was Easter. He missed the brunch, but the meet ended early enough for him to drop by the club for some Easter pictures later in the day!) We shared brunch with my mom, Jake, Brad, Susan, Brandon, Rachel, and Leah. The food spread was unbelievable, but the company was better!

Now, back to the food. The club had literally everything you can think of for an Easter Brunch: Prime Rib, Ham, scalloped potatoes, mac n cheese, asparagus, rolls, salmon, omelette station, waffle bar, salad, bacon, chicken tenders, and more. Plus, they had an amazing dessert spread. Clearly, we did not leave hungry!

While we were eating, the Easter bunny decided to start making his rounds. He visited each table and handed out Easter eggs to the little ones. The egg hunt had to be cancelled since the weather was less than ideal.

Peyton has recently started developing a little stranger anxiety and cries when people she doesn't recognize hold her. As you can imagine, I didn't expect the Easter bunny to go over very well. To all of our surprise though, she LOVED the bunny. She was happy and smiley the whole time. Win!

After brunch, we walked outside to get some family pictures. The Easter bunny spotted us again and decided to join us. He handed Leah and Peyton a couple more eggs and posed for some pics for us. Such a sweetie bunny!

Peyton modeling her adorable custom-made romper from Gingham and Grace Etsy shop!

Leah, not so thrilled with the bunny, being reassured by Peyton. "It's okay, cousin, I got you!" 

 All in all, this was by far, my favorite Easter to date. We were surrounded by family and got to celebrate the holiday with our own little bunny. I hope everyone had a wonderful day as well!

Easter Photo Dump:

Thanksgiving 2015

This Thanksgiving was definitely one for the books (or blog)! After a late change of plans, Ryan and I accompanied my parents, Jake, and my Grandma, who flew up to visit from Ft. Lauderdale, up to Hendersonville, NC to spend the holiday weekend with family! We left early Thursday morning and made the 3 hour drive, getting to the house with plenty of time to visit before sitting down to a Thanksgiving feast!

Guys, how special is this picture!! This is four generations of women on my mom's side! Bubby, Mimi, Peyton, and Mommy

Peyton, true to form, was an angel right up until it was time to pray and feast. Of course, homegirl wanted to eat her Thanksgiving dinner the same time as the rest of us. Once she was fed, she was back to being a happy girl and enjoyed spending time with all of her great aunts/uncles and my cousins!

The rest of Thanksgiving night was spent eating more food, playing Telestrations, watching football, and sitting by the fire pit outside. It was a wonderful way to spend Peyton's first Thanksgiving!

Hanging out with our wonderful hostess, Aunt Carol! 

On Friday, the girls and guys split up for most of the day. The guys went to play 18 holes of golf while the girls braved the Black Friday traffic to hit the outlet mall near Asheville.

The gang met back up early evening at the house and decided to walk to downtown Hendersonville to grab some dinner. Downtown had their lighting of the Christmas tree event and welcomed Santa to town, so it was packed. While waiting for a table to open up at the restaurant we walked around, showing Peyton all of the lights and the horse-drawn carriages trotting through town.

On our last full day in town, we once again went to downtown Hendersonville to shop some more and watch the GT/UGA game. We spent the early afternoon in a sports bar watching our yellow jackets suck it up before heading over the Mast General Store to walk around. This store has been a family favorite over the years, and we can easily spend hours looking at all the cool toys, gadgets, clothes, kitchen accessories, and candies.

Itty Bitty in an itty bitty adirondack chair that fit her just right.  

Saturday night, we all gathered back at the house to eat a delicious stew made by Aunt Carol, polish off the rest of the Thanksgiving desserts, and play Rummy 500 and Presidents, our two favorite card games! 

We sadly said goodbye Saturday night and headed home Sunday morning, kicking off the Christmas season with the first of many adorable Christmas outfits for Peyton. I'm so excited to share and create new family traditions in Georgia as a family of three!  

Happy Hump Day, Ya'll! 

Waving Goodbye to Weymouth

Writing that title may have made me tear up a bit. I can't believe that we've already been in Georgia for 7 days. I can't believe that we have moved out of our apartment already. I can't believe that the U-Haul has been packed, driven 1,152 miles, and unpacked into a storage unit. I can't believe that my student teaching and grad school have come to an end. I can't believe that we've left the place that we've called home for two and a half years and are starting new...with a baby on the way!

Ryan and I threw all normal routines out the window these past few weeks in favor of spending as much time as possible with our amazing friends up North. We went out to dinners and had our friends over as much as possible before we packed everything up.

Those last few weeks in Weymouth were such a whirlwind...I tried to capture as much as possible in pictures but I didn't do a very good job of documenting the things we did. To reminisce and play a bit of catch-up, I just thought I would throw the hodge-podge of pictures together in this post to look back on.

Thank you to all of our friends up North for just being our friends. We wouldn't be who we are today without you all.

Mine and Marybeth's graduation cake from the wonderful staff at Murphy! 

Ryan's last softball game with Life! This was his first home run of the night! 

Our going-away dinner at the Ale house:

Packing up the U-Haul:

...because who can really pack a U-Haul without pans of baked ziti and some Boston Lager?!?!

Acrobatics in an empty apartment...

Right before we handed our keys back in... 

WE LOVE YOU GUYS!!!