Deck the Halls

Naomi and I drove to Lynchburg this week to get our Christmas things out of storage. We spent the afternoon visiting with Paul's grandmother, and then loaded up the car with boxes from her basement to bring back home. Added bonus--we finally got our winter coats too! We had a really nice time decorating the tree with Naomi before bedtime the next evening--so cute.

All unbreakable ornaments on our tree this year, save one or two at the top, and Naomi has really enjoyed rearranging the ones within her reach on the bottom. She takes them off, admires and examines them, and put them back on again.

Our Christmas tree is rather Charlie Brown-esque, as we purchased it a few years ago for our small duplex, but it dresses up acceptably well. Naomi's section of the tree is a bit, shall we say, "busy"

but all in all still evokes a festive spirit in the house. The rest of our decorating is relatively simple--some stockings and garland on the mantel with a nativity and a few Christmas bears and elves (garnered from my childhood) perched above. A bright, felt Advent tree, with my great great aunt's antique buttons in rows on the bottom to pin on the tree as ornaments each day leading up to Christmas. A wreath on the door with bright red ribbons on the porch beams, and a goal yet unaccomplished to cut some greenery from the area around our house to hang. Perhaps this weekend!

Fall 2008!

Busy Busy Busy Fall. Typical for us.

Summer 2008!

We took several trips this year and also had fun camping.

Springtime 2008!

We had a lovely spring. I'll post more about it soon.

Good Morning!

I've wanted to post a bit of video on here for ages, and finally took some this morning. Naomi is all smiles when she wakes up--enjoy!

Snow Day!

Here in Roanoke, we had the first significant accumulation of snow in 2 years. Four inches, which "down here" is enough to close all schools, cancel many other events, and send Paul home from work after just a few hours. We had fun outdoors with Naomi, and enjoyed the extra time at home together. Hooray for snow days!

Growing growing growing!

I can't believe how quickly time goes by with Naomi in our lives. You'd think I'd be able to do so many different things while at home during the day, but somehow it just doesn't happen that way! Naomi is growing and thriving and is, of course, as cute as ever! Her current favorite passtimes are: sucking on her feet, bathtime, grabbing everything to shove into her mouth, kisses on her cheeks and tummy, and giggling, squealing, & babbling away. She actually rolled from her back to her stomach on the 5th, but hasn't done it again since. Maybe this is because she does NOT like "tummy time" and wasn't particularly pleased to find herself in that position! Here are just a few pictures from the last month or so.

One of my favorite naptime pics!

This is actually from mid-November when she was first really holding rattles, etc. Now she is quite good at grasping toys or anything else she can reach, switching from hand to hand, and of course "tasting" each and every thing!

Cute smile in one of my old shirts that my mom saved and washed up for us!

This is Naomi, Mona, Ian, and Hannah at brunch in early December. We have had a good time keeping in touch with some of our natural childbirth classmates and the newest additions!

Out shopping in Charlottesville for one of Naomi's Christmas present. She loved being carried in our pretty woven wrap.
Bathtime fun!

Christmas Eve with cousins Rayna and Kyle. I need to get some more Christmas pictures from my family though, because it seems that we took some video, but they got the good still shots...