Goodbye 2010....

With the holidays, family visits, and vacations filling our recent weeks, I realize that it's been almost two months since I last logged on. I thought I'd squeak one last post onto the blog before 2010 was behind us. Here are quite a few photos from our recent adventures. We hope you had a wonderful Holiday and are ringing in the New Year right!

It's my Birthday!!

In early November, my sisters Megan and Karri came to visit to help celebrate Pearl's birthday. It was so nice for Pearl to get plenty of play time with her aunties. We went for a chilly walk around a nearby lake, drank plenty of hot chocolate, and watched Pearl open some first birthday presents.

For Thanksgiving, my parents came to visit again this year. Pearl learned how to say "Nonie and Pop-Pops" very quickly, and Nonie taught her "Patty Cakes", which is now Pearl's favorite Nursery Rhyme to sing, taking the top spot over "Row Row Row your Boat," which she used to ask for by name. Now she can do the motions of Patty Cakes with her hands, which makes her very proud. We had fun making a thanksgiving feast, and Pearl LOVED the turkey. She loved it so much, she rubbed turkey juice all over her head. As you can see in the photo below, she's just used it as hair gel.


Pearl loved to walk around the house with Nonie and Pop-pops. Still not walking on her own, but she just likes the help.

Hoping to get a chance to play outside in the fresh snow....

After Thanksgiving dinner, we trekked out to the Christmas Tree farm to cut a tree. Took us a while to find the perfect one....Nonie's prepared with saw in hand...

Found it! (Pop-pops did the actual cutting when it came time to take care of business)

Pearl was not quite so amused with the whole endeavor, but once we lugged the tree to the car, out of the cold, and got it into the house, it was a whole other story...

She loved putting ornaments on the tree (as did Pop-pops, by the look of the above photo). Now Pearl points to her favorite ornaments and has given many of them names. Her favorite ornaments are miniature nutcrackers. She likes to stick her fingers in their mouths or try to feed them bits of food. (I think we'll be keeping the tree up through March if it's still alive by then.)


No, this is not Ken, Pearl and I taking a swim in Lake Michigan in December.....We snuck away for a week to Aruba in mid December, beating the holiday rush and missing out on a huge Wisconsin snow storm (good timing!). On our first day there, the front page of the Aruban newspaper had a photo of the snowstorm that hit the midwest. It felt kind of good....

Pearl was a little under the weather while we were in Aruba. I think she may have gotten a stomach bug. She didn't eat much and the above photo generally describes her mood for much of the trip: sad and sleepy, with a far off gaze. But we still found ways to have fun despite the projectile vomiting and her spirits picked up toward the end of the week.

Ken building a massive sand castle for Pearl to enjoy once she was done with her snooze. (I personally think he built it for himself though....)

Last night in Aruba, we ate at this nice little restaurant that had tables right on the water's edge on the beach. You could dip your toes in the water while you sipped on a cocktail. Very nice....

Back home on Christmas morning, Pearl was very surprised by the arrival of Santa Claus and all of the fun gifts he left for her.

Here she is doing the happy dance in front of the tree.

And getting some very good practice opening gifts...

One of her favorites was this wheelie lady bug that her Auntie and cousins from Canada got her. she loves scooting around the house on it. We hope you all made many fun memories over the holidays too!