Christmas all around!!

What a wonderful Christmas weekend!!! We hope everyone had as good of a weekend as we did, full of joy and happy times with your families. We started our weekend out on Friday by having dinner with Josh's parents and then driving all over Lafayette to look at Christmas lights. It was so much fun. The grand finale was when we went to a house where you tune into a radio station and their entire house goes to the beat of the Christmas music. It was impressive to say the least! Very cool and it got us all in the spirit I think! Their neighbor even came out and his dog had twinkling lights around it's neck! We didn't get any pictures of the house, regrettably.

We always spend Christmas Eve with Shell and her family, and this year I decided that I was going to cook! Usually Josh would do the cooking, but he's been working and had to work on Christmas Eve, while I did not, so I decided to try to be a wife and cook. It actually turned out alright!!! I made a ham (and even basted it every 10 minutes!) and really good mashed potatoes that I then baked, and some green beans and corn and rolls. And we had wine and Shell got tipsy before we went to church! Anyway, we had a lovely time. Here are some pics of dinner...

Take a look at that ham! And that cute hubby of mine!

And then the guys cleaned up! Not particularly unusual to see Josh in there, but Danny on the other hand!...Then we headed off to church and it was a pretty good service. Josh actually really enjoyed it and he sang when we lit the candles and sang "Silent Night" at the end. He must've been getting in the Christmas spirit big time to have sung and it was really cute.

Here's a picture of our Christmas tree with the presents under it and our snowman on a sled...it seems that it might be the ONLY snowman we'll be seeing anytime soon....BOO!

We forgot to get a nice family pic in front of the tree.Adorable boys...He's trying to think about crawling!Cheese! Opening the broom vacuum that we got them...just Dan's style!Danny helping me open the bookshelves they got us! We love it!!Kowe in her sassy Santa's Little Helper shirt...Shell and her family (and Kowe)...Kowe unwrapping her presents...

We have tons and tons of pics from Christmas Day! It'll be another day or two before I have them downloaded and sorted through. Another post then!

Merry Christmas!!!

We want to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas!! We're really excited to get to spend some time with family and just relax. Josh has been working really hard and is in need of some good old R&R!! The holiday seemed to come so fast for us, we didn't even send out Christmas cards! But we are so thankful for the friends and family that we have and we want to wish you all the happiest, tastiest, and most fun-filled Christmas ever!! God Bless.

Happy Birthday Parker!

Our nephew Parker turned 1 this week!!! Here are some pictures from his birthday party on Saturday...

YUM Cake!!

Opening Presents

Climbing on the boxes

What little boy doesn't want his own tractor??!

He is the sweetest and cutest little thing. Happy Birthday Parker!!

Holiday Time...

We put up our Christmas tree a while back, but we just this weekend put the ornaments on and decorated the house. Here is one picture of the tree with the newly arranged living room, which we actually really like. We're going to take some more pics and we'll post them later. Notice Kowe in the sweatshirt that she has from last year. It's a size S and she is now a medium, so we were singing the fat dog in a little suit song to her. You can see how utterly enthused she is to be wearing the thing...
And I came upon this when going through some pictures and I had to post it. This is one year ago around Thanksgiving time. She's grown so much!! How adorable is she in her little bitty sweater trying to eat a piece of big dog food. She couldn't even chomp the whole thing!
She needs a brother!!

Cuties

I could not get over how cute Linc was in his cowardly lion outfit! Have you ever seen a cuter boy?!?!?! He's so laid back and at one point he was in his chair and I looked over to see his entire lion's main covering all the way down to his nose. He was just hanging out with no complaints, just kicking his little feet. He's so sweet. Here's Griff, the trashman. That's all he wanted to be for Halloween because he and mamaw watch the guys come and get the trash every week and they watch until they're off mamaw's street. And he loves dumptrucks. So that's what he was. He was over getting his picture taken, so this is the best one I have.
Finally, here are Ellie and Brock. I thought her wig was hilarious so I had to put them on here! You'll remember Ellie as our flower girl at the wedding, but here she is as Wonder Woman! And Brock's even got the hair style going for Superman with the combover and Penny made his hair black. Usually it's red.
No pics of Kowe. She didn't like the shirt we got her and we felt bad. It said Little Pumpkin, so Josh loved it because that's what he calls her, but she was really uncomfortable in it. I think it was a little too small. Her belly seems to be growing (somehow it's bigger every time she comes home from Grammy & Papa's...you think there's any connection with those Dairy Queen hot dogs??), but don't tell Kowe we said so. She's still a sassy girl.

Grandma, What Big Teeth You Have!

Here are some pics from the halloween party we went to this weekend. We were Little Red Riding Hood & The Big Bad Wolf and we won best couple costume!

Here's Shell and Dan And Shell and I

Where's Kowe?

Here are some pictures from Kowe's bath. Can you find her eyes?? (Josh has since cut her bangs and she can see again!)

Wedding Pics are up!!

Our wedding pictures are online!!

If you want to check them out, go to

www.image-source.net

and you will click on "View Your Images," then "Christina and Josh," and then when it prompts you to enter a password, it is joshchristina and you can put whatever email you want, I don't think they do anything with the email addresses.

I have found that the best way to view them is to let them load (which can take a minute or two) and then to view by category and do the slideshow...you can make it switch every 2 seconds and it's a little more visible and quicker than looking at the little thumbnails. We're very pleased with them and are excited that we can get our cd to finally order our thank you's!! Dave Mason is definitely amazing. Enjoy!!

Honeymoon Pics!

FINALLY!! I'm finished with the week's events!! We had such an incredible time. The island of St. Lucia is breathtaking and the people are gorgeous and so welcoming. It was a great vacation full of relaxation and many adventures. We were both sad to leave but definitely ready to be home and see our puppy!! Anyway, there are still many pictures that I didn't post, so if you want to see more, you can go to:

share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8IYtHDZm2cOqg

Enjoy!

Also, the wedding pics are supposed to be up very soon! We'll keep everyone updated! We can't wait for them!!

Monday: Helicopter Ride

Our honeymoon started out with an amazing helicopter ride to the resort, which Jeremy & Lisa did for us as a wedding gift. It was incredible! We had neither one ever been in a helicopter, so it was a new adventure and it was so amazing to see the island from a different perspective.


Here we are all geared up...It's a little foggy, but still gorgeous.The beautiful water...


This is a picture of us coming up between two mountains. It was a little bumpy and kind of scary (well, okay, for me at least) but it was breathtaking to come up on these mountains and then go very close between them and then you come upon this amazing view of the island. It was just amazing. Here we are at the end of it...Josh looks kind of scared! This was such a great start to the honeymoon, so thanks Jeremy & Lisa!

Tuesday: Lounging

Since Tuesday was our first full day at the resort, we decided to relax and get acquainted with everything all day. We spent much of the day on the beach.

This is the day we got our lesson on the hoby cat and then we did it again a few days later. The view of the resort from the hoby cat...
Here are some pics from dinner...
Josh's Mahi Mahi
And we walked the grounds and enjoyed the weather. Here is one pic of the hammock that we laid in for a little bit. We also came upon some horses on the road outside of the resort that were just freely roaming.
Josh near one of the outdoor restaurants and you can see the mountains and ocean in the background faintly.

Wednesday: Soufriere Tour

Wednesday we took a catamaran to the local town of Soufriere. This was an incredible day and we got to go to a local restaurant to get a feel for their cooking and we got to see the town.
This is a picture from our seats on the catamaran. We got some of the best seats right by the trampoline at the front of the boat so we got to watch the waves and enjoy the weather from there. Here is a picture of the beautiful Piton Mountains from the catamaran.Our first stop was to the sulphur springs. The smell wasn't too bad :) I'm told that it looks very similar to Yellowstone's sulphur springs. This is also the only drive in volcano. We were actually in the pits of a volcano that erupted long ago to make what is now the island's landscape.Next we walked through the botanical gardens. They were beautiful and we got to see nutmeg trees and cocoa trees. St. Lucia exports cocoa to Hershey's and we got to see real cocoa straight from the trees which is white and gooey and sticky.
At the very back of the botanical garden there is the Diamond Falls. This waterfall changes colors each day based on what elements are more prevalent that day. This is also the sight of the waterfall scene in Romance & The Stone. And the botanical gardens were used in Superman 2 when he jumps off of one of the Pitons to drop down and pick a Birds of Paradise flower for Lois Lane. We were pretty excited about the movies that were filmed there and we still have plans to watch them. Also, the original Dr. Doolittle was filmed in Marigot Bay which we also visited this day. It was amazing, but the pictures didn't turn out too well from the bay.
Finally, on Wednesday night, they had the Signature Guest dinner. This was probably our best and funnest dinner of the entire week. This is where the Sandals staff prepares a special meal for Signature Guests and we got to have dinner with several of the other Sig. Guests and some of the Sandals staff. We got to sit with the funnest girl named Keitha as well as several other couples and it was so fun, not to mention that the food was incredible. Josh had THE best fish, even I could have eaten an entire meal of it. And I had surf & turf and I ate it all, which is telling when it comes to shrimp! Here is a really good picture of Josh enjoying the hors' dourves.
This is one of our favorite pictures of the whole trip. I need to crop out the umbrella, but the sunset looks amazing.
Simply beautiful.