Happy New Year ’11 : Part One

Happy New Year!  Did you know today is the very last day that I can say that?  Well, according to Ryan Seacrest and his millions of Twitter followers.  Yesterday he asked “what’s the expiration date on saying “Happy New Year?”

Someone replied “halfway through January.”  Or January 15th.

So I’m going with that since today is January 15th.  Happy New Year!

The past month has been so crazy.  Some of it is still a blur and most of it is still sitting on my digital camera.  Christmas morning was so much fun.  It was great to be in our brand new home.    (This photo could have been a potential Pottery Barn ad expect for that blue TV screen there in the corner and those wires hanging from the mantle.  Maybe next year.)

The kiddies got matching Mickey Mouse Christmas “ja-mammies” (as Annabel likes to say.)  

Daniel is hugging his Bumble stuffed animal.  Annabel got the Clarice.  They are from the special “Rudolph” set at the Build-a-Bear store.  (Mama got the Rudolph because we needed the complete set. Duh.)

Here’s Daddy reading the traditional “Twas the Night Before Christmas.”

Santa was very good to the kiddies.  They both got the number one item on their Christmas list.  Daniel’s was a garbage truck.

Annabel’s was a princess tea set.  Here she is serving some tea to her GG.

Then it was Christmas tree pancakes for breakfast and off to church. 

(Daniel wanted to wear his tie on the OUTSIDE of his sweater vest so everyone could see it. )

Right after church we were back in our PJs drinking orange juice (kids) and mimosas (adults) and playing with all our new stuff.  Cheers!

The very next morning we headed out on our week long road trip to visit family.   We drove to North Carolina  then up to Maryland then back to North Carolina then home to Florida.  It was a whirlwind of fun, awesome food, and weird sleeping arrangements.  It was snowing in South Carolina the entire first leg of our tour.  Daniel asked, “Why is all that dust flying around our car?”  What a Florida kid.  I realized then that he had never seen snow actually FALL to the ground.  He’s just seen it ON the ground.  When we arrived in NC, we had the chance to run around in the cold, throw snow balls and make snow angels. 

Annabel did not like the snow as much as Daniel, but she is so cute when she cries.

We had a great visit with Pop Pop and Queen which included a lot of the aforementioned eating plus lots of drinking and being merry.

Then it was off to Maryland.  Part Two recap tomorrow!

We are now heading out for some antique market shopping.  And when I say we, yes I mean all four of us.  I figure we’ll last 20 minutes.  Hopefully that will be enough time to pick up a cool mirror for our guest bath.