Christmas is so much more fun now that there are kids around. It is complete mayhem too! My nephew looks like my dad here quite a bit, particularly in the hair department (sorry dad!). Zoe loves Kylie (original name Colley, Zoe named her. Short story: Sugar and Spice are Kylie’s parents. Sugar and Spice are brother and sister. They weren’t fixed yet. They bred. Had babies. My brother and SIL didn’t need more kittens so my mom adopted Kylie after Red died in June. Mom didn’t like the name Colley so she renamed her Kylie. Kylie has a brother Nathan who is still at the other house. End story) but…

In the early morning hours of Christmas morning the rain started in heavy with a bout of hail sometime in the night. It rained most of the morning and stopped sometime after noon when we went to visit my grandmother at her assisted living facility. We checked the radar and the snow line was coming closer and before we left our visit the snow had started. We didn’t expect it to accumulate but it did! All afternoon the snow fell in heavy flakes and finally when it accumulated enough Chris and I went outside to play! Our heavy winter wear was not with us so my dad let us bundle…

My niece and nephew came down to visit with my mom and sister in law a couple of weekends ago. I love being around my family and it is always fun to have them come visit. I can’t wait to get a couple sets of chairs to put outside so we can spend more time enjoying the yard and watching the deer. This time around my sister in law, Stephanie, opened the front door and found herself practically face-to-face with a deer in our side yard. Deer even enticed her to get out of bed shortly after she’d told the kids to let her lay in bed longer. See, deer…

+WILLLLSOOOONNNN! +Painting pumpkins with my family last weekend. Zoe is in pre-school now and is smart, smart, smart! Grayson is growing fast and is an adorable troublemaker. The kid does.not.stop. Go! Go! Go! is hit motto. I keep wanting to cuddle with him like I did with Zoe when she was his age but he doesn’t want any of that. He has legs and wants to use them. The cat is Kylie, aka: Colley….Zoe’s original name for her. Zoe loves her some Kylie and Kylie is kind of like Grayson and does not like to be cuddled! Never a dull moment when children are involved!

Back in July my mom, brother, sister in law, niece and nephew came down for the weekend to help us unpack. I went almost the whole weekend without taking my camera out but I managed to pull it out when the kids were playing upstairs in our the large room we’re going to call the entertainment room. Right now it is lined with boxes of items to sort through for Goodwill. Turns out the boxes are just as entertaining as any toy from the toy store! My brother’s mini-me. Annnnnd we’re falling over…. Running circles is also very entertaining to four year olds….and wears the 32 year old out just…

This is the last photo I took of my grandfather, William Ralph Whitlock, on June 9, 2012. I didn’t know it then. I’d come up to Fort Worth with the main reason to see my grandparents (my mom’s mom and my dad’s dad) and of course to see the rest of the family too. I hadn’t seen been up there since the first of April and knew it was time for a visit. I only wish I’d made more time that weekend, spent more time sitting with Grandad. Instead I made it a rushed visit, squeezing in after getting a pedicure with my mom, sister in law and niece. Zoe…

Happy Birthday Bro. 29 isn’t so bad…Enjoy it! Curtis posted this on Facebook a few weeks ago and I got a good laugh out of it. Gauging by the time on the clock, I’m thinking this was a first day of a school photo, maybe 7th of 8th grade for me and 4th of 5th grade for him. We were stylin’!