More on this later!
We still have Christmas bows on the windows of our house. Go ahead, you can judge us.
Last weekend I took V to a birthday party for one of her preschool friends at Burger King.
She sat beside her good buddy Tiffany, after almost an hour of pure bliss in the play area.
Then the cake came. She didn't immediately have a fork in front of her, so this was her next logical move.
I couldn't even get her to lift her face for another picture with her friend! She tried, but she just couldn't part with it, so she brought the plate up with her. She's crazy!
I had some more pictures of the kids playing at the party, but they all turned out blurry because they were moving too fast.
Books on CD from the library...perfect for rest time!
Last Sunday after naps we took the girls to the Salem Civic Center for the indoor carnival they held for children. We stayed for about an hour or less, but they were thrilled. It's so fun to see them get excited about things! They rode several rides, played a game, and then Vivian got her face painted (she anticipated that the whole time). It was nice to get them out of the house to do something especially for them.
On one of the first rides, Kate looked at me and said, "Take my picture, Mom!" I think she's got the idea about moms and their cameras :)
I think it was the first time that either of them have asked to have their picture taken and then posed. Funny!
(I tried to do a special effect on that picture, if you're thinking it looks strange)
Vivian chose to have a pink butterfly painted on half of her face. She loved it!
We all knew that Kate would do better with just something small painted on her hand :) She was just as happy with that, and the man did it for free thankfully!
Their favorite ride was the merry-go-round!
Kate has always had a significant dislike (understatement!) for taking a shower. Now that our bathroom is being remodeled, our only choice for bathing is the downstairs shower. It has been quite the ordeal as you can see...screams straight out of a horror movie. This particular instance, V was upset about the temperature of the water, so you can hear how fun our nights can be. ha!!
We've figured out some other alternatives...bathing her in the sink, or taking them over to my parents' house to use their tub. But I'm sure you can understand why they've only been getting washed a couple times a week lately :)
You can't see anything but the door because the girls were naked, obviously. And another thing about the video: don't you love how calm and patient Aaron is being with them?! Sigh.
Every once in a while when Kate is taking a nap, I sneak in to look at her for a few minutes. It's a joy to see her still and quiet. It's almost like a subtle refresher for me, to get me ready for the afternoon and evening.
Those couple of hours around 1:30 are a gift of grace for all moms, I know. It's certainly necessary to give us a chance to catch our breath! This 2-year-old is a sweetie but she's also good at sucking all my energy :)
Last Saturday we threw a party for our Dad's 60th birthday! It was a fun, easy party to prepare and we all enjoyed it so much.
We all met at Mom and Dad's house and started things in the early evening.
The most special thing about the party was the people that joined us. My Dad's mom, brother, and sisters and their spouses all came from North Carolina (actually, almost everyone came from NC! We were so thankful they made the drive for this occasion). Michael takes the prize for coming the farthest...he is living in NYC and caught a bus to Virginia!! We had a good crowd of about 20.
I didn't get as many pictures as I would have liked, but here are some to give you a good idea of how we celebrated.
Stephen and I gathered as many pictures of Dad from the last 60 years as we could. He printed them in B&W and I mounted them in this shadow box frame in the shape of a six and a zero. I had a lot of fun looking through all the pictures...some good laughs and sweet "awwws" there :)
This doubled as a party decoration and a gift for Dad.
Erin Carroll made this cake for us...perfect! She used the colors from his airplane (we also matched the plates/balloons/etc. to these colors). The design is from the tail of the plane, and she used some delicious marshmallow fondant in addition to the regular icing. There were lots of comments on the cake, as is usual for her cakes!
Stephen blew up some of Dad's old school pictures to use as a decoration above one of the food tables.
Stephen used all of the pictures he had scanned to make a DVD slideshow. We used this to get the party started. After we watched this once or twice through, we began with dinner.
The young girls were really into the slideshow! Cute! In the middle is our cousin's little girl, Hannah. She is 6 and precious...I was so glad that V and K got to spend time with her last weekend.
The rest of us were glued to the pictures, too. It was a fun way to start the party.
I know my Dad was really happy that Granny came up from Lucama to be there!
Chris and Lynn are my Grandma's neighbors and long-time friends from Raleigh. It was nice to get to know them better and party with them.
Michael and our cousin Amy
Sisters! Aunt Julie and Aunt Stella
The cake table with a view of the invitation
The birthday man and his firstborn
We put these chalk decals on the walls around the room for people to write on. In addition to this acrostic, we had one that said, "5 things we love about Larry" and one that said, "5 birthday wishes."
Kate was in and out of Papa's arms the whole night. Of course she wanted to be in on the present-opening!
The main gift for the birthday was this group of envelopes: "60 years of memories." Over the past two months (but actually most people sent theirs in during the last two weeks!), I've been collecting written memories that people have of Dad from the last 60 years. The response was great...he had everyone from family to old friends to employees to fellow battery distributors to send in a note. Lots of them were sent in the mail handwritten, but we had some emails, too. Everyone wrote a specific memory that they have of doing something with Dad or something that he did...it was so much fun putting them all together! It was a great project for me!
I split them up into separate airmail envelopes and numbered each of them, up to 60.
During the party, we passed out all the envelopes to everyone who was there, and we each read them out loud to Dad, one by one, in order. It was a cool experience for us to all do it together. We were able to really celebrate him and his past as a family!
After that, we cut the cake and hung out some more. It was very relaxing and enjoyable.
Thanks for taking the time to look through these pictures from the party! And thanks to everyone who came...it meant so much to us all, especially to Dad.
Happy 60th birthday, Dad!
New Year's Eve 2011
We started a bathroom remodel today. Well, to rephrase that, Wayne started a bathroom remodel for us today. We are anticipating a new, clean bathroom in about 6 weeks. In the next few days, if anyone can find some cool bathroom ideas on Pinterest, let me know! Or if you can think of some "must-haves" for designing your own bathroom, please email me.
They are ripping the tub out now (which he found out is the original tub from 1939!), and little Kate Kate is sleeping right through it, in the next room over. Gotta love a good sleeper :)
Wow, I'm so late in sharing these pictures with you, but I still wanted to get them on here for us to look back on later!
We had a great Christmas. Our holiday season was the smoothest one so far with the babies because they are old enough to go with the flow more and are also so much fun!
The weekend before Christmas we were in NC for Aaron's family party. We really enjoyed spending so much time with them. The first pictures from the album below come from that day. About halfway through the album, it switches to all the pictures from Christmas Eve at my parents' house. We had some guests that day, as you'll see, and it was a very relaxing time for all of us!
I only took a few pictures on my phone from Christmas Day. We got up that Sunday morning and had a normal routine because we were going to church, but after naps we opened a few gifts together and spent the rest of the afternoon and night just hanging out and playing!
We got the girls a puppet theater, so Aaron put on a show for them right away. They were thrilled about it and have a lot of fun with this gift.
Aaron went shopping for them and got this gun. They didn't like being shot at (of course!) but they thought it was funny to find a target and shoot at it :)
Written on the bathroom mirror while he was in the shower, per the tradition :)
Happy New Year!
Only one life, 'twill soon be past,
Only what's done for Christ will last.
-C.T. Studd
I've seen this in several places on the Internet and thought it would be fun to do with Vivian while Kate was napping today. Maybe, if I can remember, we can do this each new year to see how their answers change! She made me laugh with this :)
What is your name?
Vivian
2. How old are you?
3
3. What is your mom’s name?
Mommy
4. What does your mom do during the day?
You stay at the house and fold the clothes.
5. What is your dad’s name?
Daddy
6. What does your dad do during the day?
He fixes batteries and puts the money in the jar.
7. What is your favorite color?
Pink
8. What is your favorite thing to eat?
Macaroni and cheese
9. Who are your friends?
Julia, Macy, Chandler, Jonah, Tiffany, Bradley, Ansley
10. What is your favorite song?
The Milkshake song
11. What is your sister’s name?
Kate Kate
12. What is your favorite place to go?
The Omelet Shoppe
13. What is your favorite thing to do?
The Strawberry Shortcake game with my 2 girls
14. What do you like about your Mommy?
You're really beautiful.
What do you like about Kate?
She smashes stink bugs.
What do you like about Daddy?
He goes to work.
15. What do you want to be when you grow up? (She didn't understand, so I rephrased it to say, What kind of job do you want to have when you grow up?)
I wanna have a job just like you (excitedly)
16. What is your favorite book?
Cinderella
17. What does Kate like to do?
Watch Dora.
18. What makes Mommy a good Mommy?
God. And you're not lazy all the time.
How does Daddy make you laugh?
He does funny things like he wiggles, wiggles, wiggles, and he does a silly song.
What do you and Daddy do together?
We go to church.
How do you know that Mommy loves you?
Gives me hugs.
How do you know that Daddy loves you?
Daddy tickles me!
Where is Mommy's favorite place to go?
Mac n'Bobs
We hope you've had a great Christmas like we've had! And we wish you a wonderful new year like we are going to have with two growing girls and a baby on the way!
Baby #3 is due in the middle of August. The first doctor appointment went so well today: a strong heartbeat! We can't wait to meet the next member of our family!
Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD,
the fruit of the womb a reward.
Like arrows in the hand of a warrior
are the children of one's youth.
Blessed is the man
who fills his quiver with them!
He shall not be put to shame
when he speaks with his enemies in the gate.
(Psalm 127:3-5 ESV)
It's been hard to find time for the computer this week to update photos because we've been potty training!
Kate has done so well thus far and I couldn't be more pleased! She's so cute about it, too, which has made it more fun.
Timer set for every 20 minutes
Bare-bottomed most of the time
Started yesterday
2 accidents on day 1, no accidents today!
Small candy for each success
Lots of exaggerated girly squealing
A little exhausting, but so far hopeful :)
I hope you can watch this several times this weekend. What a gift.
Advent: God With Us from The Village Church on Vimeo.
Fernandez Family
About
-
This blog is a way for us to journal about the fun events and milestones of our days as husband and wife and new parents. Enjoy catching up with what's going on in the Fernandez family!
Aaron and Lisa
Married December 18, 2004
Vivian Gray: born June 18, 2008
Kate Leigh: born August 5, 2009
Hank Michael: born August 8, 2012
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