Abigail is 14 months old

We are blessed. Abigail is 14 months old today. Just yesterday she took her first steps. We are excited about all her new experiences. Thank you God for our healthy, beautiful and happy baby girl. Until next time...God is good! All the time!

Abigail took her first steps!

We are thrilled to say that Abigail took her first steps today. We got the second try on video. It won't be long now before she gets the hang of it and will be running around! Thank you God for our healthy, happy, beautiful daughter! We are blessed. Enjoy the video. Until next time...God is good! All the time!

Christmas 2009

We had a great Christmas holiday visiting our families. We headed to Virginia Beach on Christmas Eve. It's a two hour drive down there but thankfully traffic wasn't bad at all. We got unpacked at Grandma Belle's house and then headed over to Mark's cousin's house for the Hadley Christmas Eve party. The food was good and it was nice to see his relatives. Abigail was able to play with a few of her third cousins and had a blast. There was a gift exchange and we unexpectingly got a couple gifts for Abigail. Thank you to all that gave! We then headed back to Mark's mom's house and stayed the night. Abigail slept very well considering she was not in her crib. That was a great Christmas present to me! On Christmas morning I fixed green bean casserole to take to my cousin's house for Christmas lunch. While it was baking, Mark, Belle and I exchanged gifts. Abigail got even more stuff! She is one blessed little girl. Thank you Grandma Belle! After the gift exchange, we all packed up and drove an hour to Elizabeth City, NC to spend time with my mom's side of the family. It was so good to see my parents again. Christmas lunch was delicious as always. We exchanged gifts in the afternoon. Abigail got more and more stuff! Thanks Nonni and Papa! We had to head back around 3pm since Mark had to work Christmas night. It was hard saying bye to family. We wished we lived closer to family. It's hard being in Richmond without our families. Don't get us wrong, the church family is wonderful but there's nothing like your real family! Thank you to all of our family for loving and supporting us so much. We are truly blessed! Enjoy the pictures. Until next time...God is good! All the time!

Christmas Pictures

Here are a few pictures we took of Abigail for our Christmas cards this year. Our baby girl is growing up! She is sitting in a rocking chair that my late Grandpabud(my dad's dad) built. We tested her out in the chair in her pajamas before we got he dressed. Abigail enjoyed sitting in the chair only for a little while. She got real hot and frustrated because she could not crawl around in her dress. We had to strip her down to just her diaper as soon as the last picture was taken. Enjoy the pictures! Until next time...God is good! All the time!

Look at me!

I think I got the hang of this.Mommy's favorite pose
Another favorite pose
Joker smile
Getting bored
No, I don't want to look at you
Photo session over!

Snow!

They've called it Blizzard 2009 on the news and boy did we get some snow! We got between 7-9 inches around town. Some areas east of us got up to 13 inches. Thankfully we stayed safe. Enjoy a few pictures I took from our balcony. Until next time...God is good! All the time!

Abigail and her walker

Abigail hasn't walked on her own yet but she loves using the walker that our friends, Tommy and Amy, got her for her birthday. Here are a few clips. She should be walking on her own soon. :) Until next time...God is good! All the time!

Mark's 30th Birthday Party

We celebrated Mark's 30th birthday Saturday afternoon with a few close friends from church. It was a nice get together with our friends at Brandon and Misty's house. Thank you for your hospitality Brandon and Misty! We always enjoy visiting your home. Although we had the first bit of snow of the winter season during the party, we still had a good and safe time. Before dinner, we all snacked on chips and Misty's french onion dip and chips and salsa and cheese. Football was on the tv for the evening (Florida and Alabama-sorry that the Gators lost, Dad!). Pizza and boneless wings from Domino's was Mark's choice for dinner. Mark is not a cake person, so I made his favorite brownies with peanut butter chips. Brandon made his famous dirt which is always delicious. Mark received money, gift cards and a sweatshirt hoodie. We are very thankful for the gifts and time with friends. Thank you to all who came! Until next time..God is good! All the time!

Abigail is 13 months old

It is hard to believe Abigail is 13 months old. It feels like just yesterday that I was still on maternity leave and getting up every couple hours to feed Abigail. I don't miss the lack of sleep for sure. Abigail has changed so much in 13 months. The pictures below give a glimpse of how much she has changed. We are certainly blessed with a good-natured baby. She is a miracle and we thank God for her every day. She is so close to walking. She will stand up on her own straight from the floor but no steps yet. She will walk along things in the living room all the time. It won't be too much longer! Until next time...God is good! All the time!

Bath time 1 month old

Bath time 13 months old

Happy 30th Birthday Mark

Happy 30th Birthday to my wonderful husband, Mark! I love you with all my heart. I am so blessed to have met you 4 1/2 years ago. Thank you for your compassion, love, support and kindness. You are a great husband and father. Here's to many more years to come! I love you!

Happy Thanksgiving

I am truly thankful for a wonderful family. God has blessed us with such a loving and caring family. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday by far. It is a time for me to reflect on all of God's blessings and also to spend quality time with family. Belle came up yesterday and spent the night with us in Richmond. She is always so bubbly and loving. We got up early this morning and headed to Elizabeth City to have Thanksgiving dinner with my mom's family. My cousin, April, has a beautiful home. The food was delicious and the company was even better. Thank you God for my family. I even sang a special duet with April for my mom. What a blessing that was. Thank you April for singing with me. Thank you Mom for asking us to sing. I hope it was as much a blessing to you as it was to me. You are such a great example for me. I love you with all my heart!
I only took a few pictures today. Abigail got about a 20 minute nap while snuggling with me on the love seat and then about a 40 minute nap on the way home. She did get to see some helicopters before we left. :) April's husband, Brian, is in the Coast Guard and he let her play with a small helicopter while he showed her a video on the computer. I wish we could have stayed longer but Mark has to work at 11 tonight. We are thankful for his job but the hours sometimes make it hard for us to travel. Well now that Abigail has gone down for the night, I am not far behind. Until next time...God is good! All the time!

Recent pictures of Abigail

I am sorry that it has been a few weeks since the last post. Since Abigail is a year old and meets the height and weight requirements, we turned her car seat around. The car rides are much more enjoyable for all of us.
Mark picked out a dress while shopping in Kernersville back in August. I couldn't wait for Abigail to wear it. Mark picked a good one. Enjoy the pictures. We are truly blessed with a beautiful, healthy and happy daughter. Thank you God for our miracle! Until next time...God is good! All the time!

What a week

We started out the week with Mark getting three of the four wisdom teeth removed. One was impacted and had to be stitched up. Monday evening and Tuesday was really rough on him. Thankfully Belle was here to help watch Abigail. The pain, swelling, nausea and dizziness was pretty bad the first couple of days. Mark has not been a big fan of the soft food diet. He is getting sick of the yogurt and pudding for sure. Mark was able to go back to work Thursday evening. The overall pain has subsided some but the one that was impacted is still causing pain and discomfort. He goes in to have the stitches removed and have a post-opt appointment in the morning. Please pray all goes well and that he continues to heal quickly and completely.

We had an interesting Saturday afternoon event. Mark was going to turn Abigail's car set around and he decided to take the trash out on his way to the car. After he put the trash in the dumpster, he noticed that there were some burning ashes. The trash he put in there immediately caught on fire. He came upstairs and told me about it so we decided to call the fire department. It was pretty windy yesterday and we didn't want to take any chances. Abigail got to see her first fire truck up close. It was pretty interesting to see the fire fighters work up close. I know that it was just a small dumpster fire but even the fire fighters said that because of the windy day an ember could have flown out and caught the trees or even the apartment building on fire and cause a lot of trouble and heart ache for a lot people. They were very kind and thanked us for calling. One of the fire fighters even offered to help Mark with the car seat. I took a few pictures.




Abigail has been a little more fussy than usual the last couple of days a because of teething. Our ride home from church turned was not fun. We were thankful to be on our way home earlier than usual but there was a wreck on Courthouse and we had to take a detour the Smoketree neighborhood. Abigail was clearly tired and getting more upset the longer we were in the car. I did all I could to comfort her. We were almost to Walgreens and Abigail started to cough. I could tell she was about to gag and out it came. My poor little girl threw up all over herself. Mark stopped the car in a left turn lane and she was still throwing up. She was so upset. I had to get her out of the car seat to calm her down. There was throw up everywhere. She finally calmed down after a couple of minutes. Of course I had to put her back in the car seat so we could drive and that made her cry again. I felt so bad for her. We eventually got home and Abigail got a bath. We took her car seat out and washed the cover, her clothes and my clothes immediately. She went down for a nap without a peep. I didn't want to take a chance so we stayed home from church tonight. She woke from her nap but only wanted to snuggle. She was back in bed by 7:30. Please pray that she feels better. I also have not been feeling well the last few days and Mark just started getting a sinus infection since last night. We need your prayers! Until next time...God is good! All the time!

A couple videos

Here are a couple videos of Abigail. I kept forgetting to post the one from her birthday. Sorry! Until next time...God is good! All the time!

On Abigail's birthday...her new elephant...wave bye bye


Lastnight before bedtime...loves (beats) the kitty

Halloween 2009

We were invited to Angie and Jeremy's for Jeremy's 32nd birthday and a Halloween Party tonight. It was good to get together with friends. Abigail's black kitty outfit didn't work out because she was too long for it. We ended up getting a pumpkin outfit today. I call her pumpkin all the time anyway. Enjoy the pictures. Until next time...God is good! All the time!

Wild hair baby before the party

Oh no, I got caught!
The spread (great job Angie!)
Momma and her pumpkin
Momma and her not so happy pumpkin
Where's my hat?
Hee Hee!
Luke and Abigail
Luke and his beautiful blues!

What did you say?

Yeehaw!