10 Things We Are Thankful For in 2010

• The fact that we have peace with God through the redeeming work of Jesus on our behalf





• Our beautiful, healthy baby girl





• Our great new house





• Chris' good job





• That I get to stay home with Marianne





• That the Gamecocks won the College World Series

• That the Gamecocks won the SEC East

• Our amazing church and all the wonderful people there





• Our loving and supportive family





• Our fun and faithful friends

Two Notes:

We are also thankful to our friends Vickie and Brian who took the awesome pictures at the top and bottom of this post and other pictures that will be our Christmas card soon!

When we were brainstorming our list Chris also wanted to put that we were thankful for Marcus Lattimore. Since we limited the list to 10 and other things we are thankful for did not make the list I thought it better to leave him off. But I did want to make a note of it because I thought it was funny!

Three New Things

This week started off super rainy. Marianne and I were going out to lunch and I remembered that she had some cool rain boots. They were too big (sorry, Ashleigh) but this got me in the mood to try all her other shoes on her little feet. I found one pair that fit her. She looked so cute in them I had to take a picture!

Doesn't she look so proud of her shoes? It is as if she is saying "Look at me! I am grown up!"

Based on the success of the shoes I thought I would see if the little robe someone gave Marianne fit her. She likes being wrapped up in her towel after a bath so she liked the robe but it is still too big. It did make for some cute pictures though!

I was inspired by some friends stories of how much their daughters liked their bouncy seat to get out Marianne's Ocean Wonders Jumperoo. Marianne looked on as Chris put it together and then she got to play in it. Every time she uses it she likes it more. Today was her third day and she couldn't stop smiling. These picture are the first time she spent extended time in it and she was still trying to figure it out. She is still too short for it so we had to put phonebooks under her feet. You can see them in the last picture covered by a towel so they wouldn't be too slippery!

Surprise Precious Moments

Watching Chris with Marianne makes me love him even more than I already did (which was a lot)! It is so fun to see him interact with her and vice versa. The following picture are times when I walked into a room and found something unexpected but totally precious.
I walked downstairs a few Saturdays ago to find them both sleeping on the couch. When Chris woke up he asked if I ever slept with her like that. When I said no he said, "You should".

Yesterday Chris had to go to a training so he got to finish working from home. I left Marianne upstairs playing at Chris' feet while I went to go make dinner. Chris said he would bring her down if she got too fussy but he never did. I came up once dinner was in the oven to find this. Chris said Marianne had been "helping" him for almost an hour and that she had almost sent an email by hitting the laptop mouse with her foot!

Why I want a new camera

I have really been hinting hard about wanting a new camera for Christmas and below you will see why. These pictures were taken by our friends Jason and Leslie with the camera they bought on the eve of their new baby. The quality is noticibly better than the pictures we take and for every ten pictures they take they get nine good ones. For every ten pictures we take we get one good one! There are a few good ones of the three of us but I am not going to post them yet because one of them might end up on our Christmas card...

Our Little Sweet Pea

Chris said that Sunday was one of the best days of his life. It started with him drinking coffee and enjoy the nice fall weather on the front porch with Marianne. Then while they played together Marianne was laughing like never before. She laughed longer and harder than we have ever heard her and it was all because of the game she was playing with Chris. He was thrilled!




After church we took Marianne to the Botanical Gardens where they were having a special day called Goblins in the Garden. They had all kinds of different activities for children and they had a costume parade. Of course Marianne could do none of the activities and we just watched the parade go by instead of participating but it was still fun. Chris was a proud daddy and wanted to hold Marianne instead of keeping her in her stroller because he wanted people to see her. She was very sleepy and she slept almost the whole time which is why she looks the way she does in all these pictures. But I still think they are cute!

Blog Roll Shout Out

Except for the sports blogs on the right, the blogs we love are written by our friends and family. They are all great in their own unique way but I wanted to point out our newest addition. One of my friends who is super crafty has started a blog about all the crafty things she does. What I wanted to share is that from her blog (The Apple Crate) you can link to her Etsy shop where she has beautiful handmade cards for sale. As the recipient of some of her gorgeous work I know how amazing her cards are and I thought some of you might want to check them out and maybe even order some! But don't buy too many because I plan on ordering some too!

Delaware

Marianne and I had a wonderful time visiting family in Delaware this past week. I was a little worried about how Marianne would adjust to all the new experiences but she did great! Grandma only had to start talking to her to get a huge smile out of Marianne and Marianne seemed to love Grandma's house (especially her couch as you will see below). It was a fun trip and I really have to brag on little baby Marianne. She was a great traveler. Everyone kept commenting about how good she was during the flight. And she was a great sport about meeting all sorts of new people and having to make some changes to her routine! It was such a fun and easy trip I think we will try it again some time!

Isn't it cute how Marianne and Grandma kinda match? And we didn't even plan it!

Marianne loves her Aunt Sue!

Cousin Michael roller bladed all the way over to Grandma's just to be in this picture! Not really, he just came to hang out but he also got to take some pictures and be in a picture.

Marianne had fun sitting up on Grandma's couch. I think she felt grown up.

Four generations