Merry Christmas!

We had such a wonderful Christmas season! I am always sad when the holidays are over and we pack up all our decorations, but I am grateful for the memories we made!

We celebrated Christmas a few days early with my family before we left for Charlotte. We had everyone over for pizza and presents and had a blast. My family is loud, crazy and just the absolute best! I sadly didn't take many pictures because I was just enjoying our time (and playing hostess) but here's a few!

Our living room was full!

Da boys

I loved having everyone in our home!

Sweet little cousins

The next day we traveled up to Charlotte, NC to spend Christmas with Jon's family. It was such a fun time! We got to stay for a week which was the perfect amount of time (although Gigi wouldn't have minded us staying longer I'm sure!) and I'm so glad Josh was able to spend time up there again! I tried to remember to take pictures so here's a look into our week!

Snuggles and snacks with Gigi

Jon and our newest nephew, Darren

Winnie

Ho ho ho!

This little guy gives me baby fever!

Winnie, Taylor and Josh

Pop Pop's head makes a good drum!

Christmas Eve tradition of opening new pajamas!

Reading books with Memere 

Santa came!

Waking up on Christmas morning

Toddler Jon :)

Christmas breakfast!

Feed me!

This light up ball was the first thing he opened and that was all he wanted to play with!

New blocks!

Tower master

The traditional legos for Jon

New cars

New puzzle

Storm trooper from Uncle Tay and Aunt Steph

Snuggling with his giant Olaf pillow

Hugs for Aunt Stephy

Opening girly things :)

I don't even know

Brown sibs

The stairs were his favorite!

Christmas dinner (and all the babies were sleeping!)

Bath time!

Oh that hair!

Reading with Aunt Stephy (and Darren who is in the basket :)

3rd Annual gingerbread house competition - guys' house

Girls' house (and the winner!!)

This smile is my most favorite

Watching the cars

Totally a VanLue face right here

Getting kisses from Dolce

Oh. Hey.

Giving kisses to the baby

Cousins making music together

Give us all the snacks!

Wrestling with Dada

Josh holding his new cousin.

"baby! baby!"

We took a day trip to the mountains to visit Nana and Da! They hadn't seen Josh since he was 10 months old!

The sweetest

Josh loved their yard!

We love you Nana and Da!

Brothers. They never take a normal picture.

Miri is definitely the prettiest of this bunch!

Love this girl!

Snuggles with Tay Tay

Love!

Giving Winnie hugs before we left

And kisses...Josh wasn't too sure about those

He loves Miri!

I love this one!

Haha! 

Loves his Pop Pop and Gigi

Last hugs before we come back in February!

Merry Christmas!

Thanksgiving and 16 months old!

Is anyone else in full - on Christmas mode like me? I finally know what everyone on our list is getting and I'm proud to say I'm almost done shopping and wrapping. I love this time of year!

This year we celebrated Thanksgiving VanLue style with my side of the family. When we all get together it's always fun, loud and a little bit crazy...and I wouldn't have it any other way! We had a fabulous meal and in true VanLue fashion lots of jokes and hilarity. Here's some pictures from our day!

Quite the spread! 

Delicious!

Mel and Leni - the two tallest VanLue girls :)

My sweet boys!

My dad stayed dressed like this the whole day. This won't surprise you if you know my dad very well :)

Desserts!

I was super proud of this "turtle" cheesecake - and Jon has requested it again!

Mimi and her Wubba

Decorating cookies

These two <3

Attempting a Christmas card photo :)

Love our little family!

Sooo worn out after a long and fun day!

Jon and I left Josh with Mimi overnight and went out to a fancy dinner for Jon's bday and to see a movie. It was a glorious 18 hours "away" but we sure did miss our boy! Thanks mom for watching him!

Josh is now 16 months old and hardly ever slows down these days! Definitely a toddler in every sense of the word...including a defiant little attitude coming through! Oh dear. I realized that up until now what I thought was "parenting" wasn't actually parenting at all. It was simply keeping a child alive. Now come the parenting years and boy I feel very unprepared at times! Days are long and hard sometimes but I wouldn't trade them for anything! I'm so thankful I get to spend my days home with our precious boy! (Remind me I said that the next time Josh hits or bites me will ya?)


In addition to becoming even more of a toddler this month, Josh has also officially graduated to a new car seat. He's honestly needed one for a while but we kept putting it off. He still fits in his infant seat but his poor little feet were dangling out of it for a while :) So...we finally picked one out (I tell ya it was a hard decision with as many models as cars out there!) and so far we are very happy with our new big boy seat! We are keeping him rear facing until he turns two (no judgement here if you turn your tot around earlier...we just think it's safer) and as you can tell from the pic below Josh is totally comfy in it :)

Josh's favorite activites these days are park dates with mom, climbing on everything (he can now get up on our bed by himself), wrestling with daddy, going on walks...make that RUNS in our neighborhood, and playing with his ball, cars and reading. He also LOVED the big box his car seat came in as you can see below :)

I am absolutely loving this age! Hearing him say new words (our newest is "rectangle") and learn new skills (he new exactly what to do with that basketball hoop!) is just so much fun to watch. He's been without his paci (Wubba) now for 2 months with no problems, and he's off his bottles now for the last month too. He's still a good eater as long as it's something he likes (ha!) and adores his aunties when they come over to play. He's growing up! We love our little Wubba man!

Bath time is always fun!

Doesn't need my help up the steps anymore!

Walking with mom and eating clementines!

Training for the NBA maybe?

We are plowing through our final two weeks of school and work before we leave to celebrate Christmas in Charlotte. We can't wait!

Halloween & Josh's Dedication

We had a super fun weekend celebrating a few different things. First was the hubby and my 4th anniversary which we celebrated with pizza and a movie after the little man went to sleep. I can't believe we've been married for 4 years!

Second, was Halloween which I'm sure many of you are still feeling the effects from...sugar coma anyone? This year was super fun since Josh could walk RUN around. We decided to go with a superhero theme this year and we all dressed up as Batman characters...with little mister as the Dark Knight himself. He refused to wear anything on his head or face so we went with some Bruce Wayne styled hair instead of a mask. We had a blast walking around my parent's neighborhood (which is gated and super kid-friendly) and although Josh didn't really know what was going on, he had a great time. Every house we went to that was decorated he would say "oh wow!" and he especially liked the lollipops he got :)

Batman, Robin and The Riddler

My boys!

Batman and Robin...a dynamic duo

Peek-a-boo

Our trick or treaters!

These two are always up for a party!

Having so much fun already!

Always on the move these days! 

Batman and Cat Woman

Thanks Josh for being so cute and getting all this candy for your mom and dad ;-)

We also celebrated Josh's dedication at church on Sunday! We are so grateful to be a part of a church that celebrates parents and stands alongside them through the challenges and joys. Josh got his very first Bible and really liked being up on stage. We love our little Wubba and are so excited to see what God has in store for his life!

Thanks Mom for taking these pics AND for getting Wubba ready that morning so I could sing :)