Marbles Museum

For President's Day we took a trip to the Marbles Museum downtown. It is a hands-on learning museum for kids. We had a good time watching Kate explore. She had fun crawling and climbing on various things, "driving" a fire truck, walking with Daddy through a huge pirate ship and building with giant Legos. The only downside was that a little boy tried to kiss Kate while we were playing with some toy trains!!!! Don't worry, Mommy saved her, but I don't know where that kid's mom was! Luckily, Jeff had walked around to another exhibit and wasn't there-who knows what he would have done!


I'm not sure who had more fun playing with Legos-Daddy or Kate-

I love my puppies!

Kate loves watching Precious and Max and being outside with them. We can't wait for spring to get here!

Happy Birthday to Me!

As you all know, Kate celebrated her birthday the first week of February, but it has turned into a month long celebration. Her Nana brought Kate balloons for her party and this one is still afloat. Everytime she is in her high chair, she points to it and wants me to sing "Happy Birthday" to her-she can't seem to get enough of that song! The cutest thing is that she, again thanks to her Nana, has learned to say "please" even though it sounds more like p...p...p...p... I can't resist giving her what she wants when she adds p...p...p to her request...I think this is setting a very bad precedent!

Happy Birthday Kate!

Kate turned one on February 7th! We can't believe a year has already gone by! Our precious 6 pound little one has turned into a cruising, fun-loving toddler who has left baby food and formula behind and says Dada, Mama, Baba (for bottle) and can clearly indicate what she wants and doesn't want. She even has her own sound for a dog. Just say the word puppy and she makes (what I think she believes) is a barking sound, although it sounds more like ah, ah. It's hard to put into words how much joy and love she has brought to our family and we are so thankful that God has blessed us so richly!

Here she is 7 days old on Feb. 14th, 2007:


Here she is a year later with her same pink bear:

Kate's Birthday Last Year

Just for memory sake-here is a picture from her birthday last year. What a face!

Fiestas!

We had two parties for Kate. One on her actual birthday-a dinner with her parents, grandparents, and Nonnie who came in from New York. Here she is blowing out her candle on a platter of cupcakes-with her birthday crown of course!

Her second party, complete with a pinata, was the next weekend with her grandparents, great-grandmothers, aunts, uncle, cousin, and friends. Kate was battling her first ear infection ever-I know you can sympathize Kate B.!- and her Dad stayed upstairs because he was battling a terrible sinus and respiratory infection. Kate was a trooper and we all had a great time celebrating with her. Dad made it down for the last few minutes of the party.

The pinata had candy for the "big kids" and cheerios for the little ones.

Hurry and get some candy-before Uncle Dan gets it all!! Kate was actually very happy just holding one piece of candy and a bag of cheerios

Everyone was so generous with the toys! I think Kate was a little overwhelmed with all her new things. I don't know where we are going to put everything!

We're Still Here!

Hello everyone! First, let me apologize for the almost two months of blogging neglect-can we say blog slacker? Christmas, visiting family and friends, a trip to Florida, a rampant stomach virus that affected everyone including grandparents, massive teething, the start of second semester, and jury duty have all conspired to keep us away from these digital diary entries. But finally here I am, at the computer, wondering how to update everything since Christmas. My sweet husband has offered to accomplish various household chores if I would finally update this website. Our little girl is almost a year old!!! So folks-let me warn you that I will be adding many, many pictures as seen in the posts below-so feel free to view them in installments. Enjoy...

Happy Birthday Aunt Jennifer!

We went to visit cousin Scarlett a couple of weeks ago to celebrate her mom's birthday. Kate and Scarlett had so much fun watching and playing with each other. Kate especially enjoyed Scarlett's unique exersaucer.

Congratulations Grandaddy!

Grandaddy Matthews was named Principal of the Year for Harnett County. We went to the awards ceremony a few weeks ago. We love you and we're proud of you!!!!

To Florida We Go:

After Christmas, we traveled down to Florida to see Great Grandma Costa. Kate did a great job on the plane and became very attached to her new baby doll. She even had her very own seat on one flight. Grandma Costa had not met Miss Kate yet, so we surprised her. We were very glad to see her and spend time with her.

We hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas-

Kate's First Christmas-

Kate's favorite thing about the entire holiday was the tree. She loved looking at the ornaments and hearing her Dad explain the meaning of all the special ones. Her second favorite thing to do was to find her bow in her hair and pull it out-you can see her triumphant smile.

Christmas Eve

We spent Christmas Eve with the Matthews family and went to church with them. Grandma and Grandaddy have a replica of Santa's sleigh that Kate really enjoyed.

Grandma, where are my reindeer?

Kate and Scarlett

Kate and Baxter

Christmas Day

Christmas day was lots of fun. Nana and Uncle David came over Christmas morning to see what Santa had brought Kate. We had a nice brunch and helped Kate play with her new toys.

We then went to visit Grandaddy and Grandma again and play with cousin Scarlett.



Grandma and Grandaddy gave Kate her very own UNC Tarheels rocking chair. She loves it. She gets very upset if we don't help her get into it so she can rock away. Kate looks a bit under the weather in this picture as she was in the process of getting her first molar-those were some rough nights.