Christmas celebrations & Bringing in '09

We had a wonderful Christmas in Alabama.  Leslie's entire family lives within 20 miles of each other, so it's great that we get to see them all at the holidays.  We started off at Granny's on Christmas Eve with lots of delicious goodies and presents.  Here is Granny and Mom:

Here's  a shot of all the ladies - four generations of females only!  And my sister Ashley has one more girl on the way! :)

Me and my beautiful (& preggers) sister Ashley:

After Granny's we headed over to Grandmama and Grandaddy's for a fabulous Christmas Eve dinner and more presents.  Here is G'mama, Ashley, and my niece Rylie:

And Mom, Dad, and Aunt Susan... and check out the spread!  Yum-O!

Me and Susie:

G'mama and G'daddy with his new present:

And Rylie chilling out with her Uncle Wes:

On Christmas Day, for the first time in all my 29 years, we did not go anywhere!  Wes and I were at Mom and Dad's and we just relaxed, watched Christmas movies, and ate all day until Ashley, Josh, and Rylie came over that evening.  It was wonderful.  Here is Boston loving all his toys from his stocking that his Gram and Pop gave him:

Approximately 5 minutes after this picture was taken, he had ripped the head off the stuffed cat.  Oh well.

Mom and I made lots of treats on Christmas morning:

That evening we did our family's gifts.  Here is the awesome shirt we got my dad:

And for some reason I didn't take many pictures of us opening our presents, so that's all for that.  We had lots of fun, though, giving and receiving all the great gifts and spending time together!  After presents, we all watched "Christmas Vacation" which is the perfect ending to Christmas Day.

The day after Christmas we had our festivities at my Big Daddy and Nanny's house (my other grandparents), but I believe I forgot my camera and therefore have nothing to show for that day.  It was a great time too, though!

December 27th was my cousin Kiley's 8th birthday, and I am so happy she had a skating party!  Wes and I have been roller skating three times in the last four months -- it's been a good year.  Here is the birthday girl in her birthday shirt:

Rylie and I had a blast skating together.

And Wes had to show her the proper form at skee ball.

Later that day we had some Wal-Mart fun, of course.  We couldn't believe what we saw at the Gadsden, Alabama Wal-Mart!

Trust us, that is nothing like the real thing.  And Wes and Rylie having fun at the after Christmas sale - how cute are they?

Another highlight of the holidays was getting to see some dear, dear friends who were also in Gadsden visiting.  It was SO GREAT to see Brandie, Kinsey, Michael, Ashley, and their precious kids since this only happens once a year if we're lucky.  I have been friends with these girls for almost 20 years.  I cannot believe I can even say that.  Yikes!

So we drove the (terribly) long journey back to Buffalo and got ready to bring in the new year.  We had a Restoration Church staff Christmas/New Year's party on New Year's Eve and it was fun.  This is how you store your sparkling grape juice in Buffalo:

Here is a shot of everyone right after midnight enjoying our sparkling grape juice.  This is Alex, the executive pastor and his wife Jennifer.

And our children's minister, Derek, and his wife Michelle:

Here is Sam and Nick, Pastor Dan's 9 year old twin boys.  As you can see, they were excited to be awake past midnight.

And the pastor, Dan, and his wife Gina:

And us:

Whew, that was a lot of pictures.  What can I say?  I love pictures!

Our first real blizzard, and part 1 of Christmas 2008

First of all, we of course have to include some pics of our Boston.  Here we are doing his favorite thing - cuddling.

And here he is under the blanket his Nana knitted for us.  He loves to get under it and stick his nose out to sniff.

So the week before Christmas, we experienced our first real snow storm in Buffalo.  The only time we had ever seen this kind of thing was the big snow storm of 1993 in Alabama!  We had to go out and play obviously!  This is in our front yard.  Check out how deep it is:

And I thought I'd throw in a pic of our cute little tree.

Back to the snow.  Here is our balcony.  The snow is up to the seats of the chairs!

This is in front of our house as we were leaving to drive south for Christmas:

And here's our little Saturn amidst the snow:  (Isn't the street beautiful, though?!)

We set out for the 11 hour drive to Nashville while we were under a lake effect snow warning.  It was not fun.  For the first 6 hours of the drive, we were in snow and had to go 20-40 miles per hour.  Here are some shots of what we were driving through in New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio:

We were SO excited when we saw our first bit of grass that wasn't covered in snow about 6 hours into the trip.  Needless to say, the drive to Nashville took 14 hours instead of 11, but we were very thankful to make it there safely.

The next day, we met several of our Nashville friends at Chick-fil-A for lunch.  We had to eat there since the nearest one to Buffalo is 105 miles away. :(  Man, it was good!  Here are the dudes - Kevin, Wes, Zeb, and David:

And the girls - Melodie, Amber, Sara, Leslie, and Jennifer:

The Brown family also came out to eat with us.  Here is Chanda and Cadence:

Sweet Cayla:

And here we are playing with smiley Annika:

It was really great to get to see and hang out with our Nashville peeps for a little bit!  After lunch, Wes, Boston and I got back in the car for the rest of the drive to Gadsden, AL.  The 3 hours was nothing compared to the 14 hours the day before!  I'll share about our Christmas celebrations in the next post.  Hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and a fabulous New Year's!

Alabamians in Yankee Country

It's been a while because we've been busy!  My (Leslie's) parents came up to Buffalo for a visit this past week and we had a fabulous time.  This was only my parents' second time ever flying, and their first time ever flying together.  This was also their first time in New York, and actually the farthest north they've ever been, so it was a totally new experience for them.  We took lots and lots of pictures, so I will put a lot up here.

They got to Buffalo on Tuesday, and we woke up Wednesday to snow falling!  It was perfect.  As you can see, mom and dad were very excited.

It ended up being very cold and snowy for the week they were here, and it didn't melt until the day they left.  Here we are at Dolci, a great little dessert spot near our house.  They had their first cannoli here and loved it of course.  Delish!

We walked up and down our neighborhood, Elmwood Village, and enjoyed all the little shops and the beautiful old homes.

On Friday night, Wes performed at a coffee house, and we had a good time hanging out and listening to our favorite musician.

On Saturday, it was beautifully sunny and totally freezing.  We went out to the harbor area on Lake Erie and enjoyed the sights.

Then we warmed up by introducing the parents to the best fast food in Buffalo: Mighty Taco.  Mmmmmm, super mighty.

Then we went over to Delaware Park near our house.  As you can see here, the lake is totally frozen and snowed over.

And of course I need to throw in a little pic of Boston and his cigar.

On Sunday we hit Niagara Falls!  It was gorgeous with the snow around it.  Up on the observation deck, the wind and mist from the falls was unbelievably strong and we were pretty much frozen.  But it was still amazing and fun!

On our last night we went to dinner at Bada Bing and dang it was good!  I recommend the bada-bacon-burger.

Well, that's been our last week.  We're getting ready to head out to Alabama for Christmas on Monday and we also get to stop through Nashville to see friends.  We're very excited to spend time with family and friends, eat treats, give and get gifts, and of course celebrate our Savior Jesus Christ!  Hope everyone has a merry little Christmas!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

First of all, this is a store down the street from us, and I just really want to call them and ask them what their hours are...

Anyway, hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving.  We had a good time at our friends' house even though we were missing family.  We came home that evening and got right into the Christmas spirit by putting up our tree and decorations! Yay!

Even Boston got into the spirit.  Doesn't he look so distinguished in his Santa hat?!?! :)

Saturday wasn't so great on the football front.  The best and most anticipated game of the year - Auburn vs. Alabama - was on, but obviously it didn't end the way we had hoped.

This was actually the first time Auburn has lost against Alabama since we've been married, so it was a sad day. We still love our Auburn Tigers, though, and we'll get them next year!  

On a side note, notice in the background the cute stockings hung on an actual fireplace for the first time!! Love it!