Happy New Year

The beginning of 2007

The end of 2007


Mike and I were talking earlier today about New Years past and how exciting they used to be as we would figure out what plans we were going to have. It was 7 years ago tonight that we shared our first kiss as midnight struck. This years plans are a little different. We put our daughter to bed around 7:30, we are making dinner as I type and we are going to take down our christmas tree. Wow, the excitement. The funny thing is, we couldn't have pictured it any other way. These are the kinds of nights that make us happy, home together as a family. Mike may see midnight strike as he is much more of a night owl than I am, I am sure I will be fast asleep as 2008 arrives...

As we say goodbye to 2007 we can't help but feel a little sad over the change of the year. 2007 will no doubt be remembered as one of the best years of our lives. The year our daughter was born has brought us much happiness, some tears, and no question, many memories. We welcome the new year however with open arms as we have no doubt that this year will bring many more memories and much happiness. 2007 was filled with other memories in addition to Hadley's birth... Jill began a new job and one that she loves, we celebrated our second year of marriage, we saw the birth of many friend's babies and spent lots of time with loved ones. We continue to be thankful for our blessings and look forward to a new year of many more. Happy New Year to all of our family and friends, we love you all!

Hanging with mom

Here's a pic of Hadley and mom hanging out! We have really enjoyed our christmas break together, it has been great spending so much time with each other!!!

Orion Anthony

Hadley has a new friend and it's a BOY! Becky and Kevin welcomed Orion Anthony Holmes into the world at 7:35 Friday evening. He weighed in at 8 lbs 6 ounces and was 21 1/2 inches long. Everyone is healthy and doing great. Congrats Bec and Kevin!!! Check out Becky and Kevin's blog, the Holmes Family, to the right...

Melanie and Anson came to visit us last night, here are a couple pics of the adults for a change!

The last of Christmas and exciting news!

Hadley enjoying her new wagon!

Here are the last pics of Christmas, these are from Grandma and Grandpa Schwenzen's.

On the exciting news end of things, Hadley decided to save her christmas present for mom and dad until this morning... She gave us her first step this morning!!! It was so exciting! She has been walking the last couple of weeks just holding on to someone with one hand so we knew it was coming, but this morning she decided to go for it and both mom and dad got to see her first solo step!!!

On the other end of exciting news, we are still waiting for baby Holmes to make his or her way into the world. Due yesterday, the little one must have decided that he or she wanted a day all to him or herself and didn't want to share it's birthday with Christmas, so hopefully we'll have some news soon. We know that mommy and daddy Holmes are getting very tired of waiting for the baby to be here and we definitely can understand that! Come on baby Holmes, we're all dying to know, are you a boy or a girl??? Then, in just 5 days baby Ellmaker is due so we are eagerly awaiting his or her arrival also!!! Such excitement!

Christmas Morning

Santa stopped and left lots of nice presents at our house Christmas morning. Hadley got a lounging Elmo that is as big as she is! She was thrilled to see that sitting under the tree and she immediately went to him. The third and fourth pictures are of Mom's special present for Dad. The one where Mike is reading is of him reading this...

Mike, my present to this year requires a story first...
My favorite memory of my life with you to date was the morning the second day we had Hadley home from the hospital. She hadn't slept the entire night and you and I were taking turns just holding her, rocking her and comforting her. I had just woken up and I went into Hadley's room where you guys were. You had turned her rocking chair around so it was looking directly out the window in her room. You had Hadley in your arms and were playing Louis Armstrong on the boombox in her room quietly. I came up to you and looked at you and you had tears in your eyes. I asked you if you were okay and you just looked at me and said, "I am watching the first sunrise with my daughter" and the tears slipped down your face. This gift is something to forever capture that memory.

The painting was painted by one of Mike's high school classmates that is now an accomplished artist. She painted this just for us based on the story I emailed her of that morning. Mike was in love with his gift!!!

The Fam

A couple family pictures when we are all dressed up!

Christmas #2

Here are some pics from Christmas number two at Grandma and Grandpa Jankowski's house. Hadley got the tickle me elmo and when she realized what was in the box, daddy couldn't get it out fast enough. Her obsession with elmo continues!

A night before christmas

Papa and Hadley had a little (actually a really big) story time.

A visit from the big guy

One of the most exciting parts of our weekend was that Santa came by for a visit. Hadley was intrigued with the big guy and enjoyed sitting on his lap, checking out his beard and ringing his bells. He left her lots of presents that she enjoyed opening.

Baking Cookies

We just returned from part one of Christmas, celebrating with Mimi and Papa in Appleton. We had a great time. In these pics we had a cookie baking session. It was lots of fun. We were going to take Hadley sledding for the first time, but ended up needing to stay indoors because of the weather. The cookies were a fun idea!

10 Months Old

Hadley is 10 months old today. We continue to be amazed by her. Just two months from now she will have been in our lives for an entire year. Sometimes it feels like two minutes, sometimes it feels like she has always been here because we couldn't imagine life without her. She seems to learn something new every day and has developed a little personality of her very own. We just adore her and cannot wait to experience the holidays with her for the first time.

Elmo and penguin

Hadley has a new love, actually two new loves... stuffed Elmo and stuffed penguin. She LOVES them. In fact she won't go anywhere without them unless she gets preoccupied enough with something else that she forgets them, but as soon as she gets sight of them she must have them immediately. Tonight she was walking with her walking toy and Elmo and penguin had to come along. I thought it was cute to see her with one animal in each hand walking the walker.

A weekend at home

I had to put a couple cute ones since I posted the other one below this post! Enjoy! Nothing exciting to report, we had a nice weekend at home this weekend. We got the christmas tree up and decorated and surprisingly, Hadley isn't overly interested in pulling on the branches or ornaments, at least yet. Other than that, we purchased a new washer and dryer since ours decided that winter and right before the holidays was a good time to die on us. Oh well, isn't that how it always works!!!

STOP TAKING PICTURES OF ME!!!!

That's what this picture screams to me, I found it hilarious!!!!

Christmas tree shopping

Tonight Mike, Lindsay, Hadley and I went to pick out our christmas trees. Mike and Lindsay have had a tradition of going together the last couple years to get the trees for Lindsay's house and our house. This year, Hadley and I joined them. It was a very beautiful night with snowflakes falling as we checked out the trees!

Saturday night at the Schwenzen house

So, there is currently some sort of winter storm going on outside. We are warmly tucked in the house safe and sound listening to the ice hit the side of the house, thanking God we aren't outside. Just thought I would post a few pics of Hadley playing tonight. The first two I just thought were cute and the last one shows just how crazy our house is when Hadley is playing, toys EVERYWHERE!