A Wrap-up on 2008

We finished out the year 2008 with a bang! On the Saturday after Christmas, we celebrated with Dave's family here in Charlotte. It was fun to have everyone together and to have a chance to use our new Christmas china too!


Here we are cooking in our new aprons, getting ready for lunch with the Bachmanns!

In keeping with tradition, Dave made Savannah wear her stocking after opening it. She seems to be saying "Daddy, please, this is so silly."

Alyssa and Savannah. They don't come much cuter!

The Bachmanns and Weningers

After going to church on Sunday, where Savannah threw a complete fit not wanting to stay in her Sunday school class and ended up in big church with us, we decided to go ahead and take the Christmas decorations down. Good thing we did, because Dave was up all night pretty sick with the stomach virus. He stayed home from work on Monday so it was pretty bad! (There is another example of God at work! Surgery was originally scheduled for Monday. It would have been next to impossible to have surgery with Dave so out of commission.) Trying to get Savannah out of the house for awhile, we ventured to Discovery Place on Monday morning. Then it was off to my doctor's appointment. At least now I know that when in a bind, Savannah is a perfect angel in the presence of a doctor!

I also had an anesthesiologist appointment on Tuesday, which I thankfully had a sitter for! It was long and boring, but one more step towards surgery on Tuesday. Speaking of, we're still set to go next week. Hopefully I have all of my ducks in a row and will be ready to be away from home for 3 days. My mom is coming on Monday night and staying through Thursday morning. Then Dave's mom comes Thursday afternoon and stays through Saturday. It will be so nice to have someone to keep my sweet little girl entertained for a few days as I'm not sure how out of commission I will be for awhile. Anxiety is starting to build each time I think about the surgery, but I have to remember that He is in complete control, that He already knows the outcome, and that He has this precious baby in the palm of His hands. As my friend Jenny said this week, it doesn't matter what the doctor says, God is bigger!

Wednesday we finally made it back to Savannah's My Gym class which was perfect timing! During the afternoon after naptime we got out another Christmas gift, the Play doh set. I could hardly believe that it kept her attention for an hour straight! WOW! I don't even mind the mess when it keeps her occupied for that long. :)

Dave and I decided to go to bed early last night (yes, we're old) as the way I reasoned it out, today would still be 2009 whether we stayed up or not. At least with going to be early I could be rested and enjoy today! Honestly that's the first time EVER when I haven't stayed up for the New Year, but it sure was nice to get a good nights sleep. Today we've made a trip to Harris Teeter for triples and plan to watch the Clemson bowl game in a few minutes. Speaking of triples, as we wrap up the year, here are our annual coupon savings: Grocery stores $3276.29 and other stores $2165.45 - for a whopping total of $5441.74 just by clipping coupons!!!

What a year this has been. We have had many exciting times as well as sad times, but have seen first hand God at work. I couldn't be more thankful to have such an incredible husband, daughter, and to be blessed with another baby on the way. So, this year my New Year's Resolutions involve these precious people. I plan to work on being a better wife and mommy. To really seek how to be a Proverbs 31 woman who works diligently WITHOUT COMPLAINING. It's a super big challenge, but I'm up for it.

Happy New Year to all of our family and friends!

Merry Christmas!!

Christmas Eve this year was quite different from ones in the past. We found out Wednesday morning that my grandmother was admitted to the hospital for dehydration from the stomach bug that seems to be going around, so our annual gift opening and dinner at her house just wasn't the same without her there. We did decide to go ahead and open gifts since it's so hard to get everyone together and also since the gifts were anxiously awaiting opening by three little kids! Here are a couple of our pictures from Christmas Eve at Grandma Page's house.

Here is Uncle Mark with Maddie, Dillon, and Savannah. He had to leave shortly after dinner to go stay with Grandma at the hospital.

One of my favorite gifts was matching aprons!! Are we cute or what? I can't wait to get started cooking for Dave's family who will arrive today with my helper by my side.

Savannah in her "fur" vest putting baby to bed in her new doll bed.

Then we were off to mom's for the night and to await the delicious Christmas morning breakfast. We opened gifts at mom's Christmas morning and then packed up our car and headed back to Charlotte to do our own Christmas. Plus, Santa gifts were waiting!!

Here is Savannah playing with the houses at mom's

Maddie is having a blast on top of the car at Granny's house!

We finally arrived home and after a good nap we let Savannah open Santa presents. Here she is wearing her new coat and carrying her ladybug umbrella. She played with those two things all night; who would have thought she would like them more than some toys from Santa! You can see part of her loot in the background. Boy did our little girl get WAY TOO much stuff! I have to say that seeing her eyes light up was so worth all of the effort put into Christmas this year.

Now we await the arrival of Dave's family to open yet more presents! This has been an awesome week and I am so thankful that we have family close enough to celebrate with everyone for the holiday.

I hope each of you had a wonderful Christmas with your family too! Merry Christmas!!!

The Fun Begins

Today Savannah and I travelled to Cherryville to visit with my sweet friend Marie and her family who had flown in from New Jersey. We always have such a great time just catching up and visiting with Marie, Adam, Brody, and of course Sue!! We missed Marie's dad this year as he was at work, but his house was still very welcoming. Oh how I wish Marie and Adam lived closer . . . I miss them!

Savannah did great in the car, mostly because Brody gave her this cool Leap Frog letter set that she loves! All I have heard all day is "I go get my letters now. I play with letters now. Can you find _ mom?" When we got home we had lunch and apparently Savannah didn't get enough. When I asked her what else she wanted she replied "I have nothing idea."

Tomorrow should be another fun day with the three cousins together again . . . pictures to follow for sure!

A BLUE Night

As they say, all good things must come to an end . . . and our perfect day ended in a very blue way about 2:00 this morning. Savannah started crying "mommy, mommy" and I went in to find her, the bed, pillow, blanket, etc. covered in blueberries. I'll spare the details, but let's just say that I "slept" on the floor of her room and assisted her at least 4 more times with being sick. It seems like every year we have the stomach virus and bronchitis right before Christmas. Hopefully Dave and I will stay well and we'll all be healthy for Christmas this year.

A Heavenly Day

Today has been just about perfect! My little angel woke up this morning in one of the best moods I can remember and has been the sweetest child all day long!!! Seriously, she woke up and said she needed to potty, went pee pee on the potty, easily got dressed and didn't pitch a fit about what I wanted her to wear, was delightful on our long walk, and didn't even cry when I told her she couldn't have a cookie at Harris Teeter because she had already had birthday cake. Here are some pictures from our morning.

See my little angel in red? She sat perfectly quiet while Miss Jessica read the Christmas story at the Happy Birthday Jesus party this morning. Oh, as a side note, she was very excited about giving the new Dora doll to Toys For Tots. She said that "it was for a girl who has no presents under her tree."

There she is again . . . waiting patiently for her slice of birthday cake. Thanks Jessica for an awesome party. We loved it!!

Then, onto the grocery store where she was great too, especially considering how much stuff I had to buy!! So when we finally got home, we unloaded the groceries and had lunch outside (well in the garage with the door open). What a beautiful day today! Who would ever even know it was Christmastime with this 70 degree weather!

I just hope she is this pleasant after her nap!

Christmas Update

Things have been insane around here! With trying to figure out surgery plans, finishing the Christmas shopping and cards, entertaining a toddler with bronchitis, and trying to keep myself from eating another entire bag of Cheetos I've been going non-stop! I thought I had all of the shopping done last week, but then Dave reminded me that he needed to get gifts for his employees. Thankfully I wrapped up every last bit of shopping this past Sunday and finished wrapping the last gift for Savannah (not including Santa) today as it was delivered yesterday! So with 45 presents under our tree, we're D.O.N.E.!!!

This isn't the greatest picture, but I continue my philosophy of not needing a tree skirt with so many presents! That's a lot of shopping and wrapping!

Dave has been a huge help these past few weeks. Although being quite overwhelmed at work, he has continued to come home each night and just take over with Savannah after dinner. He has also been in charge of our elf's travels. Here is the latest location. Savannah enjoys finding him each morning, although sometimes he does forget to move.

On the baby front, I've actually started to feel better. :) Yesterday was so beautiful here in Charlotte so Savannah and I took advantage of the weather and went for a long walk. I guess I've been on the treadmill too long and forgot how hilly our neighborhood is . . . plus that I'm pregnant so last night my calves were quite sore. At least I got a good workout! Then this morning my arms were throbbing from doing over an hour of raking yesterday too. Savannah wanted to play outside so I had to make use of that time by doing some much needed yard work. It was an awesome day and today is almost just as warm!! I went walking at 6:30 in shorts and short sleeves this morning. Craziness.

Well, I'm off to make use of the rest of my WEE school time.

It Broke My Heart

Today at My Gym Savannah wanted to swing in her favorite caterpillar swing along with another girl. The swing is so cute and safely holds two children facing each other. So in she goes and the other child's mom and I start talking. Of course one of the first things she asks me is how old Savannah is. I told her almost 2 1/2 and her eyes grew an entire size. Before I could even say how Savannah has always been big for her age and how it was okay because she was all proportional, Savannah chimed in "I a big girl". My heart breaks just thinking about the fact that Savannah knows she's bigger than most girls her age. I guess she's heard that one too many times from yours truly . . . so no more! I vow never again to talk about Savannah's size in front of her. I do not want her to grow up thinking that she is different or fat and it makes me sad to think I may have already ingrained this image in her mind. :(

Want an extra $.99?

Okay, so most of you reading this are going to think I'm crazy, and yes, pregnancy has made me a little more loony, but this is too good not not share. It all started a few months ago when Dave and I were trying to get rid of a credit card. It's one of those rebate cards where they automatically credit your account every month with a percentage of your purchases. So, being the thrifty person I am, I was trying to get our rebates to the point where I would lose the smallest amount of money in rewards. I had it figured out so that after our rebates credited we would only owe $.97 cents and then we could pay off the card and close the account.

Well, guess what happened? When the statement came it showed a balance of $0 and had a credit adjustment on the account for $.97. So, basically they gave me almost a $1 not to have to deal with collecting the $.97! Long story short, this has worked with two different credit cards for 5 months now! Can you believe it? Each month the day before the statement closes, I pay off the credit cards leaving a balance of only $.99 and when the statement comes they've adjusted the balance to $0!

I've calculated that the minimal interest we earn on our checking account (on the average credit card balance) is less than the $.99 we make by paying off the cards early, before the statements end. So there you go, an easy way to make some extra money!

We Are SOOO EXCITED . . .

I've been waiting to finally make the big blog post, but we are so excited to finally announce . . . that Baby Bachmann #2 is due to arrive this coming June 24!! Dave and I couldn't be more excited and are anxious to soon find out if we'll have another girl or a sweet baby boy. We've known for awhile that I was pregnant, actually Savannah knew even before Dave! She announced that her "mommy had a baby in her tummy" to the childcare workers at church the very morning I took the first (of many) tests . . . and I hadn't said a word to her!

Anyway, please be praying for us, specifically the health of the baby and myself. At the first ultrasound, my doctor found a very large cyst (about the size of an orange) on my ovary. She feels that the risks are less to operate second trimester than to try to wait until after delivery to remove the cyst. So, my surgery is scheduled for January 6. It's a very scary time for all of us, but I have to trust that God is in complete control. As my friend Elaine said, He is not surprised by any of the details of this pregnancy or surgery.

I'll be sure to keep the blog posted with details, but for now, I feel like it's a boy!

Thanksgiving Gatherings

This year we decided to make two trips to celebrate Thanksgiving. We travelled South on I-85 for Thanksgiving Day with Dave's family and then we travelled North on I-85 to do Thanksgiving with my family on Saturday. It was quite a bit of travelling but we truly enjoyed our time with both of our families. Here are some pictures from our adventures!

First, Greenville, SC. Savannah and Alyssa. Are they cute or what?!

They also enjoyed putting on a concert for everyone there!

The Bachmanns and Weningers

Savannah was still exhausted from Thanksgiving and fell asleep on the way to Burlington. Nice glasses!

Here are the missing monkeys! Savannah loved playing with her other cousins at grandma's house.

What an awesome time to reflect on all that we have to be thankful for. Friends, family, children, and blessings too many to count. We are truly thankful!!