Greek Festival 2009

This past Saturday, we attended the Greek festival at the Greek Orthodox church in Nashville. Lily Catherine had a BLAST playing and dancing with her cousin Andrew while Charlotte slept soundly in the Ergo for almost the entire time we were there.

Lily Catherine had more fun dancing on the dance floor between the performances of the Greek Dancers. She also loved watching all of the dancers while we were eating dinner.

For dinner we got to have all of our favorite traditional Greek dishes including Pisticcio, Mousaka, Gyros, Loukoumades, and Baklava Sundays.

After dinner, Lily Catherine caught sight of all of the inflatable fun and we spent the rest of the evening playing on those.

Just before heading home, we went back inside the church to say good-bye to Great-Papou who was working at the Greek Grocery stand. Let's just say that Lily Catherine made out pretty well since just before we left Papou bought her a sweet "Love My Papou" shirt (which she put on immediately after we got home), and she convinced Randy to buy her a hotpink "jingle skirt" that is now her favorite thing to wear around the house.

Welcome Baby Charlotte!

On August 7, 2009 at 3:28AM

Charlotte Elizabeth Bury

joined our family weighing in a 8 lbs, 6 oz and measuring 19 3/4 inches.

I just had to share these!

The weekend before Charlotte was born, we took Lily Catherine to the park to do a quick two-year-old photo shoot. At 39 weeks pregnant (and in early August in Nashville!) it wasn't easy to chase her around, but I was determined to get some photos of her before the new one came along. I didn't want to miss out on those last days before she started to look more and more like a "big kid" than a baby. Let's just say that braving the heat was so worth it. I love the photos that I got!

The New Nursery

The new nursery has been a work in progress now for months,
but I think we have finally completed all of the finishing touches!

We decided to leave the walls the original blue that they were when we moved into the house regardless of whether or not we were having a boy or a girl. For the first half of the pregnancy I really thought we were having a boy, and I had picked out a green, blue and white plaid fabric to be use in the nursery.

When we found out we were having another girl, I knew that I wanted to use the nursery rhyme toile fabric called "Over the Moon" that I had found at the fabric store when Lily Catherine was about 6 months old. However, the fabric has a white background and our crib is white, so I needed to find some coordinating fabrics to match. I set out to find just the right blue and pink striped fabric, but I couldn't find anything that worked. I spent countless hours driving from one fabric store to the next to find things that would coordinate with one another just the way I wanted. It took three stores to find gather all the fabric I used.

Then came the really long part... SEWING all of the room decor. I must say that this took A LOT longer than I expected it to take, and I will definitely think twice before ever embarking on something this ambitious again, but I am really happy with how it all turned out.

The Crib

The Bumper

The Window Seat

The Valance

The Pillows on the Bench

Close-up of the Bench that Randy built

The Diaper Stacker

Summer 2009

We have been so busy preparing for the arrival of baby girl #2 that I have been very bad about updating our blog with what has been going on this summer. YIKES! I can't believe that our last post was after our trip to Texas. (Courtney, I really expect you to keep me more on top of this thing ;) ). I also have a tendency to get photos up on Facebook and forget about the blog. Hopefully I'll get better at sitting down and doing both at the same time.

Summer Water Fun!

We have spent nearly every weekend this summer on the boat on Center Hill Lake. Lily Catherine is really starting to love going just as much as we do. It's also a great way for the entire family (both dogs included) to spend time together. Lily Catherine has actually started jumping into the water off of the front of the boat and swimming a little with her life jacket on.

On the days that we're not on the lake, we have been at the pool. Again, Lily Catherine is jumping in and even learning to swim with the aid of a floaty swimsuit.

Our Little Artist!

Not a day goes by that Lily Catherine has not engaged in some kind of artistic endeavor. She LOVES LOVES LOVES to paint, draw, and color. She has at least a box of 64 crayons in nearly every room in the house. She also will draw on just about anything (including herself) if given the chance, so I am constantly monitoring her to make sure that her little creations are making it on to paper and not the walls or the floor. For her birthday, she got a week of Art Camp at Cheekwood. She still asks to go to art camp almost every day. I am just waiting until Tuesdays for Tots starts back up so we can at least have Tuesday Art Camp at Cheekwood (on the weeks we actually make it there). Otherwise, we'll continue having At-Home Art Camp.

The Big 2!

On June 17, Lily Catherine celebrated her 2nd birthday and the following Saturday we had a wonderful birthday party at the Red Caboose Park in Bellevue. I am pretty sure that it turned out to be the hottest day in June that day, but everyone seemed to have a great time despite the heat. We were also SO thankful to all of our friends and family who brought dog food and dog treats to donate to the Humane Society instead of gifts. Lily Catherine has plenty already, and one thing we know is that she LOVES dogs. We can't go near pet stores on adoption days because she wants to bring all the puppies and dogs home with us.

Looking Ahead!

We have so much in store for our family in the next few weeks. Baby Sister (no name yet!) should be here any day now, and I have been sewing like crazy making the crib set and nursery decor (photos to come SOON!) I have also made several new outfits for the new baby, and I am now working on clothes Fall clothes for Lily Catherine. So far I have 2 of about 8 outfits finished for her, but several of them are works in progress right now, and a few are nearing completion. Lily Catherine begins Ballet classes in September at the same dance school that I attended for 15 years. I am so excited about this, and I think she is too since all she kept saying when we went to register her was "I want to dance!"

New updates should be coming sooner rather than later. I've already packed the camera cord so that we can upload photos of the new one right in the hospital.

Stay Tuned...

The Texas Trip (Part 2)

Dallas
March 29-April 1

The morning after the wedding we headed straight for the airport to take a quick flight to Dallas to visit the Patnode family (Todd, Molly, Brendan, and Abaigeal).

It had been about 6 months since the last time we got to see them, and Lily Catherine had so much fun with her older cousins. The week was full with lacrosse games, baseball games, and taking the big kids to school. Lily Catherine even learned to say "MOO" when she saw the cows on the ranches going to and from school.

Lily Catherine and Abaigeal had SO much fun together. We still here her ask for "Abba" or "Abby" almost every day.

On Wednesday, after the kids went to school, we headed towards downtown Dallas to go and visit SMU and McCartneys (the store where I worked during college). Lily Catherine got an SMU pom pom, a hoodie sweatshirt, and a Peruna stuffed animal (Peruna is the SMU mascot). She also rean around around campus going up and down the steps of Dallas Hall with Randy about 20 times and trying to get as close as we would let her get to the fountain.

After a fun trip around campus, we jumped back into the car to go to the airport and head home. Lily Catherine actually walked all the way onto the plane all by herself for the very first time. When we found our seats she looked out the window and kept saying "Bye Bye" to Texas.

We're looking forward to another chance to get back to Dallas soon (but probably not before baby number 2 makes her debut), so that we will have more time to also catch-up with all of our Texas friends.

The Texas Trip (Part 1)

Houston
March 27-29

On March 27th Lily Catherine and I flew to Houston to attend Uncle Erik and Michelle's wedding. Randy had already left the day before, so that he could be there in time for the Bachelor party/Golf outing festivities. Even though we lived in Texas for 5 years. We had never been to Houston before.

We had a great time on Friday night at the rehearsal dinner. Lily Catherine especially liked playing with the balloons with Auntie Courtney.

On Saturday morning we were excited to get to have brunch with Jeff and Robyn Kozan, some friends from Dallas who we haven't seen in awhile. It was great to get to catch-up. Then it was time to go and get ready for the wedding.

As you can see, both Randy and Lily Catherine were in the wedding. Lily Catherine was the flower girl. She was SO excited to go down the aisle that I had a hard time making her wait her turn until all of the bridesmaids had gone down. The plan was for her to meet Randy at the end of the aisle, and then he would walk her back to me, so that I could hold her during the ceremony. I told her she was supposed to go straight to daddy. She ran about 3/4 of the way down the aisle and then decided it would be more fun to have daddy ch6ase her (a game she plays at home all the time). She spun around and ran straight back to me with Randy following her. I scooped her up and we walked to our reserved place in the pew and Randy went back to his spot with the groomsmen.

The problem was that I had told Lily Catherine that she was going to go to daddy, so she spent the next few minutes screaming out "DADDY! DADDY!" Lily Catherine and I ended up in the courtyard outside the sanctuary for most of the ceremony.

At the reception, we changed Lily Catherine into a different "party dress." We mingled outside for a bit before sitting down for a yummy dinner. Thankfully Auntie Sarah took Lily Catherine outside to throw leaves in the pond so that Randy and I would have a chance to eat. Lily Catherine hung in there at the reception for awhile, even leading Randy out onto the dance floor to dance, but when it was time to sit down to watch the newlyweds cut the cake she passed out in my arms and then slept on the table for about an hour until it was time to go.