Abby has started her own little tradition of starting off each new year with a ghastly-looking black eye. Last January it was from a wild bath with her cousins; this year it was from tumbling off the bottom step and hitting the wall. I loved Abby's comment when she looked in the mirror a couple of days after the incident: "I look like a little dog!"

New Year's Visitors

Luke's parents, Nora and Scott, came to see us for a few days after Christmas. We had a fun time together!

We took them to the awesome (and free!) St. Louis Zoo, where Abby enjoyed using her new camera.

We brought in 2009 together!

We also took Grandma to The Magic House (St. Louis children's museum), where the highlight for Abby was painting and the highlight for Katie was the new "Jack in the Beanstalk" slide (very cute).

Grandpa was successful at making Baby Alex smile and even giggle.

Katie loves the American Girl baby doll that they brought for her.

Christmas Catch-Up

Well, life is finally settling down a bit . . . we've had an exciting few weeks! Even thought it's been a whole month since Christmas, I still wanted to share some pictures. We had a quiet St. Louis Christmas, the first one Luke and I have had together away from Utah. We missed everyone of course, but we also enjoyed the simplicity of being our own little family in our own home. Here are a few pictures.

Katie and Abby with some friends on Christmas Eve--we had dinner and games with a few families at our church building

Katie and Abby discovering the doll house that Santa brought

Katie pondering . . . and enjoying the dolly Abby gave her. (Abby was so cute when we did her Christmas shopping at Dollar Tree. She chose all the gifts herself, and they were all hits! Daddy got gummy bears, Katie this dolly, and Alex a little blanket.)

The cookie plate left out for Santa & crew

Alex trying out his new "Bumbo seat," with Katie supervising :)

Katie quickly getting the hang of unwrapping . . .

Abby modeling her new dress and putting her new "art kit" to good use

After a fun Christmas morning, we spent the afternoon at the home of some friends from church. It was a great day!

Daddy--Daughter Weekend

Carrie and Alex flew home to Salt Lake this weekend, leaving Dad, Abby, and Katie back home in St. Louis. We felt bad that we got ditched, but decided to make the most of our lot in life. The girls and I had a fantastic time together . . . and I accumulated a substantial number of points towards my future flyfishing expedition (at least that's what Carrie says!) Here is the evidence of the fun times we had:

Sleeping in front of the fire in our sleeping bags on Friday night

After setting up the sleeping bags and pads, Abby said, "this is way more

fun than I thought it was going to be with you, Dad!"

On Saturday we went to the Powder Valley Nature Center. Abby's favorite part was the animal puppets, Katie the "big green frog," and Daddy the large fish tank full of largemouth bass!

We had fun, just the three of us. But, we all can't wait to have Mom and Alex back home!

Luke and I have decided that this is us right now.* Thus the lack of blogging and updates . . . but we're working on it! In the meantime, I hope you're having a fabulous day! :)

*Courtesy of Mary Engelbreit, one of my very favorite artists of all time, who happens to live right here in St. Louis! (It's not like I've bumped into her at the grocery store or anything, but I still think it's cool.)