2015 Minutes

2015 felt like about 15 minutes.  A very action packed 15 minutes!  The last few months have been particularly busy.  We celebrated Thanksgiving in Wichita, enjoyed Christmas at home, celebrated Tom and Amy’s birthdays, started another soccer season, had snowball fights, and graduated Natalie to a big girl bed.  Wow!

We spent Thanksgiving with Tom’s extended family.  Tom's aunts, uncles, and cousins from his father's side of the family gathered in Wichita with his grandparents.  We were certainly grateful to see four generations of family celebrate the day together.

Christmas was very fun this year.  This was the first year that Natalie really "got it" and Harrison was in full blown excitement mode.  We spent Christmas Eve at Tom's sister's house, along with about 30 other family and friends.  Christmas Eve is also Tom's birthday, and Amy and the kids helped make it special.  They worked very hard to make a "custom" birthday card that Tom will remember forever.

Christmas morning was a blast.  Santa dropped off quite a haul and the kids, and they enjoyed many special gifts from friends and families.  Harrison is really into Legos, Transformers, Star Wars, and baseball gear.  And Natalie is having tons of fun with a small doll house, puzzles, and more puzzles.  Santa brought them a Paw Patrol "Paw Patroler" toy that they actually share quite well!

For the most part, we've been incredibly lucky with the weather.  Between the random 60 degree winter days we have only experienced one real snow, and the kids made the most of it with snowball fights, sledding, and hot chocolate!  And the weather didn't stop soccer for Harrison.  He has had fun with an indoor league and made some new friends (like the giant stuffed dog below).  Soccer, and what seem like weekly birthday parties for friends, we've stayed pretty active.  

Amy also celebrated a birthday in December.  To celebrate, we decided to get fancy and take the family out to dinner at a nice restaurant.  Going out to dinner with everyone is always kind of a gamble, but we knew it would be a "memorable experience" no matter what.  Fortunately, the kids were incredibly well behaved and we all had a wonderful time.  It was the perfect end to an incredible 2015.

Most recently, Natalie has graduated out of her crib and is now sleeping in a big girl bed.  She was actually starting to jump out of her crib, so it was time!  She's adapted really well to the new bed, and does seem quite proud of this big milestone.