Christmas in Ohio

We're ready for our presents now! Taylor with cousin Braun man.
Braun (14 months) Taylor (27 months)

Taylor with her Papa John

We are back in Texas after 10 days in Ohio. We are happy to be back, but miss family already. We had a great time, even though two nights it happened to dip down into single digit temperatures!

Taylor made out like a bandit like always, and Joe and I couldn't have asked for a better time spent with family and friends. Taylor got so many gifts - and the ones that made the top of her happiness list was a princess dress from cousin Ellen that she wore for two days, a toddler-proof camera from Grandma Nosy (we tried to call my mom GMA Nezzy, but Tay had other ideas for her name), and a Little People's town from Mamaw and Papa.

Taylor was absolutely perfect on the plane ride home Monday - falling asleep on my lap after each take-off and waking up as we landed!!!!!!! I think she was detoxing from all the sugar and candy her grandmas kept feeding her!! I'll get you both back some day! :)

Happy New Year!!

Love,

Katie

Our non-racing trip to Dallas.....

We headed to Dallas this weekend. Orinignally we planned for cousin Emily from Ohio to come to Midland to help take care of Taylor and Joe after Joe's toncilectomy on December 10 while I raced in the White Rock race in Dallas. Everything changed - Joe cancelled his surgery, and I got sick and had to stop training just two weeks before the race. BUT, we still had Emily come down and we all decided to take the trip to Dallas, support the team for Mr. Will and get some Christmas shopping done! We had a great time and here are the pictures from the past few weeks....
Emily and Taylor on a break from driving!

Taylor hanging some ornaments from Aunt Jane!

Drinking and driving on a fun new toy a coworker was so kind to give to us!

And this is currently how our potty training is going. Yes, she sat on the sidewalk and peed. Oh, and this doesn't show how about an hour later she poo-d on the living room floor. Thank God for sidewalks and tile!

fun weekend with the starkey's!

random pictures from this past weekend...

make sure she gets the last drop of cheerios and milk!!

getting caught!!

hanging out at fiddlesticks with the rest of ConocoPhillips.

joe and taylor sliding down the slide!! she loved it, joe was a bit scared!

playing in the sand!

CHRISTMAS!!!!

yes! we put up the Christmas decorations early so we could enjoy them!!taylor helping us out - having great conversation with joe during the assembly!

we found this barbie doll during the unpacking process! she loves it! thanks aunt kathie!

drinking hot chocolate and loving every second of it!

long leg taylor enjoying the "leg lamp" christmas story ornament! :)

the candy day.....

i LOVED halloween growing up because it meant eating tons of candy. right?! well, as a parent of a well-aware toddler, i dislike this day very much. however, after her sugar rush, she slept 12.5 hours. the down fall - all her teeth will fall out in the near future. just kidding. we dressed taylor up for our office trick or treat party this year. they created a safe area where the kids could walk around to each office and we got to take a few hours to socialize with our coworkers and their kids. we dressed taylor up in her flower girl dress and added hot pink wings, hot pink tights and her white striderites, added a tiara and woala - she's a punk rock 80's fairy! enjoy... taylor, our little fairy

"cany, cany, cany!!!!!"

still time for a conference call in between tricking and treating.

ah yes, the joe dirt wig made an appearance last night as we were getting ready for bed. she so looks like the real little joe dirt!

Random Fall.....

i found some random pictures when getting Taylor's halloween pictures up here. enjoy...

taylor wearing her cool new horse turtle neck from aunt jamie. fortunately we were able to run into lyndsy dunn's family at HEB so of course, we'll be getting one for josiah now too. he was quite fond of it.

taylor sleeping in the car

taylor and mommy on the slide

taylor on her new bike... she'll be able to ride it in the next few years!

new shoes, and stuff

taylor's grandma jeanette sent two new pairs of tennis shoes that arrived yesterday! i had taken taylor's diaper off and let her run around the house as we are attempting to potty train again. so, i have this naked butt that wants to try on her new shoes while doing a webcam with grandma jeanette. after a few minutes of chatting taylor ran off and this is where we found her - she had climbed up onto one of the dining room chairs and had grabbed a banana and sat there just like this until she finished the entire thing. classic...