Birthday Princess

Happy Birthday Addison Elizabeth! 

I can't believe it's already been a year. 

Addi was born on Dec 27, 2007 at 3:02pm, 

weighed 6 lbs, 9 oz and was 18 inches long. 

Addi had a yummy birthday. 

Nana took us to Chick-Fil-A for lunch (Addi's favorite) before treating us to strawberry cake at Celebrity Bakery. 

 Addi thought this balloon was hilarious! She would laugh and giggle every time we touched it. Her belly laughs are contagious and pretty soon she had everyone around us laughing with her. 

 There was plenty to choose from at the bakery, but we stuck with strawberry cake. Pink just seemed right for the occasion. 

Addi didn't hesitate to dig right in. 

That icing was gone before we knew it.

Christmas has gone to the kids

Christmas in the Harris family has become a BIG deal. With 10 people buying presents for 10 people, you can imagine the amount of presents, chaos & commotion that come with each holiday season. Counting Addi, we now have 4 grandkids running, crawling & climbing on basically everything. It's a blast. They get so excited about..well..  EVERYTHING (with the exception of new clothes). 

Here were some highlights:

Tristan's transformer: Chris and Ben worked to "transform" it for nearly 30 minutes. These are for kids right?

Addi's Radio Flyer wagon: Ripping off the paper was half the fun.

KK's & Tristan's microphones: Should we really enable the noise factor?Dad's new TV: Chris and Ben are still drooling. :)

Addi's wasn't sure what to think about her 1st Christmas present.

 So unwrapping the presents quickly became a group effort.

The box alone, provided plenty of entertainment.  

Obviously, she had it down by this point. 

She even got comfortable on Bubba's puppy.

Kenlee was better at sharing. 

Addi followed here around all day. So cute.

And to top it off, there were plenty of hugs and kisses to go around. We're so blessed!

And Nana won the bet. To our dismay, Chris, Tami, Kaylee, Tristan & Kenlee all showed up at 9:53. 7 minutes early. Very impressive. 

Christmas 2008

Merry Christmas everyone! We're in Colleyville this week with the Harris Family. We went to candlelight service last night before coming home to open 1 Christmas present each (a Harris tradition). We're up early this morning, enjoying hot chocolate & eyeing the presents with our name on it. The festivities will begin once Chris, Tami, Kaylee, Tristan & Kenlee get here. We've taken wagers on what time they'll arrive. Here are the bets:

Mom: 10am

Dad: 10:11

Tiff: 10:45

Ben: 10:56

Winner will be waited on hand & foot for the rest of the day. 

I'll let you know...

Washington D.C.

 Ben & I spent this past weekend in D.C. There's nothing like cold weather to get you into the Christmas spirit. On Thursday night, we headed to the White House lawn and listened to carolers around the National Christmas Tree (I didn't even know that we had a Natn'l. Christmas Tree) before meeting up with Niki, Brett & Dennis for dinner at Lauriol Plaza (Bill Clinton's favorite restaurant) for the best Mexican food in town. On Friday, Niki showed us around Old Town Alexandria. It is the cutest place I've ever seen! I now know why Niki loves living there so much. Mac & Julie took us to Mt. Vernon on Saturday. We toured "The General's" house, hung out with camels and payed our respects to George before calling it a day. Did I mention that we got in free? Julie is so sneaky :) We picked up cupcakes after dinner and met back up with Niki for a competitive night of CLUE (as in the board game). Niki and Julie had our number. The rest of us didn't stand a chance, even with our complicated strategies. We had a birthday brunch for Ben (Happy B-day Babe) on Sunday, before heading back home. It was a wonderful weekend. Thanks Niki, Mac & Julie for showing us a GREAT time! We love you guys.

 The National Christmas Tree. It's surrounded by 56 others 

(1 for each state & territory + the Dist. of Columbia)

Here's Niki and me in Old Town. 

This place looks like it's out of the movies.

 At Pasta Mia they make you wait outside (in the bitter cold) until they open at 6:30. The guys held our spot while we waited in Starbucks. Totally worth it.

Here's Ben trying to make his selection at Georgetown Cupcake. 

He got 2. 

It's SNOWING!

Can you believe it! It snowed in Houston! My camera couldn't capture the flakes and obviously it didn't stick to the ground, but I promise, it snowed! Just like a kid, I ran outside, Addi in tow, both of us all bundled up. I tried my best to capture Addi's expressions. The flakes stuck to her hair and to her nose as she tried to grab them. My neighbor was driving by and jumped out to take a picture of us. Notice both of our snow boots. Obviously, more of a fashion statement down here than a necessity. Or are they?! I'll have to keep em' closer to the door (as opposed to buried in our snow gear), just in case another blizzard blows in!

Jolly Old St. Nicholas

I was determined to get Addi's picture taken with Santa this year, with it being her first Christmas and all (by only 2 days, but still). We got to the mall and the line was surprisingly short. Addi was dressed in the cutest lil' thing and Ben was able to join us, so everything was working out to be picture perfect. That was of course, until Addi saw Santa. 

It never crossed our minds that she would be scared of him. She took one look at him and started crying. Poor thing. It broke my heart that we spooked her so bad. Santa told us that next year we should rent Santa Clause (the movie) and let her watch it a few times before bringing her back. We'll have to give it a try. 

So here are this year's pictures. 

Perfect or not, we're so proud of our little angel.

Black Friday

Black Friday is a big day for the Harris ladies. 

I used to think those women who would wake up at 5am & rush down to Macy's, just to fight the crowd and stand in line for hours were CRAZY! Just pay the extra $10 next week and save your sanity. Well, I've become one of them. My mom, Tami and I have even made it a Harris tradition. Each year, we try to plan some type of shopping trip, but with hectic schedules this month, we had never finalized plans. 

Well, they surprised me & showed up at my door the day after Thanksgiving! After trekking 4.5 hours down I45, they were ready to hit the sales. And did we ever! I'm almost done Christmas shopping...and it's only December 1st! Addi & I loved seeing Nana and Aunt Tami. Ya'll are AWESOME!!