Muffins with Mom

Every year the PreK has muffins with mom. We spend just a couple if minutes eating breakfast and looking at artwork the kids make for us. It is really a sweet time and I enjoyed my time with this little guy. He is growing up way too fast!

Up on the Housetop!

Lyle always does the Christmas lights and this year he decided to try something different. We usually just put lights around the edge of the house and then around the windows, but this year he wanted to outline the whole rooftop. We were going to do the windows as well but ran out of lights and time....next year?
Anyway, here he is up on the roof patiently putting up the lights.

And here are the kids playing outside while they waited on daddy to be finished.

We think the finished product is pretty fantastic! Nice work, daddy!

St. Nick comes again!

As he does every year on the eve of St. Nicholas Day, St. Nick came to our house for our Christmas lists. The kids and I were sitting around the tree watching a Christmas cartoon when he banged on the door making us all jump about ten feet! He left us lots of yummy candy and these cute pjs. Kids were beyond excited!

So much help

Since I will be taking over this beast once these babies get here, I thought a good job for the kids one day would be to help me clean it out. They were all about it and jumped right in. Ella vacuumed out the truck while Luke wiped down all the doors and seats. They did a great job and I thought it was funny seeing them in there working so hard. I love these kids!

A very happy little girl and a new house!

Last summer, Lyle bought for the kids workbooks to work on over the summer. As motivation to finish them, he said they could get a present when they completed the whole book. Ella immediately knew she wanted an American Girl Doll for her prize. Luke rambled off a couple things but never had a real answer as to what he wanted.

Well, this past October Ella finished her book plus she got an A+ on the test Lyle wrote up for her just to make sure she actually got all the math skills. Now just to be fair, Luke worked very hard on his as well but his was a 1st grade workbook and he needed a little more guidance to finish it...which he didn't get:( He is still working on it though and is doing great.....still doesn't know what he wants though!

Since, Ella finished hers Lyle had to keep his word and get her an AGD....even though I reminded him it was very close to Christmas and her birthday was in January! His response..."Well, I didn't know she was going to finish the thing in November when I made the deal!" So, we planned a quick trip to Dallas to let Ella have a fun day at the AGD store to celebrate. It was made even sweeter because her cousin Belle got to join in on the fun! Ella picked out the doll that looked most like her and named her Clara.

I couldn't resist taking a picture of Lyle hanging out in the AGD store....doesn't he look like he is loving it!

 A doll store may not have been his thing but he is sure proud of Ella!

We let the girls get their dolls' ears pierced. Here they are waiting in line at the doll salon and then Ella is showing off the earrings.

 But the fun didn't stop there. Mims came along for the trip to and let the girls pick out new outfits for their dolls. You can imagine with all the options in that store how long it took for the girls to decide on one outfit! It was funny watching them run from one area to the next. Thanks so much Mims!!

This is my favorite picture.....we are in trouble! The girl likes to shop!

We really had two reasons for making that trip to Dallas. Mims and Pa recently moved into their new house and we couldn't wait until Christmas to see it!
The house is beautiful and we felt like we were at a resort sleeping there. So warm and cozy!
Here are a few pics:

My only real request for the trip was that we got to start the fire outside so Saturday night Pa started the fire in the fireplace and broke out the new grill for a wonderful BBQ in the back. It was a very peaceful end to a very exciting day!

The kids also got some time to play in the park that is a two minute walk from the house. They are very silly kids:

Picking Pecans

You know the holidays are just around the corner when we pick pecans! The kids anticipate this every year. Trying to fill their bag faster than the other. We went to my parents' this past weekend and loaded up on some of the best tasting pecans every! My mom and I spent the rest of the afternoon cracking pecans and just talking while the kids played outside on a beautiful Saturday afternoon! It was a great day!

Halloween 2013

This Halloween season went by soooo fast!!
We kicked things off at the house by getting out all of our decorations and adding a few new ones to the mix. The kids decided they wanted to make a pumpkin patch on the wall entering the front door. So they spent the better part of a day making paper pumpkins and a big sign that said 'The Burdine Pumpkin Patch" Here are some pictures of the process:

They even got Daddy involved. He made a black pumpkin!

And here is a picture of the final product. Ella made a brown fence and the Patch sign while Luke made a sun and a "slug"! Ha!

That same day we also made a chocolate Halloween cake the kids have been dying to make since I bought the cake mix awhile back for my mom's birthday which we didn't end up using.  Its really nothing exciting but something about adding sprinkles to something makes for a huge party for these kids!

Finally, it was Halloween night!! The kids could not be more excited! I cooked a big cabbage soup and corn bread for the family along with Uncle Craig and Aunt Lauren who always celebrate this day with us. After we ate, it was time to Trick-or-treat!!!
Here is our little Magician and his Magic Rabbit:

Lauren and I sat around the fire and drank apple cider...not spiked this year since we are both preggo (she is 16 weeks along just like me not twins though:). Lyle and Craig to the kids around. It was a really great year. We had beautiful weather and there were so many people out celebrating.

At the end of the night...the candy trade began. This is Uncle Craig's favorite part!

Happy Birthday Daddy!

On October 23rd, Lyle turned 38. The kids are always excited to plan his B-Day party. Last year we surprised him with a haunted house. This year, we decided to decorate with snakes....Lyle has a real fear of snakes!
You are a wonderful Daddy! We love you!

Daddy on roller skates

A couple weeks back our little niece Maya turned 5. She had her party at the skating rink. I think Lyle wanted to prove he was some what still young so he slipped on some skates. A bit shaky at first but he picked it up quick. I only saw him almost wipe completely out once! I really shouldn't make fun of him. I would have wiped out about 10 times. Luckily, I had the excuse of being pregnant:) He later said...'Man, that was nothing like I remember it!' Ha! Getting old stinks! Ella loved loved loved having him out there with her. Here are a few pics:

Our 10th wedding anniversary trip to Spain

On June 7th 2013, Lyle and I celebrated our 10 year wedding anniversary. We had always planned on going somewhere fun for this milestone but when the time came money was a little tight so we figured we would have to push it to our 15th. But then we were awarded a grant for our science project which included some travel money so we started to look for conferences and found one in Sitges Spain! So, on October 5th, we boarded a plane to Barcelona. It was quite fitting because 10 years ago to the day we boarded a plane to Paris, France for our honeymoon:)

Here are a couple pictures of the our trip:
Here we are on the plane for our 7 hour flight to Barcelona. The passengers in front of us were on their honeymoon taking pics of themselves like this so we thought we would join in on the fun.

 Lyle on the train from Barcelona to Sitges which is 30 minutes south right on the Mediterranean Coast.

Almost a full 24 hours later, we arrived in Sitges. When we got off the train, we had no idea where our hotel was but figured since the city wasn't that big we could just head for the coast and surely see it. Well, we were very wrong! We walked about 30 minutes in the wrong direction until we finally decided to get a taxi. It was a nice walk though and let us see lots of the city which was adorable. Lots of smalls shops along twisty streets that filled the hills near the coastline.

We finally made it to our hotel and were greeted by this beautiful view from our balcony

Once we got to the room, we ordered lunch and crashed!! My body and these babies had had enough. I needed sleep!

That night, which was Saturday, we walked down to the city center to a Catholic Church were we attended mass. Here is a quick pic of the church.

Afterwards, we grabbed dinner at one of the many seafood restaurants. If you can't tell by his face this was Lyle's favorite meal of the week. He melted with happiness when he tried his soup and wine. Yes, Lyle ordered a whole bottle of wine everynight although this poor wife could not partake...well besides a few small sips. Man, was it good wine! Our wine at home just really can't compare to the wine they have in Europe.

This is the city at night. It was so beautiful and peaceful! We really hit this place at the right time of the year. Not too crowded.

We spent the rest of the week exploring the city and trying just about every restaurant we could find along with every dessert shop!
The conference was a really good one as well. It was our first conference together and really fun to share ideas and talk about the science presented. Gave us lots of good ideas for experiments in the future.

Here we are in front of the poster we presented. Yes, I still have problems opening my eyes for iphone pics!

We also had the chance to ride some trains down the coast to visit some of the surrounding cities. One in particular was an old Roman port city named Tarragona. It was bigger than Sitges but very beautiful with all of the ancient Roman ruins left in the city.

On our way back, we accidentally jumped on the wrong train and got about a 30 minute extra tour of the Spain coastline but we didn't mind. We eventually ended up back at the hotel:)

Our last night out Lyle ordered champagne to celebrate our 10 years. Although, I didn't drink but a few small sips it was fun to look at and reminisce over the last 10 years.

Before we left, I asked the hotel manger to take our picture in the lobby. Lyle hates to ask people to take our picture.

 It is very similar to this picture which was taken on our last day in the hotel lobby in Paris 10 years ago. Something things never change!

We had a nice trip home with absolutely no long layovers or delays. And when we got home around midnight we were greeted to this with a clean house, two sleeping kids and one tired Mims!

We literally could not have pulled off this trip without the help of my parents who watched the kids for the first couple of days and then Mims who drove up from TX to help. I think the kids had just as much fun as we did! Thank you so much for your support! We had a fantastic time!!!