I heart you

Happy Valentine's Day everyone! Especially to my sweet hubby, Kyle! I love him like crazy and I love being married to him.

We decided for the first time this year to stay home and cook our own Valentine's dinner. It just wasn't worth the stress this year to deal with the traffic and crowds to out somewhere. So we made a delicious meal of steak and shrimp, loaded baked potatoes, roasted vegetables, rolls and red velvet cupcakes for dessert!! We ate by candle light in our dining room for the first time ever. (Kyle is not a romantic!) After dinner I begged and pleaded to watch "The Proposal" so he finally gave it. It was a cute movie, I cried three times. The end.

A Christmas Celebration

This Christmas was so special and filled with faith, hope, love and joy!! We have started a tradition on Christmas Eve of going to the Christmas Eve service at church and then having my family over to our house for games and goodies. I love it, it's so much fun!!

Christmas morning Kyle and I exchanged gifts at home before going over to my parents' house. I got Kyle a really awesome Dremel tool that he has been eyeing for a while and a few other things. He got me a new camera!!!! A Nikon D3000. I'm so happy! I love it! I'm so excited to learn how to use it and take really great pictures.

We spent most of Christmas Day at my parents' house. My grandparents and aunt and uncle also came over. My Dad cooked his standing rib roast like he does every year! Yes, Lord! We had a wonderful day and opened lots of presents. Some of my favorite gifts included my new Brighton necklace, an NC State serving tray and the gift my sister gave me... feeding a hungry baby through Samaritan's purse. Kyle loaded up with some shirts and a pocket knife.

Since we were expecting a significant amount of snow, we decided to head to Jacksonville Saturday night instead of Sunday. We were excited to have a second Christmas with the Fescoes and definitely did not want to get snowed in and miss it! The whole family was there this year so it was great to see everyone! Ava and Lincoln get cuter and sweeter every time we see them! We were also blessed with more gifts! Rick made me a shelf for my knick-knacks and I absolutely LOVE it! A RHF original as he calls it. It's beautiful and definitely one of the best gifts I have ever received. We also had a delicious, healthy meal made by Michelle and Courtney! And we got SNOW!! It was a beautiful snow and perfect for snowballs and snowmen!! We played outside in it for a while, it was so much fun!

We made some really great memories this year while celebrating the birth of the Christ Child, Immanuel, God with us! So thankful for that gift, truly the best gift anyone could ever receive!

Dad and the roast!

G-pa and Mom

Leah and Alex

Lesley and Eric, love this pic of them!

G-ma and Auntie Lou

Mom and Dad

Uncle Kyle and Lincoln

Linc and Zsa Zsa

I was so happy to get my shelf!

Cuteness!

Pretty Ava posing for me!

building a gingerbread house

Ava and the finished product

These two are crazy! Fighting on the Wii!

Yoda and Linc

Uncle Kyle and Aunt Lindsey with the kids

Love this pic!

Chad and his hat!

my shelf hung and decorated!

it's beautiful, I love it! Thanks, Rick!

My Goofy Husband

I thought he was kidding, but clearly he wasn't. Kyle has created his own version of Elf on the Shelf. See for yourself...




This is where I found the abominable snowman yesterday...

and today...

Also - we are excited to have a new tree this year!! It's a little bigger than our last one and it's sooo pretty! Thanks to our neighbor, Mr. Dan who gave it to us!!!

Home of the Braves!!

We just got home from spending a wonderful 4th of July weekend in Atlanta! I hadn't seen my cousins and their babies since Christmas! There was about to be trouble if I didn't see them really soon.

Friday night I got to experience my first Braves baseball game!! It was wonderful. Wonderful! We had good seats on the right field line. Too bad their star rookie, right fielder was on the injured list. But Chipper Jones was back!! I was so excited to see him play in real life, I've had a crush on him since middle school. He may be 39 years old be he can seriously still hang with those younger guys. He's the third baseman so I didn't see him that well but I could still cheer very loudly for him! ;) Actually, he's a real crowd favorite. The whole place erupted EVERY time he got up to bat. They went into 11 innings and finally scored the winning run!! And of course we stayed for the fireworks! I loved my first MLB game, I really wish we lived closer and we would go to so many more games!

Saturday we had a nice relaxing day with salon time and shopping. My cousin Holly is a cosmetologist and since she had to work that day she wanted us to come for a visit. Fine by me! She always wants to do my hair every time we are together! So my sissy and I got a haircut! And of course some shopping time afterwards. The men stayed home and played with the new grill and got in a few tournaments of red-neck golf (ladder ball!) We also squeezed in a little pool time. That night we had a fun cookout and the best part was.... homemade Reese cup ice cream!!!!!!! It was amazing.

Sunday we loaded up everyone and headed to the lake for the day. The weather was perfect the whole weekend. It was hot, but not miserable like it has been for the last month. Kyle and I stayed on the boat most of the day and did some tubing and a lot of laughing. My Mom and aunt tried the tube too, that was pretty funny! After about 5 hours or so the babies were exhausted and we were all hot, sandy and tired too. I was in a car with the one baby who doesn't sleep on car rides. The poor dear cried, no actually she screamed the whole hour drive home. She didn't want anything but her Momma, who was driving. It was pitiful. I know she slept great that night though, haha. We got home and had pizza and did some small fireworks out in the yard. It was such a fun day and a great way to celebrate our nation's Independence Day!

Monday morning we were up way too early to head back home! Fun times and great memories!

*Sorry about the quality of some of these pictures, some were taken with a cell phone!*

Dad and Kyle at the lake


The parents (oh yeah, we were all super cool in our patriotic shirts)


Joli


Turner Field


GO BRAVES!


the cousins: Kip, Jessica, Holly, Me, Kyle and Leah


me and Holly


me and Nevie not looking at the camera :/


Princess Nevie

Happy Father's Day

Happy Father's Day to all the fathers out there!!

Kyle and I are both so thankful for our Dads! They have been such a positive influence on our lives and we know that are a large part of who we are today is because of them. We are also so thankful to the Lord that they are still here with us... either a short drive or phone call away. We have some sweet friends who just lost their Dad way too soon. They are having to experience their first Father's Day without their Dad less than a week after his passing. If your father is still with you today give him a call and a BIG hug next time you see him!!

What Makes A Dad
God took the strength of a mountain,
The majesty of a tree,
The warmth of a summer sun,
The calm of a quiet sea,

The generous soul of nature,
The comforting arm of night,
The wisdom of the ages,
The power of the eagle's flight,

The joy of a morning in spring,
The faith of a mustard seed,
The patience of eternity,
The depth of a family need,

Then God combined these qualities,
When there was nothing more to add,
He knew His masterpiece was complete,
And so, He called it ... Dad

~ Author Unknown

We love you!!!

Celebrating Christ!!

Not that I don't celebrate the birth of Christ all year, but it's so special to have a day where I can ponder this miracle. God, became man, and died for me so I can live with Him eternally. wow. Pretty spectacular.

Kyle and I spent Christmas Eve and Day with my family. It's becoming a Simmons tradition for my Daddy to cook a standing rib roast for Christmas lunch. And if I have anything to say about it, I think it is a fabulous tradition. He promptly ushered each new guest over to the oven and showed off his hunk of sizzling meat to everyone as they walked in the door that morning. My grandparents and aunt and uncle came over to join us Christmas day. I attempted to make a white chocolate cheese cake for dessert and it turned out perfect. I was so proud of myself, hehe. It was so nice to have everyone together. We played games and ate and ate and ate and ate.... it had to end a little early for us since I had to work very early the next morning but it was such a great day.

Then after I finally got off work on Saturday we headed to Jacksonville to see Kyle's family. It was a treat to get to see John, Diane and Savannah too!!! We did a lot of good eating at the Fescoe's house too. The homemade ravioli and egg plant rollatini were amazing!!! It was a very nice and relaxing time, I'm so glad my work schedule worked out so we could stay a few days.

Kyle is enjoying his last few days off of work. It has been a very nice 2 week break for him. He has done everything on his honey-do list ;)

Happy New Year everyone!!!


Eric(Lesley's boyfriend), Lesley, Leah, Me and Kyle

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the year!!

We have been very busy with Christmas activities this past week or so!

We enjoyed our town Christmas parade last Sunday. To be such a small town it was quite a long parade. We decided there are about 100 dance studios around here, good grief, they took up at least half the parade. And my Jazzercise studio was in the parade but I decided not to participate because then you don't get to see the rest of the parade. Maybe next year. ;)

Saturday I went to two family Christmas events. Poor Kyle had to work and missed all the fun. The first visit was with my Grandfather's side of the family. That is a very small crowd, and getting smaller every year. It's actually kinda sad to see them all so sick and feeble. But it was still fun and we had a great BBQ meal, can't go wrong with that!

Then my Mom's side of the family had their Main Event at my aunt's house. The whole family was together for the first time in a long time. I have 15 cousins on that side of the family and all of them were there except three. And the cousins brought all their kids too. So there was almost 40 of us total crammed in the house. I love it!! It's crazy but I wouldn't have it any other way! There were three babies there under a year old so I was in heaven. I just went from one baby to the next, totally being a baby hog. hehe. It was so much fun!!

We have one more Christmas party to attend this Saturday and we are excited about that! The theme is "An International Christmas" so we are all bringing foods from around the world. We have it easy, we are doing Chinese!!

And the baking is starting this week as well!! I have a whole list of goodies to make this year, it's going to be yummy!!

Here are some of my favorite pics:

Mom and Dad



Me, Holly and Nevaeh



Lesley, Leah and Kooper(he was being a good listener during the story)


two sweet girls, Joli and Nevi

July 4th!

We had a super fun weekend in Atlanta visiting some of my family!

We got there Friday afternoon and cooked out hamburgers and hot dogs of course! The weather was so nice we spent most of the evening outdoors playing redneck golf and lounging in the hammock. I got to meet my cousins new baby, Nevaeh. She is only 3 weeks old and she is totally precious! I held her most of the time, hehe... yes, I'm a baby hog.

Saturday we headed out to the lake! My uncle has an awesome boat and he was nice enough to ride us all around all day. We all attempted tubing and some of the brave ones did the wake boarding, I'm too weak to handle that one. It was a beautiful day though, couldn't ask for better weather in July!!! After a long day at the lake we decided not to mess with the craziness in Peach Tree City and opted instead for some smaller fireworks at the house. And my aunt made some homemade ice cream... strawberry and rocky road! Oh my! I was in heaven, forget the fireworks, give me the ice cream. It was still great fun and it makes it so much more fun when you have little kids running around and getting all excited! :) Too bad there wasn't a Braves home game this weekend, but Kyle did get to watch his NASCAR, that was one crazy finish if anybody else out there saw it too! Anyway...it's totally worth the 8 hour trip there and back to spend an awesome time with an awesome family!

We hope everyone else had a wonderful time celebrating our country's independence! Happy 4th of July!

This was so relaxing


Me and sweet Nevaeh


Little cousins with their matching 4th of July outfits


Me and Kyle at the lake


cousins on the boat!


me and Kyle again


ready for the fireworks!