Family Reunion Weekend

Mark, Nora and I flew to Birmingham at the end of September for a long weekend with the families. Mom's family actually had a reunion, so it was the perfect excuse to get away for 5 days! Mom picked us up and the airport, then we headed north to Ft. Payne. Our first stop was to see Mamaw at the nursing home. It was good to see her, but it's still so sad. She was in really good spirits, so that was good. Children were not allowed to go into the home due to the flu outbreak, so one of the nurses wheeled her out onto the back patio. We met Jeff, Jennifer, Maxwell and Annah there, so all of the Powell great-grand kids got to see Mamaw, so that made her happy.

After picking up some groceries, we headed up the mountain to Aunt Lynne and Uncle John's cabin. What fun! We just love it up there and are so appreciative of them always sharing it with us! The cousins had a fun time playing and the adults had a great time catching up! My Uncle David came up for dinner and later Aunt Lynne and Uncle John came up for a visit.

The next day proved to be wet and rainy. So much for taking a hike! Mom and I headed back to Ft. Payne to see Mamaw and to organize a bit in her house. It's so sad to see the house so empty and in disrepair. I am going to attempt to always remember it the way it appeared to me in my childhood. I have wonderful memories of great times with Mamaw, Papa and the entire family there.

While we were gone, Jeff and Maxwell took Mark and Nora on a tour of the mountain. Mark had never seen our old family farm and the falls, so he had a great time. Maxwell liked sitting next to Nora, talking to her and attempting to hold her hand. So sweet! My cousin, Ben, and his girlfriend showed up after lunch and we all had a lazy afternoon at the cabin. Early that night, we headed back to town to my cousin Diane's house for the festivities. We had a nice time, but found out that we had missed seeing lots of family that had been there earlier in the day. The joys of nap time! Oh well, we still had a good time. Nora and Annah wore their matching Halloween dresses that Grandma made and everyone thought that they looked precious. That is a good thing, considering that Nora was a wild woman! She had not been feeling well the entire trip and suddenly perked up and ran all over the place. Mark and I had to tag team her! Nora thought it was hysterical, of course!

After cleaning up on Sunday and a family lunch, we met Buddy and Matt on the way to Chattanooga. It was so sad to leave Mom after such a quick weekend, but we wanted to make sure and see the Newman clan too! So, we transferred everything over to Buddy's car and headed to see Grammy, Stephanie and the boys!

Bath time! Nora and Annah

Change that to All Cousin Bath Time!

Nora, Maxwell and Annah

Annah and Jennifer

The family portrait

We arrived just in time for Nora to play with her sweet cousins. She jumped right into the fun and had a great time with them! They had a great time just playing together, playing the piano, eating dinner and giving love and hugs. Matt, Steph and the boys had to head back home on Sunday night, but we feel so blessed that they made a special trip to see us. It meant so much to us that they would drive up and see our family. On a funny note, they Newman boy family got to see Miss Nora New in all of her glory. She threw an absolute fit (probably the worst one ever - thus far!) because we were going to feed her dessert (i.e. a potential mess) instead of letting her sit at the big table with her cousins. She would have none of that and we finally relented and gave in. Sorry for the mess, Grammy!

We had a good time visiting with Grammy, Buddy, Uncle Dave and Aunt Sissy. We took Nora to the Blue and Yellow Park, one of her big sister's favorite parks back in the day! We also had fun walking around the mall and playing in the indoor play yard and stopping at the TN Vol Store to get Nora a Vol sippy cup and Daddy a t-shirt . (I was OK with that since Auburn beat TN the next weekend! Sorry Mark! War Eagle!) After a nap back home, we went out to eat and gave Nora a chance to work on charming everyone that she saw. We thought that these two ladies were going to take her home!

Thanks for a fun weekend Grammy and Buddy and for taking us back to Birmingham to catch our flight. We had a great time!

Nora tackling Jesse

Getting in on all the fun with Jesse and Seth!

Nora eating with her big boy cousins - Jesse, Seth and Luke

Playing the piano with Seth

The Boy Newmans with Grammy and Buddy!

The babies with Grammy - Nora and Aaron

How sweet is this? Nora giving Aaron a hug!

Swinging at the Blue and Yellow Park

Sliding with Buddy and Daddy

Hanging out with Buddy and Grammy

The Newman family!

Summer Vacation - A Very Long Post!

I am finally getting some time to do a long (more than anyone really wants to know, but they might humor me anyway) re-cap of our great summer vacation. Mark, Nora and I headed out early Friday morning (June 26th) to make our way to Orange Beach! Yippee!! We needed this much-overdue vacation so much that we decided it was worth it to drive with our very busy 14-month old. It might have taken us 12 hours to get there, but we finally made it with no incidents whatsoever!

Highlights of the drive included:
Miss Nora watching videos for the first time. She had quite the little set up with her own DVD player in the back seat. Thanks to Patrick for letting us borrow his Wiggles DVD. I think she liked it!
Nora eating McDonald's for the first time. I guess that this is a right of passage for kiddos. We were actually hoping for a Chick, but the town only had a drive through - what kind of craziness is that? Anyway, it was super cute to watch her eat her french fries (since that is all that she wanted and had to have one in each hand at all times!). Thank goodness I had some yogurt and other healthy things for her as well...
Mommy falling asleep with her head on Nora's car seat after watching The Wiggles one too many times! (BTW - this was before our Sonic stop.)

We made it to Orange Beach and were greeted by Grandma! Nora went right to her, which melted all of our hearts. It was so great to see Mom. She stayed with us at the Beach House on and off during the week. She definitely spoiled all of the Newman clan.

On Saturday morning, we all headed down to the water. Jeff and Jennifer lent us their jogging stroller, so that we perfect for heading down the road and through the sand on our way to the bay. Nora did great and really loved it! Mommy and Daddy loved handing her off to Grandma for her afternoon nap so that we could just lay on the dock for hours. Hello sunburns! It was worth the pain.

On Sunday morning, we all headed to church. It was a great service, highlighted by the fact that our niece and nephew, Annah and Maxwell, were baptised. It was fun and amusing to watch. Check out the pictures for more details! Annah was a doll baby and Mr. Maxwell was in rare form. Oh - the joys of having kiddos and never knowing exactly what they are going to do! Jennifer transferred her membership to the church, so that was great as well. Guess we're in the business of converting Baptists to Methodists in our family! I had to put that in there just for Mark!
:) After the service, we headed to Jeff and Jennifer's house for a fun brunch and an afternoon of the cousins playing together. Naps were nowhere to be found. Thanks to Jeff and Jennifer for a fun afternoon in the pool. We all loved it!

Mom took Nora to her house on Monday for some special one-on-one time with Grandma. That left an entire day for our date day. Fun, fun! We went and saw a movie, The Proposal - definitely a chick flick, but super cute. Then we headed to our favorite place for lunch, Sea 'n Suds, for shrimp sandwiches and some adult beverages. What a treat in the middle of the day. We then headed up to the outlet mall for some shopping, but the rain scared us away. Back to OB we went for a restful afternoon and evening to chill out. I missed Nora so much that I cried, but Mark promised that everything would be OK. Mom told me later that before she put Nora to bed, Nora saw a picture of us on an end table, pointed at it and cried a little bit. Of course, that made me cry again...

Nora had a great night and slept the entire time. Yippee for Grandma's house! She spent the morning playing with her cousins, which we had a late morning and a nice walk on the beach. We picked up the baby girl and headed to Sea 'n Suds again. Crazy, but true! They have the best shrimp sandwiches, I must say again. Nora ate her first shrimp and loved it! Super cute. It was then nap time and swim time down at the water. I had a dinner with Kelly at Cosmo's (another favorite) and had a great time catching up with her.

On Wednesday, we headed to Kelly's parents house for swimming once little bit was awake from her morning nap. We had lots of fun playing with Kelly, Bentley, Noah and Miss B's friend. It was great to see Pam, Mike and Shannon. Plus, we finally got to meet Shannon's baby, who was completely precious. Tristan and Nora loved the water! Nora decided on this day that she could swim. She refused to stay in her float and wanted to swim between all of us. She was even kicking her legs. How cute is that? After a late nap, Mom treated everyone to dinner at Brian's new restaurant, Cobalt. So yummy and the best view of the bay! Amazing! Nora was a fish eating machine. She ate a ton of my grouper and lots of the crab meat that was on top. She is our good little Southern girl! I just know that she will love sweet tea. Maybe next summer...

Thursday was a laid back day at the house and on the dock. Erin came over and spent the day. How fun it was to have her with the family! Don't you just love friends that just fit in so well that you don't have to make any special effort when you are with them? That's the best. I would say that applies to some many of our friends and we just love that about them. Anyway, I digress. We just chilled out, got some sun, jumped in the bay when we got hot and had fun hanging out with my McNutt cousins that were down at the bay too. I could do that everyday...

Friday - Another fun day! Mom was back with us for the rest of the weekend. We had a fun morning playing with Nora. Erin's parents, Terri and Paul, arrived in the late morning by boat (love that) for an afternoon of fun and sun. We had a great, great time with them. After finishing lunch, Mark and I headed out on the boat with them. It was so beautiful on the water. We anchored out at Ole River and hung out in the water, catching up on all the news from Mobile. We had such a great time. We just love the Grays and always look forward to seeing them when we head home. After a bit, we took a fun ride around Ono Island and headed back home. The water was a bit rough, but that just added to the adventure. We had fun catching up with the McNutt cousins once again and then playing with Nora. My Aunt Julia and Uncle David arrived while we were gone, so it was great to see them too. That night we had a seafood feast - yum! Thanks Mom for the great jambalaya and Julia and David for the shrimp! I am getting hungry just thinking about all of the great food! We then headed over to the Ogle's dock for cocktails and dessert. It was fun to catch up with more family, including Ginger, Sonny, Carol, Rich, Connor, Steve, and his family. Later on, the rest of the fam watched fireworks from the dock while I stayed at the house with Nora, who just couldn't keep her eyes open any longer after all of the fun she was having...

The Fourth - what a fun, laid back Fourth of July. We had a great time visiting, getting some sun, playing in the water and resting. After Julia and David headed back to Pensacola, Mom, Mark and I took Nora to the Gulf. We couldn't leave without actually taking Miss New to the beach! Nora absolutely loved it. She would walk right into the water or just sit and let the waves crash into her. She was absolutely fearless - we're still trying to decide if that is a good or bad thing... It certainly was precious! We played for a bit, took lots of pictures and then headed home. Mom watched Nora that night while Mark and I walked down to the dock to view the fireworks. We've decided that is just about the best place to be for the show. You get to see a bunch of different shows, coming from every direction, visit with family and best of all, not deal with traffic!

After a good night's rest, we packed up and headed home on Sunday. It was hard to leave Mom and the beach, but we know that we'll be back! It was a long trip back, but overall, it went pretty well. Nora did much better than expected, so that was a blessing!

We hope that everyone had a super 4th of July!

Click here to see our vacation pictures:

July 2009

Vacation Preview

We finally got our pictures downloaded from vacation. After cleaning them up, we'll do a real post on our fun vacation. In the meantime, I couldn't resist posting this picture...

This way to the water y'all!

Memorial Day Weekend

Mark, Nora and I had a fun and very relaxing Memorial Day weekend. We headed over to Bill and Lisa's lake house at Possum Kingdom Lake (don't you just love that name?) on Friday afternoon and spent the entire weekend just chilling out. We always sleep so good down there - guess it's all of the fresh air - and this trip was no different! We played in the water, took naps (at least Nora and I did), grilled out, played with that sweet girl (who was cracking us up - Little Miss Personality), and got a little bit of sun.

We took Nora down to the public beach area one afternoon. It was perfect for her! She looked super cute in the little halter swimsuit that Grammy gave her for her birthday. She wasn't crazy about wearing a life jacket (imagine that!), but got acclimated to it after a while. Mark and I couldn't get over how fearless our little girl really is! She just kept waking into the water as if she had been doing it forever. Crazy! She was a little scared of the big waves, but overall did great! We were some proud parents, to say the least. We can't wait to take her to the neighborhood pool this weekend and then get her in some swim lessons.

Nora's favorite look of the weekend!

Nora's new discovery of the weekend. Look at me guys!

Checking out the sand...

Loving the water!

Hanging with Daddy on the dock.

Mommy and me!