Farewell 2011

You've been a great year, It'll be hard to see you go! Hopefully 2012 will be just as good.

What are our big New Years Eve plans? Well. Hotel Grammy and gramps was open fir business with Maggie and coleman, so we made a reservation.

That gave us a night off from mommy and daddy'ing. What did we do? Date night! Dinner and a movie, good times. Hope we see the ball drop!

Kate loves it at Grammy and gramps. Her legs start kicking in excitement when we pull into the driveway. Her favorite toy over there is the sandbox filled with spoons, sifters, etc. Here's a pic of her and her favorite box of sand :)

Happy 2012! Don't forget to wish scott a happy b-day tomorrow!

Family Pic from Vogel

Hiking w the grandparents

My first hike

We are visiting papa ger and mama Lin up at Vogel state park for the day. I'm on my first hike. Fun!!

Family Day- mush warning

Today was one of my favorite days of the year. Scott has the week off, but has been putting in a few hours a day due to some important projects. We woke up, played, grabbed Hickory House for breakfast, played, napped while daddy worked (at least Kate did), went to Phipps Plaza, had lunch out, ran errands and had a nice dinner at home. What made the day so special? My amazing husband and daughter... That's what! It was a day filled with precious little moments. Katelyn is a very special little girl and i am so lucky to spend so much time with her. Today I heard katelyn laugh more in one day than I ever have (many tickle monster induced laughs) and saw her face light up with a huge grin on the escalator rides (which she wanted to ride over and over again). It was just a FUN day :).

I hope we have many more days like this as a family, priceless Kodak moments. I wouldnt mind a Groundhogs day on this one, maybe with weather a tad warmer. repeat, please!!!

Thanks Scott for such a wonderful day!

Merry Christmas!!

I hope Santa was good to you this year. He was to us and he brought Katelyn a bunch of fun toys. We spent Christmas Eve up at Uncle Scott's, Christmas morning up at my sisters, then we hosted Christmas Linner. It was a great holiday season, nothing beats time with family!

Here are some pics of our day.


Santa's gifts!! (If you see a christmas gift you gave to Katelyn in this pic, Santa may have used it to help make his gift presentation look a little more complete.)


Opening presents with Grammy



Here is a shot of our front yard inflatables. I should have taken a pic from the outside, and I'l be sure to do it before they go into storage for next year. I can't remember how much I've blogged about our Christmas inflatables. You see Scott has a dream. The dream is to be the Clark Griswald of inflatables. We add at least one each year, and now we are up to 5. We've got a santa, reindeer, penguin, snowman and this year we added a super-duper Santa snack shack. (Yes, Scott picked it out.) Eventually, we hope to have a yard filled with fun inflatables that is "the" house you have to drive by in the neighborhood. I wonder what our addition will be next year :)

We hope your Christmas was filled with love, laughter and cheer. Have a safe and happy New Years. My New Years resolution is to work out more and to find time to blog. It's hard when you aren't in front of a computer all day :(

Talk to you soon*.

Seasons greetings!

Here is our electronic holiday card. Merry Christmas or Happy Holidays to you and your families!!

Santa and You Have Mail

We went to take pictures with Santa. This is what we got:

1) Santa made Katelyn cry... a lot! I don't know if it was stranger anxiety, stage frieght, or the nice old man in the red suit that scared her. Here is a pic of the majority of our 2 minutes with Santa. Katelyn can't talk but I think I heard her asking him for baby dolls.



2) Here is our official 1st Santa photo. The photographer had an Elmo and used it to distract Kate long enough to take a picture without her crying. I was quite impressed we got a halfway decent shot.


Two great shots with the Phipps santa. He really is a great one. We'll be back next year. In case your holiday card didn't make it to you, the Allen family would like to wish you Joyful Holidays and a safe, Happy New Year. Here is another picture on our holiday card. I love it. I'll snap a pic of the card and post that too.

Our tailgate food set up

Found a picture of the chef stations at the tailgate. Yum, yum!

Miss tammie, one of kate's teachers came over to babysit.

Blog catch up

So a few weeks to catch you up on. Kate had a round of pink eye and a cold. I had a few job interviews, and mommy and daddy scored SEC championship tickets. And by "score", I mean paid a lot of money. It was our Christmas present to each other. Brandon hooked us up and we went with a group to a high-falutin' (sp?) tailgate at the world congress center with catered serving stations and bars. They even had a band. Very, very nice. Then we headed to our seats. We knew they were going to be good, but geez! Look at this view. It was a lot of fun until the Dawgs lost control of the game. You could literally feel the momentum shift, like our fan cheering energy was sucked up by a vacuum. No matter the outcome, it was a great day with friends. Thanks again Brandon and chris!!!

Dinner sleepy head

Katelyn's teacher had a birthday today. That and it was gorgeous weather. I think the cupcakes and extra play time put her over the edge! Check out our dinner video footage :)