Holiday Season - What a whirlwind!

I don't know about the rest of you, but the holidays were here and over before I could blink.  

This little man had an absolute blast!  It was so precious to see him actually "get it" now.

With some stunts with Daddy, of course.

Thanksgiving officially made "the bump" appear, but I don't regret it.

Not one bit.

I tried making homemade cranberry sauce this year, courtesy of Pioneer Woman's mad culinary skills.

It was a hit.

And then... I blinked and it was Christmas.  

H loved opening his presents, but with the usual 2-year-old attention span, it would get fixated on the very first gift he opened.  

Christmas Eve gifts at T and MiMi's House:

This Sugar Plum Fairy was not impressed with her cousin's craziness.

Not one bit.

PS - Isn't she gorgeous?  

Princess E will remain our only princess for a while!  

I'm confident she'll keep all the boys in line though.

After leaving the bikes at T and MiMi's (ahem), we headed home to go to sleep and wait for Santa!

Christmas Morning Breakfast

(that is not really coffee he's drinking, I promise)

We headed to PawPaw and DeeDee's for Christmas gifts and dinner that afternoon, after a fun morning putting our Santa gifts to good use.

And, following our tradition growing up, had a birthday cake for Baby Jesus!  

H loved singing the "Happy Birthday" song and eating the cake.

I love continue this tradition - it's an easy, fun way to reinforce the true "reason for the season."

Last Christmas as a family of three!

And this?

This is real life, peeps.

Real life with a toddler who screamed for his new Winnie the Pooh for the picture, and then a pregnant mommy to balance them both on her tummy for the picture.

Please note the progression of Mr. Smith backing out of the chaos.  Busted.

We're having a.... boy!

So... it's been a bit of time since I've visited, folks. 

Not much going on here... just that we're excited to say we're expanding our adventures to include another kiddo!  Another little boy, and we couldn't be more excited.

Christmas Eve, we went that morning for our big "Gender Reveal" Ultrasound.

And we had our favorite 2 and a half year old give us the good news, with some assistance from the ultrasound tech.

She helped H turn around with this sign:

Later on that evening, we got to share the big news with our families, which we wrapped as blue booties as a Christmas gift from Baby #2.

T and MiMi on Christmas Eve: 

And PawPaw and DeeDee on Christmas afternoon:

So... here we are!  

Eagerly waiting on Baby Boy Smith #2 to arrive in late May.

I hope to update the other major things going on sometime soon, as well as the holidays with H! 

But since this was the BIGGEST event going on with us right now, I wanted to go ahead and update you.

Happy New Year!  2014 looks to be very adventurous for us...

Haircut!

After repeated questions of "When are you going to cut his hair?" I finally caved and we went in for the Big Haircut a couple of weekends ago, just me and my H.

His long locks had grown out of the cute baby curls sometime over the Summer, but I just couldn't break myself to make the cut.

No matter how many times I was told, "Oh she's so pretty."

And, so, off we went.  To Great Clips in our neighborhood.

I laughed.  I cried.  Time stood still.  

But it was done.

He was just as nervous, but in the end - big smiles all around.

I swear it aged him 5 years.  

Baptism Fit for a Princess

We were excited to celebrate Miss Elizabeth's Baptism a couple of weeks ago.

She is an exquisite, beautiful baby girl, and we love her so!

H loves his Cousin "Biz Bet" and showers her with affection, albeit sometimes forcefully.

It's so wonderful to be able to see Sister's devotion  as a Mommy - she's a natural and E lights up when she hears Sister's voice or sees her face.  

E's baptism gown has been in the Whitfield family for years, and apparently worn by all the Whitfield children - how awesome is that?  It was gorgeous.

 

Halloween Trunk or Treat

We had a blast at this year's Trunk or Treat at H's school!

We went with a pirate theme this year, to go along with H's "Jake the Neverland Pirate" costume.

First, the parade.

H was a little overwhelmed and needed some special attention.

Or just a ploy for some attention from his teacher?

I think we know the answer to this question, folks.

As you can see, I am dressed as a pirate too, so I can match the theme of our Trunk or Treat!

I did not wear this to work, I assure you.

(Mr. Smith is too cool for costumes.)

Now he's smiling! 

We dressed up the back of the car with a treasure map, inflatable parrot, treasure chest with chocolate gold coins, and borrowed several of H's "Jake and the Neverland Pirates" toys as well.

A hit!

Fare Thee Well, Summer

Fare Thee Well, Summer.

As I'm sitting here smelling my delicious new Pumpkin Spice candle and cooking Taco Soup in the crock pot, I feel like I'm walking steadfastly toward Fall.

While ignoring the fact that it's 90 degrees outside and I soaked up one last sunny Saturday at the Farm and Pool yesterday.  

You were good to us, Summer!

Beach vacations, Mr. Smith's mission trip to Africa, Baby Elizabeth's arrival, wedding anniversaries, trips to the Zoo with pals, and weekends at the Farm.

Sigh.  

But I love Fall. 

I love the crispy mornings, 

boots and scarves, 

soups and chili, 

the brilliant colors of the leaves.

Picking out pumpkins, Halloween, then Thanksgiving.

Not to mention Alabama Football!

Thank you for the memories, Summer!

Stranded in Kenya

Well, there's a title you never think you'd type.

Not sure if you were keeping up with the news last week or not, but the airport in Nairobi, Kenya suffered greatly from a fire, causing massive destruction on their International section.

This was devastating to us because....

that's where Mr. Smith was trying to fly out of to come home after his 10-day Mission Trip.

His group was actually en route to the airport when the news broke.  

So, a return on Thursday afternoon turned into a return on Sunday afternoon, with lots of stress, prayer, tears, prayer, frustrations at Delta, prayer, rearranging with various airports, and a little bit more prayer.

I'm not going to go into the various events that the group witnessed and struggled with during their extended stay, I'll let Mr. Smith do a guest post on that and his trip to Kenya sometime soon, as well as share his amazing pictures.

But, they are home.  

Safe and sound.