Congratulations Chris and Katherine!!!

All day I've been thinking... snow, snow go away... come back in late 2008. I am so sick of this weather. I never though I would say it... but I am sick of the snow. I am sick of the cold. I just want to be able to go outside. I did take Carter for a walk on Monday. I think it got up to 35 degrees that morning. He was crying pretty hard by the time we got back to our neighborhood. For the last block and a half I carried him while pushing the stroller and trying not to slip on the ice. I'll wait until it's a little warmer for our next walk. Every other day we go to a different mall so he can run. It's kind of nice. I get some exercise and he gets tired. We have also been taking an awesome class at our coffee shop in downtown Maplewood. Today's class was all about fire trucks... which was even more awesome. Carter even got to put out a pretend fire. Too bad we didn't learn that skill until today. Last night we had a little accident when I was trying to entertain Carter by making popcorn in the fireplace. Anyway... I'm just looking forward to the days when we can get outside again.

Here's a picture of Dan and Carter yesterday. They are watching a dump truck video on YouTube (another thing we've been using to help pass the time inside).

This time last year Carter was just starting to crawl and pull up...

this year we have a hard time getting a non-blurry picture of him because he is always running to see the back of the camera.

I really wanted to put these two pictures up because of the outfit. When I took this picture the other day it reminded me of him standing in front of his old toy box in an almost identical outfit this time last year. I can't believe how much he has changed!

Just one last picture today. Lisa and I found this fun hat on one of our shopping trips last weekend.

I've been meaning to do this post for a long time... but have been fighting off the flu for about 3 weeks now (thanks to everyone checked in on me). Every time I think I'm feeling better it seems to come back. Carter and I will be missing church for the 3rd time this week. He's not been doing great either. We finally took him into the doctor yesterday and came home with medicine for an ear infection. Then right before bed last night he threw up all over Dan because he was coughing so hard (that was the third time this week). Poor guy!

Anyways... I've been wanting to put up pictures that show some of our favorite memories so far from 2008.

We got to spend some time with the Kennedy family (good friends from Seminary) on January 1st. That's one of the great things about still living in St. Louis... we get to see friends when they come through town. The kids loved the lockers in our basement.

Carter giving Amelia a New Year's Day kiss.

Grammy and Papa came for a visit in January. Carter giving Grammy a hug (he doesn't give them out often).

At the playground with Papa.

Coffee with Katherine's Mom in Godfrey, IL (my Mom was taking the picture).

Manna reading to Carter.

Carter and I took a trip to CO to see Uncle Scott, Aunt Cari, and the Baker's (good friends from Seminary) while Dan was in Santa Fe for a conference. We went to a coffee shop in downtown Fort Collins the first morning we were there. Carter was sick the whole trip :(... but we still had a really good time.

Reading with Aunt Cari and Stanford the cat.

Stanford and Zephyr waiting for leftovers from Carter.

Trying to get a pic with Carter and the Baker kids. I realized later that I never got a picture of Grayson. Here is Carter (kind of) with Coleman and Meredith. It was so fun to meet Meredith.

I got to spend an entire afternoon with Emily because my awesome brother-in-law kept Carter. He even took Carter to the grocery store.
The Symphony with Sarah and Katherine. This is one of the reasons I love living in a big city!
We have gotten so much snow in St. Louis this year. One snow day we built an igloo with the guys. It was a house rule that everyone had to crawl through it. Here is Dan getting Steven back for all the snow he threw at us that day.

Fred and Steven.

Fun with friends at a Blue's Hockey game.

My best friend, Lisa, from High School came for the Holiday weekend. It was so fun to spend time with her. The only bummer was that she caught our flu!Lastly... Carter having some ice cream with Fred and Steven. He gets special treats from them that he never gets from Mommy and Daddy.

Dan took our camera and tripod outside last night to get this shot. All of us took in the view from our front porch for about 30 seconds and then came right back in. I cannot wait for some warmer temperatures.

So Alyssa still isn't taking responsibility for "our" blog, therefore here's another post.  In lieu of Carter's latest haircut hash, I made an executive decision with the support of Aunt Lisa, to clean up and effectively cure our beautiful boy of his tired cut.

 Nana and Grammy beware of the following images: they contain gross coolness and pervasive acts of style.

Alyssa has been sick for a better part of the week, so I am having to step in as a guest author. Ignore the guy on the left as you listen to the music styling of John Legend and as you view the gravatonic gyrations of Carter.

Today our friend, Sadie, celebrated her 3rd birthday. Her mom sent me an e-mail last week to tell me that she (Sadie) wanted Carter to come because "he's a nice guy." I thought that was so sweet!! So... today Carter went to his first princess party dressed as a duck.

He may be 17 years younger... but the guys never fail to include Carter.

A dose of Daddy...

Blue eyes...

8 inches!

We finally have a snow day. It's so much more exciting when you live with high schoolers. I think we ended up with 8 inches in our yard.

We took Carter out in the snow yesterday afternoon... he's not a big fan of it.


Here is our yard this morning.