Lazy dog days of....January???

This weekend it was 73 and sunny, and I decided to soak up some of the beautiful sunshine in our backyard! Thanks to my Hipstamatic app, I got a few cute pics of the pups!

Can't wait 'til this kind of weather is the norm! Oh how I love Texas!

New Addition...

Labby Rowe

My brother is getting her on February 4th, I can't wait to have her around!

Lighting McQueen Lunch

For Christmas my roommate gave me a really cute cookbook that has recipes based on Disney characters. The recipes are easy, and designed to get kids involved in the kitchen, so of course I had to try it out when 2 of my nieces were here for New Years!

Since Emmy loves Cars we decided on Lightning McQueen turkey wraps. I got the ingredients and my mom, sister in law, Emmy, Hayden & Lincoln came over for lunch!

The girls enjoyed playing chef and since they were SO good I let them watch Cars while we ate! It was so cute when I told Hayden that I had the movie because she was quiet with a very thoughtful look on her face, and after a few seconds she asked...'do you have a couch?' Luckily I did, that girl needed a comfy place to watch her flick!

After the movie they played a quick concert on my piano, Emmy played hymns and Hayden played Happy Birthday to herself!

I hope next time they're in town we can have a full on girls night at my house, sleeping bags, popcorn and all!!

New Years!

This year New Years was really exciting for me, it was the first chance I had to meet my nephew Lincoln Scott! Of course that meant some playtime with his big sisters, and lots of fun sibling time with their parents! Here's a recap!

Video games with Uncle Brad, and lots of cuddle time with Karo!

I soaked up the time I got with Lincoln, that boy is one good cuddler!

After Em opened her gift from me (a princess tea set with dress up clothes) we had to have a tea party to try it out!
Emmy & Hayden got special handmade quilts from Karo, here's Emmy's quilt.

She's SO excited!!!

Uncle Brad & the girls had fun at Chick-fil-A's playland, look at those smiles!

I'm not sure any of us made it til midnight after such a long day of presents and fun, but we managed to do some sparklers before bedtime. I shamelessly stole these pictures from my sister in law's blog, thanks Jess!

Happy 2011! May God's love be evident in your life all year long!

Lucky Willow!

I know I love my dog an amount that some may call crazy...but let me just show you a little bit of proof that I'm not the only one crazy about this mutt! Over New Years my nieces were wacky for Willow! If they weren't petting her, they were reading to her, or watching movies with her. Emmy even helped me clean her ear one day when we noticed she was fighting a little infection off. I think they might need a little dog of their own...you decide!

Em helping inspect her ear, and both girls offering plenty of belly rubs...
melts. my. heart!

HK reading puppy stories to the puppy

Watching Toy Story 3 with Willow

Sweet kisses on Willow's head...just don't tell her daddy, he'd be way grossed out!

Oh, and I'm pretty sure the feeling is mutual because this pup was one big mope after her friends went back to Dallas!

Christmas 2010

This year Christmas was a little more low key than normal. Neither of my older siblings, sister in laws or nieces/nephews were in town for the holiday, so we decided to mix our usual traditions with some new ones!

Since Santa can't forget those children who are hospitalized on Christmas I usually go to work on Christmas Eve to see who will be there overnight, and wrap a few gifts for each child to be left in a stocking from the big guy in red. This year mom came with me and helped me wrap some cute gifts for the babes who spent Christmas at our hospital. Thanks mom!

My younger brother works for a church so we decided to skip the traditional service at our church and hold out til the midnight service at his church. It was a festive evening with a bell choir, wassail, cookies and lots of Christmas decorations in the sanctuary. Brad did a great job making it all look and sound good! We also managed to get a few family pics in front of the Christmas tree there...

The next morning we made the traditional Rowe Christmas breakfast (pigs in a blanket) and made sure to send the picture of those piggies on to our other brothers just to let em know what they were missing!

A few of my favorite gifts included:

Some crafty Martha Stewart glitters, ink pads, and adhesives. A cute doggy T for Willow, lots of gift cards and a Kitchen Aid food processor that I'm excited to try out! We were truly spoiled!

We had a great time, but I think the best part was that the celebrations continued all week long!

A few days after Christmas we packed up and headed to Austin to celebrate with my brother Greg, my very pregnant sister in law Gina & my niece Ava! We had a blast watching her open presents, like this cute Vet dress up set my parents got her! The CLS in me just HAD to do some medical play with her, and she was so good at prepping her 'patient' for shots!

Later we had birthday cake and sang Happy Birthday to Jesus, and Ava just loved blowing out his candles! It was a great way to celebrate Christmas together, even if we were just a few days off the schedule :)

Christmas Decorating!

For the past two years I've participated in a blog world Christmas Open House of sorts, but I never got around to posting these during the season! So come on in and take a trip back to December 2010! I've tried to only take pictures of things that were new/different than last year, hope you enjoy!

One fun thing about a new roommate was all her cute Christmas decorations! Lisa had her own tree, which was the perfect size for the front window, and she had a great wreath for our front door!

Wicker reindeer from PB in the entry, and some new vase fillers and sparkly candles make for a simple display on the buffet.
The picture below does this piece NO justice, but this was my big goal/vision for the arch last year after I saw a similar idea in a PB store. I cut branches from the woods near my parent's house and spray painted most of them white, then used twin to hang the oversized ornaments from them. Like I said, much better effect in person but you get the gist.
This cute poinsettia pillow had jingle bells in the middle of the flower!

Thanks for stopping by, hope you enjoyed my little tour!