Christmas 2009

What a crazy Christmas we had! First we decided that we were going to have to head to my parent's house a day and a half early to beat the weather. We were able to get back there safely. The weather there got way worse than what it was in Ankeny. They got around 15-17 inches of snow, ice and wind...it was really bad. On Christmas Eve the power flickered off and on for a few hours and a little bit over night but they never did lose power for longer than 10 minutes at a time which was much better than what some people experienced in the area. Since the weather was so bad, they cancelled Christmas Eve church service. We spent most of our time relaxing, being entertained by Brady and we managed to workout a little too.
We had our immediate family Christmas on Saturday morning, we all got spoiled and had fun watching Brady and Cadence 'open' their gifts. They weren't too interested in the opening of the gifts but it was fun anyway. Later that day we headed out to my aunt and uncles' for the extended Petersen Christmas. It was great to see everyone and Brady (the little ham) really enjoyed entertaining everyone. He loved being in their big family room trying to walk and getting applause everytime he took some steps. He is walking so much these days, he can go across the room and it won't be long before he is walking all the time! Scary! On Sunday morning we had brunch at my Grandma Parker's townhouse. It was good to see that side of the family too. We enjoyed our family time and got way too many gifts! We must have been good the last year. The holidays are so much more fun now with Brady. Seeing things through his eyes is so amazing.
I have all this week off (yay!) so Brady and I are going to have fun at home. Andy had yesterday off and has today off as well!

The one and only time he even touched the wrapping paper

Standing by his sports complex

Brady and Cadence

They play so well together!

With Uncle Nick

Daddy time

Grandma Petersen

Being the little Ham he is

Having a snack with Cousin Nicole

Mr. Mischief

I turned my back for 1 second and look where I found Mr. Brady....

Uh, oh....I'm busted!

Maybe mommy won't see me in here...

This is a fun place to play!

Mommy's Little Helper

On Saturday I spent all day making Christmas goodies. For a while I had a little helper in the kitchen. He had so much fun watching mommy bake...once he got restless daddy took him out and about to run some errands so mommy could finish up. Later that evening we went over to the Water's house for some Chinese and to hang out...we had a great low key weekend!

Look Mommy, I have my own bowl

Now I'm going to stir it

And check to make sure it's okay

Of course he had to taste test when we were done!

Cathcart Christmas Photos

Family Pic at the Skating Rink



Jaxson and Brad skating

Aunt Lisa and Brady




The boys by the tree

Jaxson with one of his puzzles

Brady getting a ride in his Mega Block wagon



'King of the World'

Brady checking out all the skating action


With Chester---he was just a little excited

Sledding around the house thanks to Nana

Sitting with Mommy

Opening Gifts

Computer Woes

Well I haven't been totally slacking on updating our blog, I have had an excuse...our computer has a virus...Grr...luckily our friend Jon works on computers for a living and is working on it for us. So this post comes from a different computer.
Here's a little to catch you up (I will post pictures once the computer is up and running):

Cathcart Family Christmas
This past weekend we had the Cathcart Family Christmas. Both Andy and I were off work early and headed up to Gowrie. We had our immediate family Christmas on Friday night. We opened gifts and had a wonderful prime rib dinner (yummy!). We all got sooo spoiled! Brady was a little more interested in finding any scrap piece of wrapping paper and stuffing it into his mouth or repeatedly climbing the couple of stairs to the sunken living room. He was a mad man and all over the place. Nana Kris had the house decorated so nicely, we were just hoping Brady wasn't going to destroy it all!
On Saturday Brady decided to wake up around 5:20 a.m. Yay! So we got an early start on the day. We relaxed for a while and then headed to the skating rink in town as they were having free skating for kids. Jaxson got to try out some skates and did a great job for his first time. Brady was in heaven---he got to watch all the kids skate around. He LOVES to watch older kids, he just had this huge grin on his face, wide eyes and kept talking and pointing. It was so cute! Santa even showed up to do some skating. That evening Lisa, Laura and Adam came over for another fabulous meal (unfortunately Karl was at home sick) and it was great to catch up with them.
We headed back home on Sunday in the later morning. It was interesting fitting all of our goodies into the Equinox. When we got home we ran to the grocery store, unpacked everything and got ready for the week. Luckily this is the last full week we'll work this year! We only work until Wednesday next week and then I have the last week of the year off and Andy is taking a couple of those off too. It will be nice to have even more family time. Hopefully we don't get snowed in so we can go do things!

Promise to post pictures soon!

Happy Birthday Brady!!!

Yesterday was our baby boy's 1st birthday! We can not believe he is 1 year old already. This past year has just flown by and every day has been a blessing with him. We have been so lucky to have such a happy, funny and entertaining little boy. We had a great celebration yesterday with family and friends. We crammed about 40 people into our house for the big day and had so much fun. Brady got sooo spoiled!!! He is so lucky to have so many people that love him. A big thank you to everyone that came.

With the birthday boy

With Grandma and Grandpa

Nana and Papa and their boys

With Uncle Nick

We are so glad we have our basement finished...we had a large crew down there

We had to get creative with a couple card tables in the living room!

Our little monkey and his cake

Grandma, Cadence, Brady and Grandpa

Brady's very own cake...he ate most of it!

Opening his gifts...he only wanted to unwrap until he got some paper he could play with!


Playing with some of his many toys

He loved everything he got...he was captivated by some of his books!

Holiday Party

On Friday the Waters, Dillingers, Fuhrmans (without Meggie as she was sick) and the Cathcarts all got together for a little Christmas party. We all have so much going on in December that we needed to have it a little early. All the kids exchanged names and so it was fun to have them all open their gifts...it was a great time!

Happy Thanksgiving!

I know I'm late but we hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! On Wednesday evening we headed up to Gowrie to spend Thanksgiving. We had a wonderful meal on Thursday and got to catch up with Karl and Lisa. Unfortunately it was a short visit for Andy and me. We had to head back home Thursday afternoon as we both had to work on Friday (boo!!). Since our daycare was closed on Friday, Brady got to spend time with Nana and Papa and Jaxson was also spending the night and Friday with them as well. I think they had lots of fun playing together!
On Friday morning, Andy and I braved all the other crazies and hit Black Friday before we had to work. We were up by 3:30 and out the door closely after. We got some good deals as we visited Kohls, Target and Walmart...not sure if Andy will ever do that again...ha ha! He was a trooper though! On Saturday we did some things around the house and we had a wedding to go to in West Des Moines. Brady went over to the Water's house for the evening and had SO much fun! He really played hard because he slept in until 7:45 a.m. on Sunday----he's never done that!!! It was great sleeping in a little! Thanks Jen and Jon!
On Sunday we took Brady to Portrait Innovations for his 1 year pictures...NEVER AGAIN will be be going there. We only went there this time because our usual photographer Sarah has been so busy dealing with family issues. What a zoo/nightmare PI was...aghh...should have learned our lesson after Brady's 3 month pictures we had done there but I guess I was desperate to get his pictures done before his birthday. We managed to get one good shot (which is hard to believe we only had a couple that were good as Brady is so smiley) so not all was lost. We've had a busy week so far and it's going to get even more crazy with Brady's 1 year birthday on Sunday. I can't believe he's going to be 1 in a few days...we have lots to do to get ready for his party!!!

What a turkey!

Clapping with Nana

Look at that face!

Brady and Jaxson playing...double trouble!