DREAMS AND SPAGHETTI-O'S: Holiday in the South

I'm back from 2 very relaxing weeks in the south filled with lots of time with family and friends.

After spending a few days in Alabama celebrating Mary Blake's adoption, helping Cat organize the nursery, and hanging out with the fam I headed north with my parents.

My dear friends Kelli and PD were visitng family in Georgia and I was able to meet them for lunch at our favorite place, Chick-Fil-A! It was so great to see them and meet their baby, Claire!

PD and Kelli are one of my favorite couples!! I love that I was friends with them separately and then they got married! PD was my date to my first sorority formal (totally as friends!) We all spent a summer in Africa together (where I totally thought Kelli was crushing on PD) and we were all on staff with CO together. All that to say we have a lot of fun (and maybe not so fun) memories together! Now PD is in seminary at Covenant and they have a baby! Man does life change.

After a pit stop at the Chick and maybe a little shopping at the outlets, I headed to the mountains of North Carolina!

My dad and I took hikes almost every morning

Winnie came home with us and had a little vacation until her parents, C and G came for Christmas!

I spent lots of time sitting by the Christmas tree and watching those cheesy Christmas movies. You gotta love those oh so predictable movies that come on during the 25 days of Christmas! Yes, I'm a sucker for those I will admit!

On Christmas day the Blakester made her first trip to the mountains to visit Mack Daddy and GG

Aunt B introduced her to the beautiful mountains. I think she was impressed

We opened stockings and presents

And Mary Blake opened her gifts. Can you tell she is super excited about the addapearl necklace she got from her grandparents. (My grandmother started a necklace for my sister and I when we were babies and added a pearl a year until she died. I still treasure it. Now MB has one!)

I think her first Christmas tired her out, b/c before too long she got a little mad!

So we celebrated the rest of Christmas while she slept.

Dad was excited about the Neil Diamond tickets we got him

And mom was excited about her new kindle fire.

I made my mom a book of her life for Christmas. I did this for my dad for his 60th birthday and had gret intentions of making one for my mom on her 60th. It's a 1 year late, but finally I finished it and she loved it!

The rest of the vacation we just hung out and played with this munchkin

and smiled at everything she did!

Her cheeks are just so squishy. I think her parents love her!

People told me that being an aunt is great, but I didn't know I would love it as much as I do. I am totally in love with this girl

We introduced MB to our 2 favorite restaurants in the mountains, Binions and Rockys. A trip to the mountains is never complete without a visit to these 2 restaurants. Judging by the way this girl likes to eat, I think she will like these restaurants very much when she gets older

And of course the grandparents bought her a onesie from Rockys

We also took her for her first trip to OP Taylor's Toy Store. Cat and I grew up going to this store.

Colette and Jonathan came over one night to hang out. They have a new baby too, who I got to meet for the first time. Colette is one of my best friends from college. Her baby Annaliese and Mary Blake are one month a part, so they got to have a little play date. You can see they both look thrilled about it!