We had a wonderful holiday season, full of family, friends, and food! I'll post more pictures on Facebook - just a sampling here - click the link at the bottom to see the full album!
Lyla had lots of fun decorating our tree. Too bad she could only reach one or two branches :)
We started December off with a wonderful visit from my sister. We were sad that Cristian could not join her, but hopefully next year! We had a great time visiting and playing with the girls. The last day she was here, we were joined by the rest of my family including "great grandma Lyla!"
On Christmas Eve morning, we had a breakfast burrito party which we hope will become a tradition! It was so much fun, so yummy, and we had about 40 people in our little apartment!
On Christmas morning, we had ebelskievers, the Lombard family tradition. It was my first time making them and they turned out pretty good!
We had a lovely Christmas dinner, just the four of us.
The day after Christmas, we went for a hike in Marin. It was chilly and beautiful.
Then, we had a wonderful New Year's weekend with Grandma and Grandpa Lemen!
See lots more photos here: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.3068877879574.2156597.1192380773&type=3&l=8581b9d631
Welcome to the online version of our annual update letter :)
January – We welcomed our second daughter, Tabitha Lou, on January 30! Tabi has brought much joy and laughter to our family this year. Lyla absolutely loves her little sister and watching them play together is a wonderful blessing.
February – Had a quiet month adjusting to being a family of four. Leah’s sister Katie was able to visit and help out for a few weeks.
March – Jared’s sister Jenn got married! It was wonderful to reunite with family and friends for such a joyous occasion.
April – Lyla turned two! Tabitha was baptized at our Easter Vigil service. Leah’s sister Katie got married! We all traveled to her home in the Dominican Republic to be there for the special day.
May – Tabitha learned to suck her fingers, which made naptime and bedtime easier for everyone J
June – Lyla ate her first s’more on our Father’s Day camping trip in Half Moon Bay.
July – We took a family vacation with Jared’s dad to Colorado. We enjoyed everything from warm sunshine to a hike in the snow!
Also took our second camping trip of the summer, and fit a so-far record 13 people in our “new” 1968 Dodge van. We bundled up for a foggy SF summer family photo.
August – Had a wonderful time camping with our college friends the Bradleys. Lyla and Tabi had their first trip in a small airplane when Grandpa picked us up for a visit to Mariposa.
September – Tabitha suffered a fractured femur when she rolled off the changing table. She was a good sport about the whole thing, and also sprouted two teeth and learned to sit up and “scoot” this month.
October – Lyla started a pre-school co-op one day a week with three of her friends (their moms helped!).
November – Tabitha began crawling in earnest and received a clean bill of health from her pediatric orthopedist. We celebrated Thanksgiving with the extended Davis family in Walnut Creek.
December – The Annual Lemen cookie baking day was again a success. In all we baked nearly 5 million cookies in one Saturday. We are looking forward to our first Christmas at home as a family of four!
We thank God for all of you, your friendship, love and support. Most of all, we are thankful for the gift of Jesus, coming into our broken world to bring redemption and new life. May your Christmas be full of meaning and joy.
This year, we spent Thanksgiving with Jared's dad and his family in Walnut Creek. We had a great time seeing all the extended family and our two kiddos got lots of attention, which they liked :) Here are (most of) the cousins engrossed in a board game:
Unfortunately we didn't get a big group shot, but I think we had at least 20 people for dinner. The next day, we went with Grandpa and Nana to Tilden Park in the Berkeley Hills. We had so much fun riding the steam train! You can't really tell in the photo below, but we are all crammed into a little train car :)
We also visited the "Little Farm" in the park. Lyla was a bit apprehensive about the big cows, but she had fun visiting with most of the animals.
After buying fabric approximately 18 months ago, I finally sewed some curtains for the girls' room. I'm happy with how they turned out; I love the fabric even though the pattern isn't perfect (I made it up as I went along...).
I even had some left over to make a curtain for the kitchen window. Goes nicely with the new pot rack that Jared and my dad built, don't you think?
We spent a long weekend in Mariposa with my parents. It was great to get out of the city and up into the mountains, and Jared really enjoyed the chance to work on some projects in the shop with my dad. He only emerged for meal times and sleeping! My mom and I relaxed with the girlies and I was able to see two good friends from high school (and their kids!) as well.
The girls had lots of time on the swingset that Grandpa put together for them.
The classic snot shot. Can't help it.
We also went to the park my siblings and I played in as kids. There is a nice new play structure and Lyla loved all the different slides. Here are Grammy and the girls!
Side note, Lyla's new favorite activity is trying to pick Tabi up and carry her around. Here she is a second after the above photo was taken, trying to wrestle her away from Grammy.
When Jared was working on the van, Lyla wanted to help. So we gave her a bucket of water and a paintbrush and she "painted" the van for at least half an hour! I will have to remember this trick for keeping her occupied in the future...
Winston was joining in on the fun. Check out the paintbrush between his paws :)
Reading stories with Grandpa.
We had lots of fun when my friend Regan and her son Caleb came to visit! He and Lyla played together wonderfully, and they even both took a nap so us mamas could talk in peace :)
On the way home we also got to see my friend Jessica, and meet her newborn daughter Avery! We had a lovely afternoon visiting together (and the guys were happy to watch the football game while we talked).
Lyla has been part of a little preschool co-op this fall. This is a photo of one of their favorite activities, making elephant masks while learning about the letter E.
She's also been taking an art class through the park and rec. She has loved being able to paint!
...with a few funny quotes from Lyla included! The "dead bird" is a bird that we saw in the street near where we park. It was there for about a week before being cleaned up and Lyla would ask to see it every time we went outside. At first she called it the "old bird" and then it became the dead bird. This video was several weeks after that though - it was so funny how it just popped into her head again!
Lyla had her first experience trick or treating this year. We just walked up half a block behind our house and then came back on the other side of the street, but she still had a lot of fun and came away with an impressive amount of candy (of which Jared and I've eaten a good portion!).
She called it going "halloween costume-ing" and when she woke up on Tuesday morning she asked me if we could go again that afternoon :)
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