Caroline's Baptism Weekend

Caroline was baptized today!  

It makes my heart happy that our little baby was baptized today and that a lot of our family and friends were here to witness it and enjoy lunch with us afterwards.

Our baptism weekend of activities started off on Friday with the arrival of Caroline's Godmother (and my best friend, Stacy)!  We enjoyed dinner and drinks at our house and stayed up way too late catching up and having a blast.

On Saturday morning, my Mom and Grandmother flew in from Texas.  They got here in time for lunch and enjoyed playing with Elizabeth and Caroline all afternoon.

 Stacy, Caroline, Elizabeth, my Mom, and Grandmother

 Caroline would take a bottle from Stacy, but no one else.

 Ga-Ga and Caroline

 I love this girl!

In the middle of the afternoon, we were joined by Ben's parents, Sally Anne and Al, and my brother and sister-in-law, Andy and Lolly.  Ben's brother, Adam, also came over for a bit before dinner time. The girls just played and played and loved getting a ton of attention from all their family (especially both of their uncles).

 Caroline LOVES her tummy time mat

(if she is on her back)

 Elizabeth and Gramps (her Great Grandmother)

Andy, Lolly, and Caroline

I am so happy Andy and Lolly finally got to meet Caroline.

She just loved her Aunt and Uncle!

 Caroline and her Dad

 Uncle Andy and Caroline

 Uncle Adam and Caroline

The girls and their uncles

Stacy agreed to take a picture of all our family that came over on Saturday

On Sunday, we got up and got ready for Church and for the lunch we were hosting after the baptism.  We headed to church around 10:15am for the 11am mass and met all of our friends and family before the service.  

 Ben was a lector during the mass

 Waiting for Caroline to get baptized

 Caroline getting baptized

 She was so good!

She never cried and even smiled a few times.

I wanted to get a picture of everyone that came to see Caroline get baptized.

We did get most everyone, in this picture we have: 

Adam, Shelley, Pap Pap, Nana, Stacy, Gramps, Elizabeth, Me, Uncle Andy, Aunt Lolly, Ben, Caroline, Ga-Ga,  Aunt Brigette, Uncle Adam, Matt, and Claire.

Not pictured: Scot (taking the photo), Laura, Alice, and Evie, Cathy and Darren, and Jessica and Noah (they came over for lunch)

 The Godparents and the Parents

Stacy, Me, Ben, Caroline, and Adam

 I love these two people!

They are both such great Christian examples and I am so happy 

they are Godparents to both of our daughters. 

Stacy, Caroline, and Adam

We are the proud parents!

Me, Caroline, and Ben

After Church, we hosted everyone at our house for a great lunch (Ben did an excellent job)!  We had pulled pork, honey glazed carrots, green bean casserole, zesty pasta salad, and melt-in-your-mouth sugar cookies.  We also sent everyone home with a little treat of chocolate covered pretzels.

 all the food

 Pulled pork, coleslaw, pickles, and honey glazed carrots

 green bean casserole and zesty pasta salad

 melt-in-your-mouth sugar cookies

Once everyone started eating, we completely forgot to take pictures of everyone that came over.  Lunch was really good and I enjoyed seeing everyone at church and at our house for lunch.  

I just want to say a quick thank you to everyone that came this weekend to celebrate.  We had family in from Georgia, South Carolina, Texas, and Pennsylvania.  It really means a lot to us that everyone came to celebrate with us.

We are truly humbled by all of the love everyone has for our girls and all of the great Christian examples they have in their lives.  I pray for both of my girls to grow up knowing Christ and to strive to be good Christian women. 

A very happy Sunday to you!

Friday Finals

Tonight I am linking up with my favorite coupon blog, Southern Savers, for a weekly roundup of our shopping for the week and how well we did.

On Monday, we headed to 6 stores.  It was my first time out of the house in 18 days and I was excited!  Ben and the girls were very patient with me and very kindly allowed me to do all the coupon shopping I wanted. 
*Sidebar, I had made my lists on Thursday and a lot of the stores (like CVS) the deals ended on Saturday, so I had to quickly recalculate some of my shopping.

**Additional sidebar, these pictures are super blurry because I took them on my cell phone.

 From BJs:  We got 2 gallons of milk, 1 box of formula, 16 squeezies, and 1 bag of bananas

Total spent: $49.28

Total saved: $9.69

Saved: 16%

 At CVS: 18 rolls of toilet paper and 18 AA batteries

Total spent: $15.73

Total saved: $16.23

Saved: 51%

 At Babies R Us: Breathable bumper, baby vitamin, and 6 new bottle nipples

Total spent: $0 (we had gift cards)

Total saved: $49.78

Saved: 100%

 At Staples: 6 rolls of paper towels, 1 ream of printer paper, 

2 packages of baseball card holders (for coupons)

Total spent: $16.76

Total saved: $1.21 and I will be getting $4.79 back in easy rebates

Saved:  26%

 At total wine: 7 bottles of wine 

Total spent: $62.33

Total saved: $15.60

Saved: 20%

At Harris Teeter: 

8 lbs. bag of potatoes

3 lbs. bag of apples

1 lb. of turkey

6 yogurts

1 bag of salad

1 package of hummus

1 bottle lime juice

2 bottles apple juice

2 containers lysol wipes

1 bottle dawn liquid dish soap

2 whole chickens

3 packages of shredded cheese

2 cans of soup

2 bags of M&Ms

1 package of yeast

1 package of 8 AA batteries

2 boxes of snackwells chocolate pretzels

2 boxes of granola bars

1 package sandwich thins

Total spent: $58.63

Total saved: $47.00

Saved: 44%

Total spent for the week: $202.73

Total saved for the week: $139.51

Do you want to take my picture?

I have been with my girls all week and have been loving on them all day long.  I am so glad to have both of my girls back with me all day and I am so happy I can take care of both of them again (but, thank you Vicki for taking great care of them!).

We have been hanging around the house ("as you do" when you can't drive) (thank you Adam W for getting that phrase stuck in my head) and I have been taking lots of pictures of my girls.

We had the camera packed away somewhere, so I finally found it and started using that for photos instead of the camera on my phone.

I was taking pictures of Caroline on the floor...

 

When Elizabeth laid down next to her and said "Do you want to take my picture too?" 

I said, "of course!" and took pictures of both of them.

Then Elizabeth walked off and I moved Caroline to the couch to take pictures of her sitting up.

Then Elizabeth sat down again and said, "do you want to take my picture too?" 

Of course my beautiful big girl!

 Then Caroline looked at me like this

And Elizabeth looked at me like this

 I snapped this with my cell phone

And then they were done with photos for the day.

This is us this afternoon

Happy Thursday!

Weekend Review

We have had a great weekend around here.

 Elizabeth was accessorizing a little bit.

 Then I introduced Elizabeth to playdoh

She LOVES playing with playdoh and has asked to use it all weekend

 She likes making "footprints" with the playdoh

 We had a little band time on Friday

 Then some play time in our jammies on Saturday morning

 Yesterday I was working on getting Caroline to sit-up and had Elizabeth join her for some photos

This little girl is getting so big!

 Really mom?- Caroline

 Fingers are tasty

 She is not thrilled with the bumbo

Saturday night, Adam and Shelley came over for dinner and we stayed up way too late and had a great time hanging out with them.  Shelley is due on Tuesday with their daughter, so we enjoyed the late night get together before they are up late at night with their baby girl  :)

 Sunday morning, Ben let me sleep in, then brought me breakfast in bed

I can never say it enough- Ben is AWESOME!

 Then I came downstairs and played with my girls

Tonight we went over to watch the Seahawks with our neighbors.  Liz and Brad are from Washington and are huge Seahawks fans.  It was GREAT to get out of the house and see everyone for a few hours.  Now I am just resting my leg and writing out our shopping and to-do list for tomorrow.

Happy Sunday!