Christmas 2009 in Ohio

Christmas tradition for us, is to drive back to Wilmington, Ohio to spend the holiday with my Dad's family. The trip should only take about 7 hours for us. On our drive this year we had one funny mishap. Josh was driving and having a very important work phone call while I was sitting in the back between Jenna and Peyton who were watching a movie on the drop-down tv. After awhile I look out the window and I was surprised to see an airstrip that had been built for a small town along our route. Then a little later I notice that there was a lot more commercial shopping places in the area than there had ever been. Finally I asked Josh if we were on I-77N...unfortunately we were not on that road but on I-85S. We had missed the turn off and had traveled almost and hour out of our way. Oh well, it made the trip longer, but it's a funny story!



This year there were 25 of us who stayed at my Nana's house...all sharing the 4 bedroom, 2.5 bath house. While quarters were cramped, we managed to make it work. Christmas Eve the extended family all got together to spend time together and celebrate. Here we are all dressed up.




This year was our niece Kandice's first birthday. The night we arrived we all celebrated with her by eating Donato's pizza and having cake. She had fun with the icing once she got over the stickiness of it!

This is my Nana, Shirley, the matriarch of our family. It never ceases to amaze me that she keeps her cool the entire time our family comes and turns her house upside-down. She is also unbelievably generous to all of us. I claim to manage chaos with my kids, maybe I learned it from watching her.






Before bed on Christmas Eve, Aunt Sara took Daniel and Jenna outside to sprinkle the reindeer food they had each made at their preschools. Jenna's had pink sprinkles in it, while Daniel's had green sprinkles!





The older kids had just set out a plate of cookies and milk for Santa and were posing for pictures. The 2 babies were already asleep, but these four cousins were excited!!!








Then it was Christmas morning and here they are waiting for the green light to go down stairs. It is tradition to wait to make sure that everyone is awake and downstairs as a family before we go into the family room. There are numerous pictures in this same place showing different generations waiting here for the same thing! This group has it easy...I remember when I was little we had to wait for my great grandparents to drive over and eat breakfast before we could cross this line.



After 30 years of holding the little kids back in the kitchen so they didn't see the Christmas surprises, my brother rigged up a sheet to block the view. I think I heard someone say...Why didn't we think of this before!







Wow...look what is down here!!!









Peyton and her cousin Kandice both got Lion walkers from Santa. Here they are test riding them together!









Here is little Tinkerbell...I mean Jenna. One of Jenna's gifts was the new movie Tinkerbell and the Lost Treasure along with a Tinkerbell dress-up outfit, which she wanted to wear around the house.











Little Peyton had the best time playing, but was a buster when it came to warming up to folks. Aunt Kitty was smart and held Peyton while giving her yogurt bites. After that they were buds!



We made it home safely on Saturday with no problems and were definitely glad to be sleeping in our beds. When I think back to the whole trips, I am grateful that my whole family still makes the effort to get together. I am thankful for traditions long established that are still practiced. I am thankful and grateful I am married to a man who puts up with all of this. I know it isn't relaxing for him at all, but he does it because he loves me and loves seeing our kids have fun. I am excited that our daughters get to play with all of their cousins and have fun, even when they don't get to be together that often. At the end of the day I feel very blessed for all that I have and for all of the loved ones in my live. Merry Christmas to all and here's to a great 2010!

The Cowley girls

I mentioned how Peyton was walking and she is!!! Every day her confidence grows and she walks more without falling. I finally went and picked my camera up from a friend's house this week and was able to capture the girls in action again.

Here is little Peyton strutting her stuff!

This week Jenna had a Gingerbread Open House at her school. My mom watched Peyton so that Jenna and I could go together. It was so nice getting to spend some one-on-one time with my little girl. Here's Jenna doing a craft project with her friend Sean who also lives in our neighborhood. Have I mentioned that Jenna LOVES to do craft projects!

After our craft project we got to decorate gingerbread men and other cookies followed by snack time. It was so much fun watching little Jenna be creative and introduce me to friends who were also there. She is growing up so fast!

Sisters gotta hug!

Jenna strikes a pose while pretending to be the mommy. Notice how she is wearing my watch.

And she's off...

It is official, Peyton is walking. On the eve of her turning 11 months old, Peyton decided she could do it on her own. She has been walking while holding onto things and keeping her hand on the side of the couch, but yesterday she did it freestyle. She was standing up with her hand on the banister post, dropped her hand, stood there for a second and took off. She made about 7 steps before plopping down with a HUGE GRIN on her face! Then later last night she took off taking 10 steps on her own. It looks like our prediction of Peyton running my Christmas might be accurate!

This morning I witnessed Jenna holding Peyton's little hands and helping her walk all through out the house. This is a vision I need to cherish/remember when they are teenagers and fighting!

A funny conversation happened with Jenna yesterday as we drove down to my folks house. Since Jenna hadn't napped I explained to her that if she napped the whole drive down she wouldn't have to go to bed early. Five minutes into the drive...

Jenna: Mom, look I am sleeping!
Janell: Jenna, if you are talking to me then you are not sleeping.
Jenna: No, mom, look (points to face). See I am sleeping! (Please note that her eye were open in addition to her talking.)

Then Jenna spent the rest of the drive talking and singing. So much for a few minutes of peace. I have now added a new position to my resume. I am now in Management. I manage chaos everyday in the Cowley household.

So I've been thinking...

Now when I hear these words from Josh my heart usually skips a beat as I am sure those words are followed by his latest and greatest idea. For me it has been a time of reflecting. I have thought a lot lately about blessings and joys, things we should be grateful for but sometime overlook and the hidden blessings in things.

A lot of this has been sparked by a dear friend from college's life which is like a movie. My friend, her husband and their son decided to adopt a child. They accepted the path that was planned for their lives and opened their hearts and family to whichever baby was brought to them. They received a call that a birth mother wanted to meet them, were selected, spent a week loving a little baby girl, prepared for her arrival on Mon 11/2...only to learn the Friday before that the birth mother decided to parent. My heart ached for them. I had a hard time trying to understand the pain, yet realizing that there was a blessing that the birth mom had decided to parent her child. I thought a lot about how I would be feeling...how would I cope? I looked at my little girls and felt more blessed than I ever had before for having them. Then I was reminded about a greater truth...God works in mysterious ways and there is a plan for your life.
I learned that while my friend was grieving her loss over baby girl Emma, there was another baby girl out there waiting to meet her new mommy. My friend and her family were selected again, the birth mother's rights have expired, and they brought home their new baby girl Margaret Grace last Tuesday. What a blessing! For those who know me well and that I look for the silver lining in things, I realize that Baby Emma needed their love while her birth mommy needed time to discover that she did love her baby and needed to be her mom. They nested for a baby girl, so the nursery was ready for this new little baby girl Grace to come home with them. My heart is so happy at this news!


I have also been thinking a lot about family and life. Sometimes things get so hectic. Hectic to the point where we almost lose sight of what is really important. We get bogged down in petty, silly things that we don't see what we have right in front of us...all that we have to be grateful for. So I want to say how blessed I feel. I have a great husband. Neither of us are perfect or always say the right thing, but no matter what I know that I have a partner for life. I have someone who loves me truly and whom I love in return. We have 2 amazing kids. While they wear me out and are making me age at a rapid rate, they are one of the greatest gifts in my life. I have so much to be thankful for and I am. I truly, truly am blessed.

That Sam-I-Am...

I do not like green eggs and ham. Try them, try them and you may. Try them and you may I say!

This morning Jenna and I had green eggs and ham for breakfast to be silly. Josh couldn't get over the color appearance and wouldn't eat them, Peyton also tried her first strawberry mini bagel. Exciting times here at the Cowley house!

I think it is just AWESOME that my little girl is playing with her Barbie dolls and using the old Barbie Corvette I played with as a kid! Now I just need to clean up all of the other old Barbie things I still have and this little girl will be set!

(Sorry the pictures are a little grainy they were taken with my cellphone.)

The week of October 3-10th we made our yearly trip to Emerald Isle for our family beach trip. We got to stay in a different house this year that was right on the beach. It is named Ever After and Jenna loved that it was bright green with purple shutters. What a difference it made being able to just walk out our back door and head down to the beach. It wasn't as big of a pain to only have Peyton on the beach for 25 minutes when you didn't have to lug all of your gear down to the public beach access.

Josh's dad came down from New Jersey to spend the week with us. Sadly Deb was unable to make the trip as Gram wasn't feeling up to making the long drive, and we sure did miss those ladies. Josh's friend Keith, his wife Crissy and their daughter Brooke came for one night and it was nice to get to see them too.

This year we got to go to the Morehead City Seafood festival. There was good food, fun rides, and time with friends. What could be better!

Jenna had a blast riding on all of the rides with her daddy and her friends.

Peyton was having fun with her Da-da at the Seafood festival! This kid is just ready to run and have fun with all of the other kids. Like we have said before Peyton is the one....

Josh, Pete, and Jenna were out in the rain fishing in the ocean with the gear they picked up that day. Thankfully it only rained on Monday and Tuesday morning and then we had great weather the rest of the week.









Peyton and I decided not to go out in the rain and down to the ocean to fish. Instead we stayed up on the covered porch, watched everyone else and enjoyed our view of the ocean.






G-Pa Pete and his girls having fun in the sun!

Here's a shot of the Cowley girls on the beach. We discovered that late afternoon was our favorite time on the beach. The sun wasn't as hot, the kids had napped, and the setting was perfect. Soooo much fun.

G-Pa Pete got to enjoy quite a bit of fun time fishing in the ocean. He said he didn't care if he caught anything, he was just having fun, but he ended up catching quite a few fish that he shared with the serious fishing couple on the beach down from him.

One nice addition to our beach stay this year was that our friends the Sanborns have moved to Morehead City, which is about 25 minutes from the beach house. So we were able to let Jenna play with her friend Bennett on 3 different days. It was fun for us to get to watch Jenna play with a friend while having fun in the sun!

All in all it was another great trip and we are already ready to go BACK TO THE BEACH!!!!

I cannot believe it's been a month

So I will start this by apologizing for not posting much this last month. All I can say is that the girls are keeping us busy and it has been a month. We started the month with heartache as Josh's grandfather lost his battle with cancer and passed on August 2nd.

In the 9 years that I knew Pop, he was one of the most loving, devoted grandpas. He always made the effort to come see us whenever we were in NJ visiting and you could tell that he was making family his priority. While his passing is sad, there is comfort in knowing that he is no longer in any pain.

On the 10th I celebrated my birthday. I was greeted with flowers, a big cake balloon, and cards from Josh and the girls. That night, my folks drove up and the 6 of us went out to dinner at 131 Main. The food was super yummy and the girls were well behaved.

Peyton did pull herself out of her crib, but she didn't suffer any injuries from the fall. If anything it taught her that she can do more things physically than she originally knew she could do. After that she was everywhere. Crawling, pulling up on things, and the crib has been lowered to the lowest setting.

On the 24th, Josh and I celebrated our 7th wedding anniversary. We weren't able to do anything on the day since Josh was traveling for work, but Saturday the 29th my folks kept the girls and we stayed at the Marriott uptown and enjoyed a fabulous dinner out. We ate at a restaurant named Bonterra. It was originally an old church in the historic Dilworth area. The food was amazing. Salads of mixed greens, toasted pine nuts, balsamic vinagrette, and a small piece of goat cheese that had been lightly fried. It was yummy. Josh had a pork chop, sweet potatoes, and spinach. I had gulf coast grouper with lemon confit, artichokes and chorizo and a basil pesto. We finished up with creme brulee. Y-U-M-M-Y! In the morning we went and had brunch at a place called the Pewter Rose and it too was excellent. We got to sit outside on the shaded balcony, were greeted with butterscotch scones and then split the egg white omelet with goat cheese, roasted red peppers and asparagus and then the crab cakes benedict which was essentially an eggs benedict with a crab cake. Josh was hesitant about this dish up until he ate the first bite and then he was SOLD. The whole time together was nice because we were able to talk and connect without any interruptions. Thank you, thank you grandma Jan and grandpa Craig for watching the girls.

Now for the girls...

Jenna is active as ever. She has been loving playing with her friends, but with that comes some bumps and bruises. One day she was playing at her friends and collided with one of them and took a knock to

the head.

Peyton is the one...

The one who will give me grey hair. (Please remember while reading this that Peyton is only 7 months old, can barely sit up for a few seconds on her own before falling over, yet army crawls all over the place.)

Today while trying to get her to settle down for an afternoon nap, Peyton was just talking to herself in her crib which is completely normal. Suddenly, I heard a loud bang and then she started screaming. I dashed upstairs to find Peyton on the FLOOR beside her crib. How on earth she did this I have no idea!!!!! Needless to say we are waiting on a call back from the pediatrician, her crib has been lowered, and I am trying to ice her eye which is not going well. Peyton will probably have her first shiner in the morning.

Wedding and cruise

Saturday July 11th, we got up early and were on the road by 4:15 am to make the drive down to Cocoa Beach, Florida for my cousin Billy and his fiancee Nicole's wedding. We made great time due to the fabulous minivan which allowed Jenna to watch movies and Peyton to be changed and fed with me sitting next to her. We pulled into the Double Tree hotel around 12:30. That afternoon and evening we hung out with family, played briefly on the beach, and went swimming in the hotel pool.

Sunday morning I got ready with Kole and her two other bridesmaids. The wedding was on the beach that morning and included Billy's son Carter in the ceremony. It was so sweet how he was a big part of the ceremony and you can see that Kole loves Carter as her own boy.

Then we had the reception inside the hotel and it was one of the best brunch meals I have ever had the best parts were the eggs benedict and the french toast with bananas foster syrup...YUMMY!!! After the reception 60 of the 65 wedding guests loaded charter buses to head to the cruise ship where we set sail to the Caribbean on Freedom of the Seas, the largest ship at this time for Royal Caribbean. I unfortunately lost my camera and have had to rely on family to email me pictures. Here are some shots from the trip that folks have sent me.

Here's the whole group of 65...

The Carolina crew at the reception having a great time.

Jenna and her cousin Brianna playing as usual.

Peyton had way too much fun at the reception and decided to tap a quick cat nap!

This is how I spent most nights in the formal dining room with Peyton asleep in my arms.

Little Peyton decided to model her Great Aunt Kitty's sun hat.

This was our cruise ship...Freedom of the Seas. What a great ship and so much fun!

This was the water zone on the ship for kids. Jenna had the best time splashing through this area. You couldn't look away for one second or she was gone!

Here we are as a family in the tropical waters at Magen's Beach in St. Thomas. It was voted one of the top 10 most beautiful beaches by National Geographic and we completely agree!

Peyton laughing and splashing and Jenna with a grumpy look. For some reason our little Jenna doesn't like her picture taken these days.

Time to head back to the boat, but this sure was a little piece of paradise.

Busy. busy, buys!

So we are not only dealing with the stresses of normal life, but we are also getting ready to take a big trip as a family. On Saturday we are headed to Florida and then Sunday morning we will be a part of my cousin Billy and his fiancee Nicole's wedding on the beach. After the brunch reception (which has a fabulous menu planned) the majority of guest will board buses to head over to the cruise port and board Freedom of the Seas, a Royal Caribbean cruise ship. We will cruise for the next 7 days around the eastern Caribbean. I am so excited, yet anxious as both kids will be with us. I'll let you know how it goes and post pictures. Love to you all!!!

So I have already mentioned that Jenna has a kiddie pool to enjoy in the drive way as we do not have a neighborhood pool. The other week I was going to refill it for her. I got the hose unwound, placed in the pool and then went back to turn on the water. Much to my surprise I was greeted by a surprise I did not like...

This big guy was chillin' on the brick wall. Needless to say I did not turn on the water, did not put up the hose and we did not play in the pool. I think I was bothered more by the fact that the night before Josh had found a snake curled up in the corner of our top step leading from the garage into our laundry room. When he tried to kill it (because it wasn't a black snake) it went between the boards. Josh spent the next hour taking the steps apart trying to get it, but never found it. Our concern was that Jenna sits on the steps and walks around bare foot. A snake is not something we want to stepping on! So this was the second snake in 2 days and I DO NOT LIKE SNAKES!!!

Being the creative mommy we went inside and built a fort to play in. This entertained for a little bit until we went on to the next game.

Peyton is moving around in her own way and is so close to being able to crawl. It is quite comical to watch her play on her blanket. You cannot keep her in one place as she rolls to her belly and pumps her legs as fast as she can. She hasn't figured out the arms/hands piece to the equation and I don't plan on cluing her in as I like her being semi-immobile.

Peyton has also had her first exposure to rice cereal and green beans. She is still trying to figure out what the strange substance is that I keep putting in her mouth, but she likes sitting at the table and eating with everyone. Next we will try peas, then squash, then sweet potatoes. After the veggies we will move on to fruits. Such an exciting time for the little peanut!

Our recent trip to New Jersey was great! (I cannot believe it has been 2 weeks since we got home and I am just now blogging about it.) Josh had a Stanley Sales convention in Connecticut at the beginning of June, so we decided to make it a family trip to New Jersey to visit Grandpa Pete and Grandma Deb. Josh got home from work on a Friday. We ate dinner, gave the girls baths, got them in their pj's, fed Peyton her bottle and got in the mini to drive as far as we could. We figured this would be the easiest way to travel as Peyton does not enjoy her car seat for that long of a stretch of time and we knew it would be easiest to drive while the kids slept. We drove until midnight and got a room for the night at Hampton Inn. In the morning we got to eat a hot breakfast at the hotel and then loaded back into the mini for a short 4 hour ride. Let me be the first to say how much easier it is to travel in the minivan. As Peyton fussed I could climb into the back to sit next to her. When she was hungry I could sit beside her and feed her. When she had a dirty diaper I could take her out, lay her on the floor, change her and then strap her back into her car seat. IT SAVED SO MUCH TIME!!! We only had to make one stop and arrived in NJ around 1:30 rested, happy and having the whole afternoon to play.



Josh was able to hang out until Monday morning when he left for Connecticut, while the NC Cowley girls got to hang out. Jenna had a blast playing in her kiddie pool on the back deck, swinging on the front porch swing, riding her Backyardigans bike, and playing with her grandma and grandpa. One day we headed out to McDonald's for lunch and to play on the playground. One day her grandpa took her to Toys R Us and she got a bunch of toys, but the most exciting trip was when Jenna got to go to her first movie at the movie theater. She went to see Up. There were some scary dogs in the movie that we had not been warned about, but other than that she enjoyed it. When Josh got back from his trip, Jenna excitedly told him she went to the movies, it was a little scary, but it was fun!

It was so nice having help with the kids while Josh was gone. More than the help it was nice getting to watch Jenna and Peyton spend time with Grandpa Pete and Grandma Deb. You can just see how much they love their grandparents and we are trying to take time to see them more often.

What a busy summer. It seems like the days just keep slipping by me. The girls just keep growing, making us laugh and amazing us every day. Jenna loves her baby sister, Peyton, and Peyton just loves her big sister. Jenna even got Peyton to have her first belly laugh while dancing around the living room.

So here is what we have been up to since my last post. In May, Jenna, Peyton, my mom and I all went to Patterson Farm to pick strawberries. I am so glad my mom was there, because she kept Peyton in the shade while Jenna and I trudged through the muddy fields to pick the berries. Jenna had fun during our first 2 passes of the rows, but then was bored. So we ended up just picking one basket on our own and then bought a pre-picked basket from the farm. Then that afternoon we made homemade strawberry icebox jam. Boy was it yummy!!!!



Here's Jenna being a diva, which seems to come out more and more everyday. She loves her purses and necklaces.

Peyton being a good sport hanging out in the shade while her big sister was playing with her neighborhood friends. The warm weather is tricky since Peyton cannot be in the sun, but doesn't want to be in her stroller that much.

Here is Jenna with her BFF Kristen riding on Matthew's power wheel. We are preparing Jenna for the departure of her pacifier by telling her that when she turns 3 she can go to Toys R Us and buy a power wheel like Matthews using her pacifiers. So far she thinks this is a great idea, but we'll see what happens when the big day really gets here.

Yet another day playing with neighborhood friends, but this time we took the kids to the mall so they could climb on the indoor figures. They had the best time just running laps around the space and jumping off of everything. Everyone napped like champs that day which made the outing worth while.

Here's Peyton hanging out with daddy watching her big sister running all over the place. Peyton is a mover and you can tell she is ready to run with Jenna.

Jenna has decided she loves to ride her bike. Here she is riding all over the driveway.

There she goes...

Now as the heat has arrived in full force, I bought Jenna a little pool to play around in on our driveway. I told her it was our "staycation" and we could pretend we were hanging out at the beach.

Jenna spent her time in the pool and I kept Peyton under our "beach umbrella" my cleaver rigged up golf umbrella attached to a chair.

When the kiddie pool was purchased so were a pack of water guns. One night while I was feeding Peyton her bottle I heard the garage door open and never heard it shut again. Once Peyton was asleep I went outside to investigate only to discover Josh and Jenna having a water fight. Jenna and I joined forces against her daddy. Josh had to be reminded of "Fair fight, daddy, fair fight!" as he would choose to soak Jenna and I each time we ran out of water and had to reload the water guns. We had the best time squirting each other and running around the house. I am sure our neighbors got a kick out of watching us.

Peyton has now gotten big enough for us to try out the highchair at dinner time. She's still a little small for it, so we still have challenges at dinner time keeping Peyton entertained and happy so we can all eat our own dinner.