Hanging at the Horneffer's

Lili and Fred Horneffer were kind enough to have us stay at their home this past weekend while we were in Louisville. A big thanks to them, they are such wonderful hosts! There house was perfect to stay at with Audrey as they have 3 grand kids and have all of the baby "gear" that made life a lot easier. Audrey needless to say LOVED their house. It was new to her obviously so she enjoyed exploring and did her fair share. They had all sorts of cool stuff for her to get into. She especially loved their sun room and the railing on the second floor that looked out over the living room. I will say she loved everything about their house, expect for their dog. For some reason Audrey is not into dogs (not into is probably an understatement actually), which is weird because she has one at day care that she is around all day. Anyways, the Horneffer's poor dog was the sweetest thing and had to be banished to the garage/bedroom/anywhere Audrey wasn't for the weekend.
They had some great toys that she enjoyed. Her favorite turned out to be Legos, the big Duplex ones, which was a surprise to me. I would have never thought to get her those at her age. She really enjoyed playing with them and the box they were in, and figured out quickly that they came apart and had fun pulling the stacks apart that were made for her.

They also had a walker/car thing. She liked to pull herself up on it and play with the things on it, but didn't do a ton of actual walking with it.

Here she is sitting on the patio table.

She is playing with her purse and accessories that the Horneffer's gave her for her birthday. Don't we all want a plastic credit card with a purple holder?

This is Audrey standing on her own, though it's kind of hard to see... She is getting much more comfortable and gaining more balance daily.

Our wonderful host and hostess, thanks again for everything!!

Churchill Downs...

We were lucky enough to visit and dine at historic Churchill Downs while we were in Louisville this past weekend. Charlie's parents were kind enough to treat the entire gang to brunch there. The concept seeming cool to me, getting dressed up and having a nice brunch at Churchill Downs. I had no idea what we were actually going there to do though! There were actual races going on while we ate, it was really cool! There was a window out to the grandstands and racetrack that we could watch the races from our table or walk outside and watch.

Here is all of us eating (brunch was wonderful btw!)...

Mr. Ruzic provided all of us "kids" with some seed money to get us started betting and spur a little friendly competition. I had never bet on horse racing before (heck I haven't bet on anything other then squares for the Super Bowl!), and the Ruzic's were kind enough to help me learn the ropes. They tried at least. I still don't really know what all those terms mean (boxed in, tri-fecta, place and show???). I am happy to say I won the bets I placed on the 1st 2 races (didn't do so hot on the rest but that's ok) which was really exciting. It's pretty cool yelling for a horse to win. It was even cooler that I just picked the horse's name I liked the best to win. Why not right? Here is one of the races. I wish I could say it's one of the one's I won but it's not.

Here is the entire gang... Grandpa is hiding back there, but other then that it's not a bad shot!

Speaking of Grandpa, Audrey got to spend some quality time with him. They watched the horses (which Audrey hissed at as she does dogs which is a hole other story) but Grandpa says what she like the best were the tractors going by after the race. No need for a grandson, a granddaughter can be just as into cars, trucks and tractors:) Charlie took the opportunity to take some great pictures of the two of them.

Here is Audrey eating on of the tickets. We thought we had lost so we gave it to her. Come to find out we won a small amount for the horse Charlie bet on winning the race (I still don't get all this stuff). The guy at the ticket counter was very nice and took the ticket, chewed and all...

Here is the family shot...

Yes, some of you have seen this dress before:)

Audrey and me

Here is the happy engaged couple, that we all gathered to celebrate...
Aunt KK & Uncle Vinnie

The happy couple with mom and dad...

Here are Audrey and I with Mrs. Horneffer after she had given Audrey her birthday gift. The Horneffer's got Audrey a purse and it is the coolest thing ever! It has a phone, lip stick, keys and best yet a credit card and case! Audrey loves it! Btw, she also got a Raffi cd from the Ruzic's which is also awesome! I have been wanting to get her one of his cd's for awhile, no kid can go without Raffi, right??? Baby Beluga in the deep blue sea....

We had a fabulous time. Audrey enjoyed herself, though most of the time we were there was during nap time. No matter, this is her 30 seconds after we go in the car...

It's a rough life, isn't it???

Btw, her adorable dress is brought to you by the lovely Stilson women (my BFF Jaime and her mom Gail and sister Danielle)... It is so cute and hopefully she will fit in it all summer!

Karen's Bridal Tea...

My sister-in-law Karen is getting married in August down in Orlando which is very exciting -and also sneaking up very quickly! This past weekend was her bridal shower. 2 close family friends in Louisville hosted a lovely Bridal Tea for Karen this past weekend. We Boston Dennison's flew down for the weekend so that Audrey and I could attend. It was great fun!

There was a full silver tea service with 2 different types of tea and tons of china tea cups, beautiful! The food was delicious, there were several different types of tea sandwiches (the cucumber, that has a formal name I can't think of right now, was my favorite), fruit salad and mini muffins (these were Audrey's favorite). There was also a beautiful cake (it had butterflies that matched the invitations) that was yummy!

I wasn't quite sure how Audrey would be for the shower. I knew she wouldn't sit still for the entire thing but from there who knows. She actually was great. I woke her up from her nap right when the shower began, so she was well rested and ready to go. She enjoyed the food (surprise, right?) very much, and sat on Grammy's lap and ate for a bit. She only got a little on her dress which I was pretty impressed with.

While Karen opened presents Audrey decided to explore the living room that we were sitting in. She enjoyed the glass coffee table (and made sure to leave her mark on it), crawling behind the couch where there were some window blinds and a very cool door stop and even a vent that had cold air blowing out of it. She also loved the pile of gifts for Aunt Karen. Here she is helping open one of the gifts.

Karen got some great stuff (don't we all wish we could register again???) that I know her and Vinnie will enjoy. You both know you can call if you have any questions using anything:) We hope everything made it back safely to Orlando!

The countdown is on to the wedding (87 days according to their website) and we can't wait!

Cute dress, eh??? It worked well as it was a A-line shift that she could crawl in. If you could all just see her face when her clothing impedes her crawling, not pretty...

You can't see very clearly, but Audrey has Karen's cake ALL over her face in this picture! She was prepping for her 1st birthday I think... She seemed to be like her Grammy and really enjoy the icing!

Memorial Day...

Well I can't believe it, but today is Memorial Day, the beginning of summer. I am excited for summer, but it also means time is just flying... We had a pretty uneventful day, which was good because we had a very busy weekend. We flew home from Louisville this morning. We were there for the weekend for Karen's shower (Charlie's sister) and to spend the weekend with good friends of Charlie and his family (and me now!). More on all that, I have several posts to come from all of the events from the weekend....

This was Audrey's 6th flight I think we counted. She was great as usual. There was an empty seat in our row on the way home today which was awesome and gave us more room. For those of you that have flown recently you know this is a very rare occurance to not have a booked or over-booked flight. Audrey slept the entire flight though, so we didn't really get to enjoy the extra free seat as much as we could of. But no complaints that she slept the whole flight...

We got home early this afternoon and spent some time on the deck. It was a gorgeous day here today, hopefully you all had the same kind of weather. I got a little camera happy with Audrey playing, but she is so darn cute I couldn't resist. We ended the day grilling out and are now ready for bed, it's been a LONG weekend...

Polka Dots...

I'm starting to get really excited about the big 1st birthday bash, it's just over 2 weeks away!

I had been waiting for the invites to all go out to post a picture of them. They came out quite cute if I do say so. A special thanks to my friend Lisa at work who is a Photoshop master and helps me to perfect my visions (she also played a key role in my Christmas cards this year, she brought my snowflake to life!)...


The invites have spawned the "theme" we have decided to go with: Polka Dots. Cute right? Not too over the top kid-y or theme-y which was what I was going for. I also figure it will be a relatively easy theme to pull off which is key with a 1 year old...

I am trying to figure out what to do about the cake right now. I want to have 1 small round cake each for Audrey and Maddie and then a larger cake for the rest of the guests. In theory I would love to stack them like this beautiful cake... I am not the greatest cake baker and am not sure how that will play out. I want to do pink and navy like the invites, how cute would that be???

So Sick...

Well it's been a rough couple of days here in the Dennison house. Audrey spiked a 105 degree fever on Thursday night completely out of the blue (she was playing with Charlie totally fine, except radiating heat from her little body). We gave her some Motrin, she fell asleep and slept thru the night miraculously. She woke up with another high temp (only 103 this time) so we brought her into the doctor. The doctor told us he was pretty sure it was Roseola, which sounded scary. He said it was a virus with high temps for 4 - 5 days and then they brake into a rash at the end when it is leaving their system. She also had a running nose, swollen eyes and swollen glands so he said. It was nice to hear that it actually was something, but as most of you know from experience there is nothing you can do for virus's except give them Motrin & Tylenol which stinks...

It was a bummer for her to be sick, but an even bigger bummer that we had to cancel a trip to Ann Arbor because of it. In true Audrey style, she got sick as we were about to travel on an airplane. This is the 3rd trip that she has been sick for. She had a horrible cold when we went to Memphis in October and some of you remember more recently in February whent she spiked a 104 degree temp in the O'Hare airport when we were going to Chicago for the weekend for a friend's wedding. I learned my lesson after these trips and cancelled this one. It is miserable having a sick baby, and it is even more miserable having a sick baby when you are not at home. I'm upset that I did, we were surprising my mom for her 60th birthday and had the whole weekend planned. This included a spa day, which I was really looking forward to, but my mom and sister still got to go which is good...

After being with Audrey all weekend I'm glad we stayed home. She has been pretty miserable, sleeping a lot, eating very little and crying a good amount. I'm hoping she wakes up her old self tomorrow so I can go to work but we will see... Oh the joys of motherhood...

Mother's Day...

First off, Happy Mother's Day to all you mom's out there! I hope you all got pampered the way you deserve to be today. Today was my 1st Mother's Day, which is kind of exciting and hard to believe at the same time (haven't I been a mom forever???). It's a holiday I have been celebrating my whole life and honoring my mother, and this year it was my turn to well, be honored:) We were not able to be with either my mom or Charlie's mom (our siblings got that honor) today, but we enjoyed our day just the same with just the three of us. I was woken this morning with a wonderful breakfast in bed that Audrey spent hours cooking. Ok, Charlie made it, but it was awesome and a great way to start the day. It was a gorgeous day and we decided to take advantage of it. After Audrey's morning nap we packed up, went and got sandwiches for Charlie and I, and headed to a park in town that we had never been to before. It turned out to be the exact type of park we have been looking for (paved paths to walk with the stroller, long enough that we get a decent walk out of it) and is literally 10 minutes from our house. We went off the trail mid-way, pulled out our blanket and had a picnic. It was wonderful. Audrey was pretty good about eating lunch not in her high chair and staying on the blanket (heaven forbid she go in the grass). We took a bunch of pictures (of course). We ended the day by grilling out and sitting out on the deck to eat dinner. All in all a perfect Mother's Day, thanks Charlie and Audrey!

Btw, how classic is this face??? It happens more often then not lately...

Stroller Ride...

So we did get that stroller ride in after Audrey's dinner tonight. I thought I'd bring the camera to see if I could get some action shots, but I wasn't quite sure how that would work with us walking/moving. They came out ok I must say. One of these days I'm going to really learn how to use my new (alright, maybe getting for Christmas doesn't constitute as "new" any longer) camera. What I really need to do is go and visit my friend Mary in Charlotte as she is an expert and get some real life lessons. Hopefully soon...

I digress about the stroller walk. It wasn't that eventful really but we enjoyed a nice family walk. As you can see Audrey brought her sippy cup. The girl drinks more water out of that thing, it is really unbelievable. She has a full thing with every meal and sometimes more. I refuse to give her juice so I'm glad she enjoys the water. As with all things, we will see how long that lasts... My mom says it's because I like water so much, I like that logic... That does mean we will have to keep her away from wine for a long time though...

11 months old...

My baby is 11 months old today, unbelievable! The big 1st birthday bash planning is in full swing... We are having a joint party with Audrey's BFF Maddie which is going to be a blast. The invites are going out this week (hopefully, my 1/2 have not even been addressed yet!). I am still working on the "theme", I have a couple of idea's but I'm not sure if I can pull any of them off. No, not like a princess theme, a cool theme that adults will appreciate. It should be fun, I'm already putting my order in to the higher powers for awesome weather so we can hang on the deck. We will see...

I'm off to go pick her up. It's a beautiful day here so hopefully we can get out for a walk after she eats her dinner... She has been enjoying being in her stroller the last couple of days, we will see how long that lasts... She gets all excited that she can sit up in the stroller, grab the bar and look out at everything around her. I really should strap her in, but that would be no fun...

Playtime with Daddy...

Audrey pulled a "I'm not ready for bed and I'm going to stand and scream til you come get me" tonight and her dad went to her rescue and brought her back downstairs so she could play. I swear she was exhausted when I put her down, but she got a second wind and played with her dad for a good 1/2 hour. She was acting pretty funny so I took out the camera. She spent most of the time crawling around from toy to toy and amusing herself. She gets a major kick out of crawling behind the curtains and playing peek a boo (or some form of it). It's kind of funny, they are obviously sheer, but I think she thinks we can't see her? If you know her at all you know that she has had something in her mouth since she came out of me, her hand, a toy, a magazine, really whatever is there is in her mouth. I thought she would grow out of this, but hasn't and is besides the point. Now that she is crawling, she has figured out the she can carry things in her mouth, like dog, from point A to point B. It is hilarious to watch and this picture doesn't do the act justice, but I'm sure you will giggle a little thinking of a baby carrying around objects in her mouth... She also gets a kick crawling over Charlie, repeatedly. I guess he is just in her way? What is some Daddy playtime without a little airplane. She gets pretty into it, and Charlie gets a work out from lifting the our little girl... Charlie thought it was funny to put this bowl on her head. I wasn't quite so sure, but when she starting doing it herself it was kind of funny. It's so much fun being the parents...