Dress up: Round Two!

Greeted by Johannes this morning in full attire

Who does this remind you of?

Baby Shower Today: February 17, 2013

Janelle was the host for her friend's baby shower today...

I just have to brag on her...

She created a most beautiful setting for celebrating a spring birth of our friend's anticipated baby girl, "Annabelle"

As you will see from the decor the theme was "Vintage birds and twiggy nests"

The decor is so cute and welcoming of spring, that we have decided to leave it up for a while, minus the swooping ribbon for the sake of our taller friends.

Decor nearly complete

Minus the flowers that were added to the tables

Twigs with Newsprint bird cutouts in all the windows

Pussy willow branch in the foreground and eggs nesting in the background

Vintage dresses and Vintage Beatrix Potter books on the mantel

Dining room table with the flowers
Birds' eye view

Decor 

Notice the birds nest on the chandelier

The buffet

Chocolate peanutbutter nests with jellybean eggs in the background
Cadbury Dark Chocolate Eggs
The string of eggs (blown and strung with pearl beads by Janelle) Eggs from our friends backyard "easter layer"

Cadbury White Chocolate Eggs

The lovely gathering

Beautiful people, Beautiful smiles

Janelle and her mom dreamed up and created the cute drinking glasses:
Ace Hardware mini-canning jar with vintage lace and button dressing each.
Finished off with Pink Lemonade with a pink straw

Mommies
Belly Bumping
4 weeks apart

Hostess  and guest of honor opening gifts

A wonderful time of faith, hope, and love shared by all.

1 Thessalonians 1:3
Remembering before our God and Father your work of faith and your labor of love and your steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ

Lovely job, Janelle and all those who helped along the way (Jan and Toni and Nicole and Marty)  :o)
Janelle, I thank you for your enthusiasm and hard work in making an event so special for all to share in the joy and celebration of this new life.  I am a lucky man and forever blessed by you!

Nana and Papa Davis Visit

Long overdue POST

Daddy and son time
Lego building

Waking up the day after Christmas overlooking Virginia Beach.

Off Season Rates are grand!

I think I am in love with these little men

And more legos
Teaching my four year old to follow directions, he possibly may not become a "typical guy"

Showing off his Lego truck

Papa arrived and on his first cold morning here was tearing out the old rotten fence bordering our home

Permissible destruction
Not an often occurrence

All hands utilized to put the finishing touches on the custom posts

He's da Man of the hour/day/week!
Thank you so much for such an incredible gift to me!

Everyone took part in making this project happen
Thank you Nana!

Finished Work

Beautiful and strong new fence
To be painted white in April/May after treated wood has had time to season..,

I remember this age.
Nothing quite like your first tools and getting to work along side Papa and Daddy
Thank you Dad (Lambert) for taking the time to train me up in this, so that I also take the EXTRA time to let my boys complete a task for/with me.

Pure Joy

Confident builder

Precision too

We couldn't let Nana and Papa come all this way and strictly do slave labor for their children...so off to the North Carolina Coast we headed...

Enjoying a lunch at the diner on the way to the beach...

Excited to be with Nana

Nathanael bellying up to the table too these days...He is very eager to try food and quickly is showing less interest in mommy milk these days.
Janelle is not so keen on that as he is only 7 months

Nags Head Coastline
Outer Banks, NC

We rented this quaint cottage for the weekend

Beautiful garden even in January

Cold front
Notice the ice in the bird bath

Living Room

Foyer

Kitchen with dinette

The next morning we visited the local aquarium where my boys got to be zoologists and study turtles.
They didn't want to leave this part of the day.

The health of his turtle is being analyzed...
all serious moments require deep contemplation with thumb sucking for Hannes

Hello!

"This turtle needs me"

Interacting with the divers in the tank with well fed, docile sharks

Touching the Stingrays

Exploring the touch tank up close

The next day we went to the Elizabethan Gardens
Beautiful in Ice

How beautiful is that!?
Colored Chard and Pansies
I may have to copy that one day!

The Bay in the background

Nathanael stayed warm with his alpaca wool, Peruvian hat I brought home from Peru this past summer

Keeping hands warm
Hearts warmed by keeping in step with Papa

And now we leave you with a closing song from
Hannes
Well, ya' may just have to visit to hear that...