2014 Year in Review

What did you do in 2014 that you have never done before?  Hiked Mount LeConte in the Smoky Mountains.  We got an ornament for our Christmas tree that you can only get if you do the 11 mile round trip hike

Did you keep your new year's resolutions and will you make more for next year? I failed again at my resolutions but I will make new ones for 2015

Did anyone close to you give birth? Scarlett and Katelyn had baby girls

Did anyone close to you die? No one close to me but my mom's dad died

What countries did you visit/Where did you go on vacation? We visited all the countries in Epcot. Ha. we traded the beach to get our own pool.  In December we went to Disney World.

What would you like to have in 2015 that you didn't have in 2014? Baby #4

What dates from 2014 will be etched upon your memory and why? April 5th, Cora-Bleu's birth

What was your biggest achievement of this year? Having Cora-Bleu

What was your biggest failure? Not eating healthy

Did you suffer illness or injury? Nope

What is the best thing you bought? Aubree's play house.  The kids love it! Thank you Craigslist

Whose behavior merited celebration? All of us? We all grew and are better than when the year started.

Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?  I don't think anyone has

Where did most of your money go? My own personal money went mostly to gifts for other people and stitch fix. I also am paying $10 a month for the next 9 1/2 years four our pool.

What did you get really excited about? Our pool, Disney World, Mark doing so great at his company

What song will always remind you of 2014? Taylor Swift Shake It Off

Compared to this time last year are you a) happier or sadder? b) thinner or fatter? c) Richer or poorer? a) probably the same b) thinner- I was 6 months pregnant last year! c) richer

What do you wish you had done more of? Temple work

What do you wish you had done less of? Wasting time on Facebook. Ugh

How did you spend Christmas? I was up at 4 because I was too excited to sleep.  I made Carmel dip, stove top potpourri, and Frito salad while I waited for the others to get up.  I woke them up at 8 and we opened presents.  Then we went to my dad's at 12. We came home and Daniel and Katelyn brought their kids over and Grandma and Grandpa came over.

Did you fall in love in 2014? I fell in love with Mark all over again

What was your favorite TV program? The Following

What was the best book you read? The Night You Were Born.  It is a kids book but I fell in love with it

What was your greatest musical discovery? I don't think I had any musical discoveries

What did you want and get? A pool

What did you want and not get? Pregnant

What was your favorite film of 2014? Hunger Games.  That may be the only movie I saw

What did you do on your birthday and how old were you?  Mark surprised me with a babysitter and we got Mexican food and went to see Hunger Games.  I turned 33
What one thing would have made your year immeasurably satisfying? Becoming millionaires. Ha ha

How would you describe your personal fashion concept of 2014?  Plain. A white v-neck and jeans is my go to outfit.  I have more white t-shirts than I need

What kept you sane?  Grocery shopping alone on Saturdays

What political issue stirred you the most?  Police brutality/the Eric Garner case

Who did you miss? Seeing my mom while she was here for Christmas

Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2014?  You get what you give

Life in the Rufty Lane

 

Cora-Bleu loves the Christmas tree

I love the ruffle tree skirt that I finally made.  I have wanted one for probably 5 years.

 

 

Aubree doing pushups

She wanted a picture so she could show Daddy.
This picture also shows our stockings that I finally made and the pallet wood tree I made to hang our 25 Days of Christ ornaments on.  We never made it through all 25 days.  Next year we will do better.

 



 

Brigham: "I drew this because of you.  You make me sad"

Me: "Well you make me sad when you don't listen to me"

Brigham: "If you didn't make me do chores then we would both be happy"

 



The night Cora discovered the Christmas tree.  This was the fastest I have ever seen her crawl. I am glad I had my phone close by to catch this moment.  That almost never happens. Ha ha

 



The Sunday after Thanksgiving we drove to Disney World.  We took Ally with us and it was so fun!  Our first stop was to drop off Cora with Auntie Becky and Uncle Paul at their hotel. They were driving back to Chattanooga that morning and offered to drop her off with Nate and Scarlett since it was on their way.  Handing her over to them brought on the tears for me.  I felt bad for ditching her so we could go to Disney but I knew she would be so much happier there than riding in a stroller 12+ hours a day.  

 

This is Brigham's car he designed at the test track at Epcot. 

 



Here he is sitting in a Camaro

 

This is in Morocco at Epcot.  This in the only country that we felt like we were actually in another country.  It was amazing.  The food smelled great too but we didn't try any.  We were full from our sandwiches in Norway.

 



 

Here is Aubree on one of her favorite rides, The People Mover

 



This is one of Brigham's favorite things from the trip.  

The hour wait was totally worth it.
 



This is at T-Rex in Downtown Disney.  The food is great and the décor is even better.  There are animatronic dinosaurs and a wooly mammoth all over the restaurant.  They have a meteor shower every 20 minutes.  It was so much fun!  Aubree was scared to death of the animals.



 

Brigham and Aubree made thankful turkeys.  I love both of them.



Thanksgiving week was Cora's first time sitting in her high chair and also her first time eating meals instead of just drinking bottles. 



 

This is from November 19th.  It was about 40 degrees.  Brigham said "If I wear pants then no one will see my cowboy boots." I let the kids wear whatever they want after telling them they may be really cold/hot/uncomfortable/etc.



 

7 Months!

 

First Krispy Kreme November 8th

 



 

Brigham took karate for 4 months.  He hated going but always enjoyed it while he was there. I hated bringing him because it was twice a week at 4 which was right in the middle of Cora-Bleu's nap time. He wants to try baseball next. This is one of the many pictures Aubree wanted taken while we waited for karate to finish.



 

MOvember



 

Waiting inside the library while Mark waited outside in the cold and rain for 3 hours to vote. Brigham put on a puppet show about why 2 boys can't get married.  I laughed during the very short show.

 



 

Halloween

Brigham was a spider but changed his mind and wanted to be Batman again.  Aubree was a butterfly and wanted daddy to be a big pink flower. Cora was a bumble bee.  I pulled her costume out of the attic a few minutes before we left.  The bumble bee part seemed surprisingly more snug than when Aubree wore it 2 years before.  I figured I remembered wrong and out the door we went.  Down the road Mark said "isn't that Reagan's?" I snapped back "no, it is a person costume." Right as I said it, it all made sense.  It WAS Reagan's costume!  I forgot that we had a costume for her from 5-6 years before.  No wonder this thing was tight, the hood had 2 holes (for the ears, duh!), and the hood also just didn't fit quite right.  I was disappointed she was stuck wearing an uncomfortable dog costume the rest of the night when we had a warm, cozy, comfortable costume at home.



 

Play group at Hodges Farm



 

Apple picking in October.  Krystin was determined to get some pink lady apples. Ha



 

This was one Friday night eating outside at Hwy 55.  We eat there most Friday nights which is great!



 

At the end of September we met up in Gatlinburg with Auntie Becky and Uncle Paul.  These are pictures from our hike to waterfall that we stopped to do on our way home.  It was a 5 mile round trip hike.  Aubree fell asleep on the way back to the van.



 

This is after she woke up.  She has no pants because when she was peeing up at the waterfall, the pee got on her pants.



 

One more sleeping picture

 



 

We waited for the others to hike up to the waterfall and back down.  It was too treacherous to carry a baby up to.



 

After the hike we stopped in Cosby at a restaurant that was at an apple orchard.  The food was great.  We came out to the van to a flat tire. Awesome. We ended up taking everything out of the van to get the spare tire.  A few people stopped to help us in the parking lot and a guy working at the candy shop gave us information about a Walmart close by to get our tire fixed at.  We made it to Walmart 15 minutes before they closed and got the tire plugged.  We were so grateful for all the help we received which made it possible for us to get there in time. 

These guys are watching the tire be repaired.



 

Reagan, Cora, and I waited outside



 

In Gatlinburg we went to Dixie Stampede one night.  The food was so good and the kids had a blast!



 

In September we finally had all our logs brought to the road for the city to pick up.  Hallelujah!

 



 

These guys are on a treasure hunt



 

September 19th is Talk Like a Pirate Day! These 2 dressed as pirates to get a free dozen donuts



 

Aubree changing Brigham's stinky diaper. Ha ha ha



 

After the Wood reunion at Dan Nicholas Park



Brigham's first day of Joy School (September 2nd)! We have 5 kids this year: Emberlyn, Jessica, Anthony, and Karter are doing Joy School with us.  We are teaching in 2 week blocks and we have assigned numbers, letters, words, shapes, and patterns for each week.  The teacher is responsible for creating the curriculum.  I teach this week.  We will see how it goes.....ha ha ha

Our new tradition of having the First Day of School Cookie Cake!  It turned out great and the kiddos were super excited.  I think this will be a great tradition!

Cora-Bleu swimming.  She really enjoyed it and kicked her legs like crazy.  Mark was brave and let her go so she could "swim" on her own.  It was fun to watch her and she really liked it!

August 29th Mark took the day off work and we went to the Greensboro Science Center.  It is a great center and the kids really loved it.  We were there for 5 hours!  I was definitely ready to go by that point. ha  Brigham can't wait to go back. 

This is the frog that lived in our bathroom for a week.  Mark couldn't find him the day I first saw him and we thought he must have gone back down in the toilet and died or something.  Well we were wrong.  He looks a lot smaller than that first time.  Maybe he lost weight or maybe my imagination got the best of me. I think he lost weight and was starving to death.

Squishy Baff!  These guys love this stuff.

If it isn't her 2 middle fingers then it is her toes in her mouth.  Aubree and Brigham were never really feet suckers.  This girl loves her toes!