One Year Makes A World of Difference....

Here are some pictures of Hudson right after he was born and a few days after. Such a tiny, tiny precious little angel......









































And here are some pictures from his one year birthday party.... he's totally transformed into a handsome "Little Devil", lol!

So...we made it through the holidays....

So, yeah, we made it through the busy holiday season without injury and are now looking forward to everything calming down a bit for a while. As much as I love this time of year, it does seem to get quite hectic and trying especially now that we have an active one year old on our hands! We did have an amazing 2007, even though it wasn't a perfect year, it was reassuring to finish the year on a good note and I think that we as a family are ready for what 2008 has in store for us. Since I took so long to start this blog, I have decided that I would really love to look back at our last year or so in retrospect and will likely be sharing lots of the things that happened in the past, so please bare with me while I reminisce as this will likely be a quite lenghty post and not the last one like that either, lol! Here are some of my favorite memories looking back at Hudson's first year (and a little more) with us!

• Seeing my precious baby boy for the first time
• Seeing the joy on David's face when he first held Hudson
• Holding Hudson in my arms and forgetting everything else in the world
• Seeing the amazing joy and pride that Marcia has had in becoming a grandmother
• Being reminded of what amazing grandparents (and parents) my mother and father are
• Sharing the irreplaceable experience with David of becoming parents ourselves
• Being overwhelmed with all of the love and amazing support from all of our other family members and friends, THANK YOU!, we couldn't have done it without you either!
• Seeing Hudson smile for the first time
• Bringing him home to meet Bailey and Leo
• Hudson's first Halloween, first Thanksgiving, first Christmas....
• Experiencing milestones almost daily
• Learning to hold his head up, crawl, sit-up and finally walk.
• First tooth (and many more to follow)
• First Easter, Fourth of July, etc, etc,
• First haircut! I did the honors myself :)
• First hugs and kisses! Hudson gives the best hugs and kisses in the world! :)
• Full circle --- First Birthday!!!
• It's the holiday season again!

As you can see...A LOT has happened this past year and although I just mentioned some of the highlights, it has been an amazing first year post baby. :) We also spent a lot of time this last year trying to continue to do updates on our house, which I admit are still far from being done, but I am okay with that. So far over the past year, we have painted our dining room, painted our living room fireplace, replaced the tile around the fireplace surround with slate tiles, added shelves in our master closet, expanded our useable attic space and restained our kitchen cabinets (which are not quite finished) among other things.

I, of course returned to work full-time after my maternity leave and while the first year as a full-time wife, mom and career woman hasn't been necessarily a piece of cake, it has for the most part been at least managable at most times. We've had our challenges, but seriously, let's get real here...who doesn't?? It's totally normal to feel overwhelmed at times and for the most part, I embrace the challenge. :) David has been amazing through it all as well...between working long shifts and then turning around being Mr. Mom when I am at work, he has really done an awesome job of keeping it together even though I know that it gets wearing on him sometimes. He is an amazing husband and father and I feel so, so very blessed to have him in my life. I couldn't ask for more.

Not that all of that isn't enough to keep us busy, I also decided to start my own business a few months back and have been quite busy working on projects for clients in my down time. (not that I have much down time these days!) I have truly been LOVING the chance to have a creative outlet and actively do another thing that I am truly passionate about. Plus, I really love that I get to do something that is also related to what I do everyday in my full-time career. It's a great way to get motivated and inspired and to really get those creative juices flowing!

Other than ALL of that, we are really trying to make an active effort to be more focused and balanced about what really matters to us most as a family and that is spending time together and loving and cherishing every moment of it. *Trying* not to sweat the small stuff and to embrace all that life has to offer and everything and everyone that we are so very blessed to have in our lives.

Welcome!

Welcome to our family blog! I have been meaning to put a blog together for quite some time now and kept putting it off due to everything else we always have going on these days, lol! In any case, I figured that since it was a new year I would FINALLY just put the brakes on and get it done. We are very excited to be able to share our daily adventures here with our close family and friends, even though I know it might get random at times, lol! We had a lot to celebrate in the past year, first holidays, first steps, first teeth, our third wedding anniversary, Hudson's First Birthday and countless other wonderful blessings for which we are so, so grateful. I look forward to documenting our future celebrations of life here on our family blog in 2008 and thereafter and hope that you enjoy it!