Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Happy Thanksgiving from the Hughes Family!!! :) We have had a wonderful week! Monday and Tuesday were a bit crazy as Katherine was sick...AGAIN. Go figure! :) She woke up Monday morning covered in hives!!! The poor kid! We are not sure if it was the start of a new virus or if it was an allergic reaction to the amoxicilin (however you spell that!) that she had just finished. She did get a pretty bad cold and cough later in the week, so I'm hoping it was the virus and not an allergic reaction. The poor thing was pretty miserable all day on Monday, but after keeping Benadryll in her system for the entire day and a good nights sleep on Monday, she woke up Tuesday with no hives! YAY!

Tuesday the Hughes girls spent the day decorating and getting our Christmas trees up and ready to decorate! We LOVE Christmas around here!

Wednesday we baked and cleaned for most of the day. Since we have been sick for what seems like months now, the house was a disaster area! So after baking two pumpkin pies and one pecan pie we did a massive cleaning around the house. It was so nice to have a clean house that smelled like pumpkin! Yummy!!

Thursday we did a few things around the house before we headed over to Grammie and Gray Gray's (My parents) for Thanksgiving lunch. It was delicious!! Momma got to break in her new kitchen and we definitely enjoyed it! :) My grandparents (or GiGi and Joe Joe as Katherine calls them) joined us for lunch and later in the day Tim and Kristen came over for dessert! It was a ton of fun! We headed home for naps all around and then we had a light dinner and passed out for the night from food coma. :)

Friday was a busy day as CiCi and PaPa came to visit!! They arrived really late on Thursday night, so we didn't see them until Friday morning. We whipped up a pancake breakfast and all stuffed our faces! :) Katherine was SOO excited to see her CiCi and PaPa. That same morning the shuttle came home to Kennedy Space Center, so they were able to hear the Sonic Boom. A definite treat if you have never heard it before. Katherine was hilarious, as soon as the boom happened she came running into the living room (I was changing Caroline's diaper) and said "MOM, MOM, the shuttle, the shuttle!! Uncle Cory's coming on the shuttle!!!" hahahaha. She thinks everything that flies is Uncle Cory's. Ha! After the shuttle landed safely, the boys headed off to Orlando for the Motor Trend Car Show. The girls stayed home and played outside until it was nap time. The boys got home just in time for our Birthday Dinner celebration for Christopher! His birthday is Dec 6, but since his parents were in town, we celebrated a week early. So we all walked over to my parents house for dinner and cake! It was great! He got a lot of neat toys to play with and now we have an extra camera, so hopefully that means I will be able to take more pictures of the girls! :)

Saturday morning we all got up and got ready for a fun day...Caroline got baptized Saturday night! :) PaPa and Daddy took Katherine to Toys R Us that morning to replace the ball that Colby popped on Friday. So while they headed out to take on the crowds of shopping, CiCi, Caroline and I headed to the grocery store to restock the frig and pantry. We got back in time to fix a lunch of hamburgers on the grill before it was time for the girls to take a nap. The girls took a nap and the boys went to my parents house to watch the UVa vs. Va Tech game. I did not want to watch, I figured either way I lost. If UVa lost, that stinks. If UVa won, then I think it would give them a reason to keep the current coach...which stinks. SO it was a pretty stress-free year for me and that game. I didn't really care which way it went, although I think I preferred losing so that hopefully we can get a new coaching staff and win some games next year! :) We had a quick dinner of pizza before we all piled into the car and headed to church. Caroline was baptized at the Saturday night service. She was really cute, but as soon as the Pastor held her she started screaming...ugh. And as soon as he handed her back to me she stopped...Oy vey! I swear she is so attached to her Momma it is scary! We came home from church and crashed.

Nothing on the agenda for today, so hopefully we will just get to hang out with CiCi and PaPa before they have to head back to VA tomorrow. :(

Here are some pictures from last night. Enjoy!!


Caroline's first experience wearing a coat!


The big Christmas Tree up and decorated!


Caroline getting ready to go to her baptism!


Katherine all dressed up for Caroline's baptism.

Sisters :)

Mommy and the girls.

Daddy and Caroline.

Beginning of November

Well my last post was of Halloween...and since then we have been...SICK. Imagine that?! :)

Poor Katherine has basically had a fever since the beginning of October, with a few days in between of no fever. ICK! The doctor finally broke down and put her on an antibiotic last Thursday in hopes that whatever she is fighting will finally get the heck out of her system for good! This nonsense has gone on WAY too long. Today was Katherine's first day back to school in what feels like forever. She was SOOOO excited to go back. :)

Last week was a ton of fun as I had a girls night out with the ladies from my couple's group. We all got our nails done at a local salon. SOO fun!!! Chris watched the girls and when I got home, both girls were sound asleep!! A+++ for Daddy!

Friday we finally managed to organize a dinner with our friends Shane and Brittany. We have been trying to get together with them for something like 4 months! Ridiculous! Anyway, we FINALLY managed to not have anyone deathly ill or some scheduling conflict, so they came over for dinner. Brittany is also Katherine's teacher at school...whom she ADORES. Everything we hear is "Mrs. Maze this and Mrs. Maze that." Shane is also the contemporary music director at church, so he comes in and sings songs with the kids on Wednesday mornings. So when Katherine found out that Mrs. Maze and Mr. Shane were coming over for dinner she just about burst from excitement! When the doorbell rang, she sprinted to the door to answer it "all by myself." Such a cutie!

Brittany is an awesome photographer, so she brought her camera along with her and took pictures of the girls while dinner was finishing cooking. Some of her shots are below. I SO wish I could take pictures 1/2 as good as she does! :) Of course Katherine refused to let me fix her hair, so she looks like she just stuck her hand in a light socket, but aside from that, the pictures are wonderful!! What's a mom to do?! :) Brittany is going to take our Christmas card pictures, which I am THRILLED about. :) Now...we just need to get the darn Christmas tree up, so that we can take the pictures! :)

This weekend was crazy. We went to dinner at our next door neighbor's house on Saturday night. It was really nice, but a bit hectic as Katherine was still running a fever. So, Mom, dad and I rotated watching her at home, while the rest of us were over at the neighbor's eating. We were pooped by the time we got home! :) (The neighbor's daughter was there and 8 months pregnant, so we didn't want to take a chance of getting her sick!) Sunday we had lunch at Grammie and Gray Gray's with GiGi and Joe Joe. It was a lot of fun as Katherine hasn't seen Gi GI and Joe Joe in weeks due to her illness. Then Sunday afternoon I had a 4 hour...yes I said 4 hour...chruch meeting. SO...Christopher was on his own...with both girls...for 4 1/2 hours! I was really worried that both girls would give him a fit, but when I got home, they were both happy as clams! Caroline apparently only cried for about 15 minutes and that was right before I got home, so she was getting tired. Amazing!! Again...A+++++ for Daddy!!

Today Katherine went back to school...FINALLY! :) YAY! She was thrilled to be back and ran into the classroom and immediately hugged Mrs. Maze. It was very cute.

Caroline and I headed across the street to Dr. W's office for our 4 month well visit. She was such a happy little camper!! Dr. W said that she is one healthy kiddo!! We get to start on rice cereal anytime now as she is getting so big! He also said that the rice cereal would probably help with the spitting up, so I guess we shall see!! :) Pictures to come soon!! Her stats are as follows:

Weight: 13 lbs. 13.4oz. (50th percentile)
Height: 25 1/4" (90th percentile)
Head Circumference: 16 1/4" (50th percentile)

Now if you had asked me before the appointment how big she was, I would have sworn she was a full pound or two heavier than Katherine was at this point...I was totally wrong! A four months old Katherine was 13lbs. 14 oz (so basically the same), 24 3/4" long (a 1/2" shorter than Caroline) and had a head circumference of 16" (1/4" smaller than Caroline). I was totally shocked! Guess that means both of my girls are going to long and lean!!!

Caroline got two shots and was NOT a happy camper about that! She will go back next week for two additional shots and then we are done until 6 months old! :) She's sleeping peacefully now in her swing! :)

Well here are some of Brittany's pictures! (They aren't the full image as I had to download them from a site, but once I get the real images from her on disk, I can send those out.) :) Hope you enjoy!!

Katherine's Pictures:


Caroline's Pictures:

Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween from the Hughes Family!!

Katherine and I were sick...ALL of last week. On Thursday we finally felt ok enough to venture out of the house for the first time other than to the doctor's office. So both girls and I headed South to the Vero Outlets on a mission for winter clothes to wear during our trip North to Virginia for Christmas, a Christmas dress for both girls and a dress for Miss Katherine to wear at Caroline's baptism. They have a wonderful Carter's outlet down there that I LOVE. We made out like bandits and even managed to get gifts for a few people. I love getting Christmas shopping checked off of my list! :) Anyway, both girls did WONDERFUL, and we were home by 1pm ready for a nap. Yeah...didn't happen. So Mom was worn out by the time dinnertime rolled around. Katherine missed school again on Friday because she still had a lingering cough. So we stayed close to home and didn't do much of anything.

Saturday morning we decided to head back to the outlets (they are only 45 minutes away) to pick up some gifts that I had forgotten about and to look for some things for my mom and Christopher. So the whole Hughes family packed into the car and headed South. We had a pretty successful shopping trip, grabbed a bite to eat and then headed home. We got home in time for Chris to go get his bike fixed at the local bike shop and then it was time to eat dinner and get ready for church. Yes, we went to church on Saturday and Halloween night! There weren't many people there as the Florida/Georgia game was on TV and it was Halloween night.

After church, we scurried home and did a quick change into Katherine's Halloween outfit. Trick or Treaters were out in full force on our street. We immediately went outside and across the street to Grammie and Gray Gray's house. Katherine LOVED getting candy and showing off her "Cowboy Princess" outfit as she calls it. Such a cutie. Caroline on the other hand wanted NOTHING to do with Halloween. I think she was worn out from our busy day. So after Grandma's house we visited one next door neighbor and then headed back to the house. Chris was handing out candy in the driveway, so Katherine climbed up into the back of the pickup truck and helped Chris while Caroline and I went inside for bedtime. She conked out in no time, so I was able to go back out and join Chris and Katherine. I think the entire street could hear Katherine. She was talking SOOO loudly. She kept saying "Here comes people for candy, Daddy!" As if we couldn't see them! hahaha.

We finally called it a night around 9 and put the little cowgirl to bed. I passed out cold shortly after and awoke at midnight to Chris and Katherine in her bathroom chatting. I had NO idea what was going on as I had been so sound asleep. Well apparently Katherine woke up screaming...I didn't hear a thing...and Chris went in to see what was wrong. Her left little leg was covered in hives?! WHAT?! So, he gave her benedryll immediately (excellent job Daddy!) and once the hives subsided and we got her back in bed, I called the on-call nurse for our pediatrician. Apparently hives are a side effect of a really bad virus...who knew?! Thankfully it wasn't an allergic reaction! So once I finally relaxed enough to fall back asleep it was around 2am.

Chris got up with Katherine Sunday morning and let me sleep until 8:15 (9:15 before the Fall Back). I felt SO much better, but still not batting 100%. We got up and got dressed thinking we were headed to the grocery store, since I hadn't been since the previous weekend...a major no, no with a two year old in the house! hahaha. Anyway, after I got out of the shower and got ready, Chris was feeling tired, so he conked out for a much deserved nap, while Katherine, Grammie and I cleaned out all of my parents' stuff from our garage and moved it across the street. It was quite a project, but the girls did it! :) After we got Katherine down for her afternoon nap, Chris went through the remaining junk left in our garage (all of our junk) and managed to make piles of trash, giveaways, and to be organized. So now our garage looks completely bare! It's wonderful!!! We still have to organize the stuff we are keeping, but it's SO much better than it was! I LOVE IT! While he was working in the garage Caroline and I went to the grocery store for some much needed supplies. I had a pick up a few things for Mom, so when we got back, we all headed across the street to deliver our goodies. Well I guess we had perfect timing, because Mom told us to stay for dinner. We had a WONDERFUL dinner at their house and then headed back across the street for bedtime! We were all conked out by 7:45pm. LOVE IT!

The bad thing is that we were all up by 5:30am this morning...booo. Oh well. Caroline slept for 12 hours straight last night, so I'm feeling pretty darn good this morning!!! :)

Check out the pictures of Katherine and Caroline on Halloween night below.


Katherine the pink cowgirl!

Caroline...she was NOT impressed with Halloween.