Unlikely Thug...

Here's a shot of our little rapper.
Okay, really we were at the Daniel Stowe Botanical Gardens
looking at lights when we got this shot. Probably there
were not any rappers there. I may have seen one by the
make your own potpourri stand... but I'm not sure.

Anyway, pardon my absence. We have been without
cable (gasp!) and therefore Internet for a few days.
So I'm back. Will catch up on Christmas in the next
few days. :) Until then...

We wish you a Merry Christmas!

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

The Outtakes

Every year as a special Christmas treat, I subject
my family to rounds and rounds of photo shoots
in order to get just the right picture for Christmas
cards. This year was no different. Here are the
ones that are soooo close and not so close that did
not make the cut. Adding a baby to the mix
was definitely more interesting.

Here we are, Andy and I know all about the automatic
feature of our camera... Evan is wondering why the
camera is beeping and flashing.

This one was near the end. Grandpa helped with
this round... and Evan is showing off for him.
But not smiling.

Adjusting mid shoot. Working so hard. Are we done yet?

This one almost made it... but lets face it...
my hair looks weird. And if we have taken
2,000 pictures, I don't want to send a
weird hair shot. You do get the sense of
Evan's active personality though.

So this is what you will not be getting in the mail this year.
I wonder what you might get? What a mystery!

55 pages later...

This post is admittedly not as cute as Evan...
however I am having my own little celebration
for myself over here because just minutes ago
I finished my Structured Group project. It is
55 pages of my own thoughts. Wow. Though
I do not want to do it again, it is pretty cool to
have in writing a six week group for middle
school girls that I designed and scripted word
for word. I am glad it is through, and am
thankful that there were no meltdowns,
or major procrastination. I rather
handled this project like an adult. :) My
prayers were answered for this project to
be finished smoothly without any stress flowing
over onto Evan or Andy. Yay!

10 months and some days

December 1st Evan turned 10 months old.
Here he is in all his 10 month glory!

Gobble Gobble!

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving this year.
We had a fun gathering including my mom, Harrison,
Walter and his girlfriend Adrienne all got together
at the Schmidt's for a big mid afternoon feast.
The food was yummy and conversation was good too.
Here we all are.


It was especially fun to give Evan some Thanksgiving
meal too. He loved all of it as much as the rest of us.
Here is Auntie Em playing with Evan. He is such a busy
boy, it takes putting a colander on your head to keep
him occupied! Go Emily!

Here's Walter and Evan, both stuffed and contented.

Me and mom taking a turn cleaning dishes.

Gus hoping for scraps. He got plenty.
Walter and Adrienne the "power couple" who dominated
in Uno. I think they may have cheated...but I can't really talk.
Margie and Emily having some Evanly time.
Mike taking his turn occupying the busy boy.
What a special Thanksgiving this was. Makes me look
forward to Christmas even more!

The Tree...

A few weeks ago I was driving to Freedom Park to enjoy
a nice warm afternoon. On the way I was captivated by
this tree! I decided it was the most beautiful tree I have
ever seen in the fall.

Naturally, the next weekend I decided it was worth
a family stop on the way to Freedom Park.
We got these pictures under our favorite tree.
This may become a yearly event!

Here's Evan always working hard!

Girls Night Out

This weekend I had a fun outing with my high school girls.
Now, I'm sure if you're reading this you know what I mean
when I say, "my" high school girls. This is a group of
girls at my church who I have been leading in a small group
since they were freshmen. They are now Seniors...
so even though they are not in fact "mine" I feel like they
are little sisters now!

Anyway, I have been wanting to do something special with
them, and the perfect opportunity arose. Andy had won
two free nights at hotel Uptown from a raffle at work,
so instead I requested two rooms for one night at this
same hotel to be used for "my" high school girls.

Well, they hooked us up with a Junior Suite and adjoining
room which took up the entire end of the building!
There were huge windows everywhere and it was awesome!
So we were all pumped. We went out to dinner on the way
uptown where the waiter hit on the girls and
they deemed him "easy on the eyes" as well.
The highlight of dinner was when the waiter asked
what we were doing...and the girls informed him they
were high school girls out with their leader who was
not in high school anymore.

Here is how the conversation went:
E: "We're out for a night on the town, and this is our leader
she is not in high school anymore... she is 27."
Me: "I'm 29... I'll be 30 in April!"
E: "You said you were 27?!?"
Me: "Yeah! When I was 27!"

I love these moments! :)
Here's some pics from dessert:
Emily drew this fun drawing on the paper on top of the
table at a swanky little place Uptown where we had dessert.

Some of the girls sitting in our huge windows at the end
of the building.

Hanging out in the room...

Just generally being responsible.

It was a great time! It was wonderful being 27 again! :)

One of them...

One of these two are happy...

Chili + Bluegrass Music = Perfect

Confession: I have been waiting for this festival for over a month.
I saw a sign hanging above downtown Matthews that said,
"Chili Cook off and Bluegrass Music Festival" and I thought...
"I am there!". Everything about that appeals to me.
1. I love chili
2. I love parks
3. I like Bluegrass Music
4. I love a small town feeling
So I have been anticipating this Saturday for a while.
It looked like the weather was not going to cooperate,
but we woke up Saturday morning to a BEAUTIFUL day.
It was warm sunny and clear was about 65 degrees.
Perfect.
Off we went.
We met some friends in the park and had a fabulous afternoon.
Here are some pics.
Behind me you can see all of the tents of Chili Competitors.
We got a bowl and went to town tasting all of the chilies.
Me and Evan enjoying the scene.

The bluegrass music and stories being told from the pavilion.

Evan was completely captivated by all of the activity around him.
He sat like this in his stroller contented for a long time.
If you know Evan, this is remarkable because the guy
rarely sits still!

Self portrait!

We had such a fun time and are looking forward to next year!

Falling for Fall...

Who Me?

I am so honored, I have been tagged.
Yep, selected by Amanda to share with the world...
Seven Quirky Things About Me.
Here goes:

1. I am a verbal processor and I speak in stream of consciousness
(and include the comments in parentheses while speaking),
(most people leave out the thoughts that pop into their mind
while talking about something completely unrelated,

but I include them.)

2. I enjoy the smell of gasoline fumes.

3. When I shout hello to neighbors, they
never hear me because I am actually a quiet shouter,
but Andy shushes me when I am on the cell phone
because I am a loud cell phone talker at home.

4. I am too organized and clean (this is how I would
answer if I were in a job interview).

5. I cannot read or sleep in a car
(so I really like to be the driver).

6. I grew up in the only family in Alabama
who did not watch sports at all. The
Alabama Auburn Game shut down everything
in the city... but the Blairs continued with life as usual!

7. I love warm lighting. I go around the house
in the evenings and turn on only the lights that
create my favorite ambiance. I think about lighting
a lot.

That's it for me. Nicole & Ellen its your turn!

A Big Ole Week

We have had a big week here at the Schmidts.
Evan turned nine months old, he is in a learning burst,
and he received his first award.

Here he is early in the week working so hard
on pulling up. He grunted the whole way up
and was so proud of himself to be standing.

Just days later he is pulling up and sitting down
like he has been doing it forever.

Here he goes:

Got it!

In addition to his pull up skills he is perfecting

his crawl. I thought he might just continue
his scooching around, but nope, he now
scurries around on his knees faster that I
had imagined.

Here he is on Halloween.
Our cul de sac had our annual
"Halloween Spooktacular" where we have a
potluck in the circle so that the kids will eat some
real food before stuffing themselves with candy.
Evan won the award for "most athletic" for his
Jake Delhomme costume. Thank you very much.

Back to the Pumpkin Patch

Last weekend we met our friends Daniel and Kelly
and their two boys down at a Pumpkin Patch in Weddington.
It was raining when we got up, and I thought...
what a perfect opportunity for Evan to wear his rain boots
that Kelly got for him! Here he is with a pumpkin sporting
his rain boots.