Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow!

Last weekend Columbia, SC finally got it's first snow of the year! It was perfect. Snowed Friday afternoon, and was gone by Sunday. Not enough to bring Columbia to a halt- which usually happens- but just enough to go and have some fun in it! I, the idiot, left my camera at work and wasn't able to take any pictures of our house covered in snow. But, Saturday Callie and I headed out to my parents house to play. Vaughn had to work but I was determined to have some fun in the snow. My dad "Papa" had a sled that you can pull for Callie which was great. Callie wasn't crazy about the snow at first so this gave her a minute to get acclimated. She was SO cute in her little sled! We bundled her up and she loved having the attention put all on her.

After walking around in the woods pulling baby girl, she was ready to get out and stretch her legs. Since it never snows here Mac doesn't have any mittens, so socks had to do, ha. She finally got used to the snow and thought it was great!

I loved playing in the snow with our sweet baby girl and so happy that she enjoyed it as well! We are happy we got the snow, but just as happy to see it go. I live in the south for a reason, I like to visit snow, not live in it. :)

Play Day

We haven't really been able to play in the back yard since Christmas when we got our new fence and Callie got her swing set. But the other weekend, the weather was perfect and we were ready to get outside for a little while. Callie hasn't been a fan of her swing as of late, but after many times swinging, she now loves it! Daddy pushed baby girl for a long time and she was squealing with excitement.

We also ran around with Doc and slide down our slide, which she can do ALL. DAY. LONG. Vaughn was teaching her how to kick the ball, and to be honest, she's not that bad! Maybe a soccer girl in the future? Hope not, not a fan, but if she's into it, we'll go with it. We can't wait for the weather to turn warm again so spend more time and more often out there
!

Costa Rica

Back in January Vaughn and I took another Chamber trip to Costa Rica. We've been fortunate enough to go on several Chamber trips and we were so excited to go again this year! We had never been to Costa Rica and we were delighted to get out of cold Columbia for a bit. It is a beautiful country and we would love to go back! We went to Liberia, Costa Rica, pronounced Lee-beria. Our tour guide told us to make sure we say "Lee-beria" or we would end up in Liberia, Africa. :) We stayed a an amazing all inclusive resort that had so much to offer us in activities, as we defiantly took advantage of that! The resort was located by itself on a a cove which was awesome to have it mostly to ourselves. the views were great, the water beautiful & warm!

The resort also had beautiful landscape and views!

The pool was a little cold for me, but Vaughn didn't have a problem partaking.

The nightlight and food was also great, which is sometimes rare for an all inclusive. They had different restaurants- Italian, Mexican and Asian were the ones we tried and loved them. We were sad to come back home because we were so spoiled by it!

Also, while we were there we were told we needed to do a Rain forest Canopy Tour. As some of you know I'm terrified of heights, but I sucked up and did it, and I'm so glad I did. The views were amazing and by the third zip line run I was fine. The tour guides though made fun of me and tried to scare me several times when they realized I was so nervous, Vaughn got a good laugh as well... ugh.

Vaughn and I are ready to go back, and hoping that next year the Chamber decides to go back. There is so much to do there and we didn't even get to do half of it. My tan is already gone, makes me a little sad that I'm looking like a ghost again. :)

Happy Valentine's Day!

The Granger household had a WONDERFUL Valentine's Day! Mommy, Daddy and Callie were very lazy for the first half of the day, and not much more productive the rest of it! :)

Callie got her Valentine's present before breakfast, I could hardly stand it, I love giving gifts! She was really excited about the new goodies too.

She got a sucker...

Some books, a DVD, PJ's, a butterfly wand...

and a brush... And let me say that she LOVED the brush. She wanted us to do her hair the. whole. day. We couldn't resist though, look at those baby blues!

Daddy also treated his girls to red roses, chocolates, a teddy bear and a very sweet card! Later on we met up with Vaughn's family at Liberty and then DR was nice enough to babysit Callie while Vaughn and I went to see Avatar. If you haven't seen it, go! We saw it in 3-D and thought it was great! I loved spending it with my little family. I had the two best Valentine's anyone could hope for!

I hope you had a wonderful Valentine's Day too!

*This silly mommy left her very nice camera at work.... these pictures were taken with my phone. Not too bad though :)

Happy New Years!

This year for New Year's we took a trip up north. And when I say up north, it was up there. We went to Charlemont, MA, aka in the middle of no-where. However, we managed to have a blast! It was super cold, never left the low 30's and they thought it was hot. Snow was everywhere, more than we've seen, and they said it was nothing.... Well, to these Southerner's it was a whole different world! It was a short flight up there and a 1 1/2 hour drive from Hartford, CT. We stayed at a cute bed and breakfast that had some farm animals. The company was great as well. Vaughn and I went with Travis & Emily and DR & Kelsey.

We stayed for several days and never slept in once. We were on the go and determined to play in the snow for as long as we could! We arrived New Year's Eve and partied at the local bar. It was very entertaining to see the locals get down, so needless to say we had a great time with them! Here's a picture of us before the big night...
The next day we went out to play at our friend's house. He has about 200 acres of land and we played on most of it. We snowmobiled, cross country skied, has snow fights, flung ourselves down hills, and just sat in the snow. We reverted back to five year olds....

The next day we decided to go snow skiing. None of us had been in a while so it was fairly interesting to watch us fall down the hill with our skies. I managed however to pick it up again fairly quickly, Vaughn, not so much. To be such the athlete, I was surprised he didn't do better. I was tickled because I finally was better at a sport than he was! HA

We had a fantastic time being in a new town and playing. I missed baby girl SO much though, it was our first trip away from home for more than a night since she was born. I was ready to get home and hug her neck. Loved being in cold weather with snow, but I think I like visiting it more than living in it... :)

Christmas Afternoon!

I know, I've been MIA for a bit, but we've been super busy. So here are the final pieces of Christmas!

After a nap we headed over to my parents house to open even more presents! Callie was lucky enough to still be in her PJ's and got spoiled all over again. Not only did she get a swing set from G-Kat and Papa, but lots of fun toys. Uncle Alex didn't disappoint either, she's ready for summer with some cute clothes!

After a shower we got ready to host my dad's side of the family for Christmas night. Christmas is my dad's birthday so we always try to make it special by making a cake for him.

We had some great food again this year and after we were stuffed we opened some presents. My Aunt Ellen gave Callie this cute sign, at it now sits right beside her little table in her room. :)

We also had fun hanging out with my cousins girls. Callie loves the big girls!

Last but not least, over the summer when we had the Rowland reunion Andrea, my cousin, did a special gift for Grandma. It was the first time she had all of her great grandchildren in the same place so we got them all to put a hand print on a pot for her. It turned out really good and Grandma LOVED it.

It was so much fun to celebrate Christmas with little Mac this year. Hard to believe that it's already over and were heading into February now. Christmas 2010 will be here before we know it!

School Christmas Party

The last day Callie's daycare was open, they had a Christmas party for all the kids. Each mom was assigned some snack for the class. I signed up for cookies thinking I could make some good ones for the class, however, they wouldn't allow us to bring any homemade items to do some kids' allergies. Oh Well! The kid's didn't seem to mind the fact that none of the items were homemade and had a blast eating all the goodies. Callie was on a sugar high for a while afterwards, but it was well worth it seeing her face with all the sweets!