Last post of 2008!!

Happy New Years Eve, everyone! Our last post of 2009 is going to be an exceptionally long one, so be sure to scroll down. It has been a very exciting couple of weeks. We have traveled, welcomed friends' new babies, celebrated our first Christmas at home and celebrated Daddy's 31st birthday!! And of course, got in some puppy cuddles - Sophie is starting to enjoy the doggies more and more as you can tell from the pictures above. Can you tell why they call them gentle giants?

We had a wonderful Christmas and Sophie was way more understanding of the whole affair than we expected. She knows just about every Christmas song you could ask her to sing and she even knows "The Night Before Christmas" about half way through by heart. The rest she can do if you prompt her :) This weekend we were sitting at breakfast and Sophie said, "Santa is a right jolly old elf!" She's on to Auld Lang Syne now in honor of New Years though!! She is also cracking us up these days with her potty references. She is showing you signs of readiness for potty training because she is telling us when she's about to go or while she's doing it. Except that she sometimes gets her pronouns wrong when she tries to branch out from her usual third person speaking and so instead of saying "I'm pooping", several times we have been at the dinner table this week and she will say "Are YOU pooping?" Sophie has of course provided us and all of our family with such joy this holiday season. We are so happy and so blessed to be home and able to celebrate Christmas with our wonderful extended family. Here are some fun pictures to enjoy!!

Sophie's pretty Christmas dress and her new snowman. I caught her the other day singing to the snowman to the tune of "You are my sunshine." Except that it was, "You are my snowman, my only snowman, you make me happeeee..." - you get the picture :)

Sophie keeping the presents safe on Christmas Eve!

A couple family pictures from Christmas Day - and Sophie in her new rocking chair from Honey and Beebee!

Sophie enjoying her newest pigeon book from Gretchen.

Santa brought Sophie a wonderful easel! She can draw happy faces (messy ones!) and straight lines :)

Above you have four generations of Hemmer ladies!! And then just some adorable ones of the sweetest cousins in the world! They are very into hugging these days.

A cute one of Sophie and Daddy and a picture of our first Christmas tree together! With presents under it! This may not sound like much to you, but to us it is a huge milestone after all those years in apartments!

We also had the opportunity just before Christmas to welcome Uncle Todd and Aunt Nikke's new arrival! Travis Cooper Philippe arrived on Dec. 17 to his mommy after a very long, very NATURAL labor! Cheers to Nikke for five hours of pushing. As you can see, Travis is perfect and we were so excited to get to see him when he was just two and a half days old.

And finally, Sophie's latest and greatest boyfriend - baby Colin! Daddy's friend Patrick and his wife Katie stopped with by this weekend with nearly three month old Colin. You can tell by his grin that he loves Sophie already - and she enjoyed 'holding' him! We had tons of fun visiting and can't wait to watch how Colin grows.
So, that's all from the Renda household! It's been a busy month, but we are excited to see what 2009 brings! Happy New Year everyone! Mommy is a little freaked out that 2009 is her fourth year of blogging - where does the time go?

Love,
Kate, Andrew and Sophie