Home Sweet Home!!!

Once a tarheel, always a tarheel! Our plans to move north were short lived and we couldn't be happier about that! Rylan was accepted at UNC School of Dentistry and so the wait is FINALLY over! Chapel Hill is home sweet home for at least 41/2 more years! Yahoo!

A Great Day!

Yesterday was a great day. In addition to finding out about Rylan being accepted in to dental school, Rylee and I enjoyed an afternoon together downtown. First we rode the bus to Franklin Street, which is always an adventure for Rylee. She loves getting to see all of the "tarheels" (aka anyone who is affiliated with the university in anyway whatsoever) and figuring out which stop to get off and how to signal to the bus driver by way of either a pull string or a button strip. I have to admit that I think that most of the tarheels enjoyed seeing her almost as much. I mean, I rode the bus for two years and it was not everyday that you saw such a cute little girl all bundled up and excited for the simple pleasure of riding a bus. Anyways, so we met up with Rylan and enjoyed a family lunch together at Qudoba. Then Rylan left us to hit the books and Rylee and I went to Kidzu, a children's museum downtown. The current theme of the museum is all about castles and all of the different types of artisans that take care of the castle. The museum is not very big but it changes its theme a couple times a year. There was a crafts corner, a dress up station, building blocks, a puppet show, a little garden to "harvest" vegetables and lots of other fun activities. I think the only reason I was able to get her to leave was because she knew that it meant another ride on the bus. So if any of Rylee's friends and moms are looking for an activity since the weather has been so cold recently, we highly recommend Kidzu... and the bus, of course.

Meeting up with Dad!

Doesn't she just blend in with all of the other tarheels?

A chef.

A baker.

A gardener.

A crazy mirror.

A sad little tarheel pretending to be in jail...probably for not wearing her seatbelt! (If I wait 2 seconds before putting on my seatbelt, Rylee insists that a policeman will come and take me to jail!)

Rylee's Reactions to good news!

Tonight Rylee's prayer was as follows:
Heavenly Father, thank you for this day. Thank you for daddy getting into dental school. Thank you for us moving to Ohio and not to the lousy place....(not sure where the lousy place is but sure glad we're not moving there!)

That's right folks...Today Rylan was accepted at Case Western School of Dental Medicine! Which means we will be moving to Cleveland in August (unless UNC accepts him on January 31st) and in May 2012 he will be a dentist! HOORAY!

So, after Rylee finished her prayer she wanted to sing "Happy Birthday" (the "you look like a monkey version" of course) to Rylan, which I guess was her way of singing her congratulations...perhaps the way someone might sing "For he's a jolly good fellow".

And when Rylan first told me the news and we proceed to jump around shouting, Rylee started crying because she was scared and thought something horrible had happened.

So anyways...It's just really funny to see kids' reactions to things...not always like you would expect!

Congrats to Rylan! We are so thrilled and excited!

Christmas at Grandma Miller's

We celebrated Christmas at my Mom's this year on New Year's Day. This is a tradition we have for years that Lance spends Christmas with Becca's family and we spend Christmas with Rylan's family.


My mom had a 9 1/2 foot real tree this year. (My mom has vaulted ceilings, Luke is on a step stool, and Lance is standing on the floor if that helps give you a visual). She had not bought a real tree in years and even when she did, it wasn't 9 1/2 feet tall. It was beautiful. Rylan and I went over yesterday and carried out to the street for her and I almost burst into tears to see such a gorgeous tree laid to rest. If it could have grown roots we would have planted it in a second.

It was a blast to watch Davis unwrap presents and try to grasp what was happening. Having a toddler around at Christmas always makes things fun!

Rylee's new dollhouse! (see the tree in the background...I wish we

had taken more pictures of it fully decorated!)

Rylee and Davis in the awesome igloo that she got from
Lance, Becca, and Davis for her birthday. Two of the cutest Eskimo's ever!

The polar bears are coming!

Today we had some of the first snow flurries in Chapel Hill this year! It was made quite obvious to us that Rylee has very little understanding about what snow is when she saw the flurries and exclaimed "You know what this means! It means the polar bears are coming!" So since we had nothing close to a white Christmas and in light of the flurries today, I thought I would add them to the pictures myself! We had a wonderful Christmas in Georgia this year with Daina, Mark, Aidan, and Mairyn! We love spending holidays with them! Whether it be Christmas or Thanksgiving or Mother's Day or Martin Luther King Jr. Day ( all of which we have done since they moved to GA a year and a half ago) we always have a blast! We hope you all had a great holiday as well. Happy Hew Years!

Rylee turns 4!

So, I am not sure anyone if checks this site anymore since my last real posting was around Halloween. But I have made a New Years resolution to start posting again, so here it goes.

We spent Christmas in Buford, Georgia this year. I am convinced this Rylee's favorite place on the planet, due to the fact that her cousins Aidan and Mairyn live there.

Rylee turned 4 on the 23rd. We had already celebrated with her first real birthday party on December 1st, so we kept it pretty low key. We did go to a place called "Jungle Jump" on the 22nd, since the 23rd fell on a Sunday. The girls had so much fun jumping and sliding on the huge inflatables that we went again a few days after Christmas!

On the way home the Rylee and Mairyn enjoyed posing for a few silly pictures! Rylee had a great birthday, however, she did have a little trouble she believing she was actually 4. She was a little confused all month about why she already had her party but still was only 3. So when the 23rd finally came and we told her "Rylee, now you are officially 4 years old." She just gave us this look like "Yeah right! I don't believe you." Ahhh! The curse of a December birthdayA new birthday dress from Grandma Hansen!What a face!