Going to church

We went to our new church, Cathedral of the Holy Trinity, yesterday for the first time. We are always a little leary of how Olivia is going to act in a new place. She did pretty good-Pat only had to take her out twice. She was entertaining the people behind us though-they had 2 boys-b/w junior high & high school age. Olivia was quite the flirt with them-a few times she dropped a bookmark over the pew, they would pick it up and give it back; she tried crawling over the pew to them; she wanted them to hold her; she waved and waved and waved to them; and I wouldn't be surprised if she tried feeding them her marshmallows when we weren't looking. When church was over, the dad commented to us on how adorable Olivia is and how much his boys enjoyed her. He said they actually stayed awake for church for once and commented that they hoped we sat in front of them next week. I thought that was cute and told Pat that I'll have to put that on the blog-Olivia the entertainer, even in church. He was surprised I didn't pull out my camera and ask the boys for their picture with Olivia. But, I settled happily with a picture with her at home after church :)

Happy Golden (8th) Birthday Bella!!

(Just a side note-we've upgraded our internet, so I'm getting more on the blog than I was going to-and it's faster than the service we had in Abq :) )
Happy Birthday to my niece, Bella! She had her golden birthday on January 8th. To celebrate, we all went rollerskating in Sioux Falls and then went to Dan and Bella's and had some chili, opened gifts, and had some tasty birthday cake made by Bella and decorated by Grandma Driscoll. Again-it is so great to be moved back to share in these special days.

Grandpa with his hands full!
Heather and Fraya-Fraya did a great job for her first time!

Anna-cute as can be skating it up!

Dan and his Birthday Girl

Dan, Heather, and Bella

Justin and Jessica taking a break with the family.

Bella on the go!

Bella before blowing out her 8 candles-hard to believe she is 8 already!

Bella and her afghan I crocheted for her (long time in the making!)

Grandma Driscoll and Bella in her new outfit by G & G from Justice-Bella's favorite store in the mall.

Curious Georgia

We have a little monkey on our hands and Grandma Driscoll nailed it on the head and came up with Curious Georgia. The pajamas are only too fitting-she's got a couple pairs of them and they are absolutely adorable on her! There isn't anything she won't get into-at least once. She loves to venture up and down the stairs (with supervision of course), gets into cupboards, climbs into drawers to reach and pull things out of cupboards above her, climbs on the furniture, loves to pull things off the entertainment center-of course she says "no no" to herself b/c she knows she's not supposed to do it, and looks at you first and then with a devlish grin goes and then does it. She is keeping us busy as ever! But we're loving keeping up with our little monkey. Here in the pictures, she has her mittens on her feet-that was the thing for awhile (she won't wear socks).

Catching Up

I am finally getting caught up (sort of) on here. After taking 3 days to upload these pictures, I will probably only add a couple more to get caught up to date. Our "high speed" internet service is slower than dial up-taking at least 20 minutes to upload 3 pix. Here are pictures from our Christmas's with the Driscoll's and the Froehlich's. Pat and I got moved up to New Ulm the Monday of Christmas week and Tuesday morning went to my parents to beat the big Christmas blizzard. As much of a big welcome back by Mother Nature we got, we'll take it to be back closer to family. We are loving it. My brothers and families didn't make it to Gettysburg until the day after Christmas, but we were all glad to be together. It was so nice to have Olivia running around with her cousins again. The Monday after, we left to go back to New Ulm-we unpacked all day Tuesday, and then went to Algona Wednesday to have Christmas with the Froehlich's over the New Year's weekend. The Driscoll cousins were just a warm-up for Olivia for all her Froehlich cousins! It was a full house-and one more addition will be added soon when Bill and Maegan have the first Froehlich boy in March. We had a wonderful Christmas and rang in the New Year with a little party for all the kids. What a fun tradition! We were also thankful this year to be with everyone-last Christmas we spent the holidays in the hospital in Sioux Falls with Pat's injury/infection. (Although injuries still couldn't be avoided this year-my brother Heath broke his ankle in 3 places and had surgery with a plate and 9 screws just before Christmas. He is in the hospital as I write this with a blood clot in his leg :( but doing ok. And Andy Larew broke his ankle playing basketball with the guys New Year's Eve day and Molly was lucky enough to get to take him to the ER New Years Eve.)

Olivia's new pink chair she got from Pat and I for Christmas. We had it shipped to the Froehlich's so this was her first time with it. She's sits in it like a little Princess-for about 5 seconds and then she's on to the next thing!

Olivia dancing with Grandma Froehich's snowman. Everything Christmas looking Olivia would say ho-ho-ho-it was so cute!

Chloe and Kaden helping Jayna set up the cool table of New Year's decorations for the kids.

8 out of the 10 Grandkids just waiting as patiently as they could to start in on the noise makers.

Pat, Olivia, and I before the big New Year's party begins!

The kids and Olivia having their Mr. Freezes.

Olivia and Chloe-Olivia actually kept her tiara on for half a minute-just long enough to get a picture.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!! 2010!!!

Confetti time! Chloe and Jason

Olivia

Michaela helping Olivia get decorated.

Kids are in bed-time for some yuker.

Olivia and her cousins Grace and Elizabeth

All 10 of the Grandkids! This is New Year's Day before opening presents.

Olivia is opening up her new billfold asking Daddy for money already!

Olivia and her beanbag from Grandma and Granpa Froehlich. She loves it! After she continously loved to dive into the dog pillow-we decided a beanbag would be a great idea on her Christmas list.

One pooped out little girl!

The little New Year's girl in her cute outfit from Gwen and Kate.

The Froehlichs. We got everyone in the picture and turned out really good!

All the adults

Christmas at my parents. This was after Church Christmas Eve

Grandma and Grandpa Driscoll with Olivia.

Olivia in her pretty Christmas dress (thanks again Nadine & Jerry!)

We made the mistake of letting Olivia touch the ornaments for pictures. By the end of the week, we had the bottom half of the tree empty and I think she managed to pull down the smaller Christmas trees a couple times.

Merry Christmas Olivia! Olivia got to open her presents from Santa Claus Christmas morning.

Olivia helping Grandpa keep score in a game of Phase 10. Justin, Jessica, Caden, and Olivia

Let the fun begin! The Driscoll kids have made it to Grandma and Grandpa's!

Pat, Grandpa, and Ryan (Heath and Kristi's)

Ryan's first Christmas. He is such a happy baby.

The Driscoll Grandkids. Olivia never likes to sit still for a picture.

Grandma and Grandpa Driscoll with the kids.

Heath and Ryan opening gifts

Olivia opening up her gifts from Grandma and Grandpa

Pat, Olivia, and her new baby doll

Of course-she always loves to play with the boxes.

The three of us.

The big blizzard. Olivia's never seen so much snow!

Olivia in the snow-sporting her new snowsuit from the McNeeses-thank you!

Olivia, Izabella, Anna, and Ethan

Olivia and Ryan with their horses from G & G. Olivia loves "going to town" on hers. As I'm typing this, she is on the horse backwards jumping up and down laughing at cartoons.

Ride 'em Cowgirl!

My Angel and me