Merry Christmas!

We hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas! Our family continues to be blessed and so grateful. We spent this Christmas in Holton with family and it was a wonderful time. We arrived on Christmas Eve and spent the evening with aunts and uncles, ate chicken and noodles over mashed potatoes and then Jack and Bella went off to bed to wait for Santa. Christmas morning brought stockings and more wonderful food and company. The day was spent in PJs just enjoying family. Jack and Bella are very excited about some of the presents they got. They got a new DVD player for the car, some great pianos and a wonderful slide just to name a few. Below are some pictures of some of the presents and fun. Oh yeah! They also got some VERY cute personalized hoodies from Aunt Tina and Uncle Dave (also Nouna and Nouno). I was also excited and emotional about getting some very special black and white framed pictures of the day that Jack and Bella were born. Jack and Bella's cousin Matt took those pictures and gave them to me for Christmas. I can only say that tears were involved! :) Thanks Matt! Enough about me.....

A pathetic attempt.....

I would like to apologize to everyone because we didn't get time to send out Christmas cards this year. As a last minute idea Nathaniel and I dressed the kids up a couple weeks ago and tried to capture a cute picture of them in front of the fireplace to put on a card. The odds were against us. At first we snagged one, but then realized we had a small flash issue. We could have spent time trying to photoshop it out......*sigh*...... We decided to try and make adjustments and just get another one. Below you will see the result and get a taste of what life is like with 2 sixteen month olds. We should have known that the moons would not align again so soon. Well, the picture didn't work out (mostly because we lost motivation) but we knew we could post them here for everyone to enjoy. We hope everyone had a very merry Christmas and will have a blessed new year!

Christmas at School!

Jack and Bella celebrated Christmas at school on Wednesday. Santa came to visit, they got presents and cookies and had such a special day. Nathaniel and I got to come by and visit and see the kiddos and Santa. Such fun. We're so lucky to have such a wonderful school for the twins. We get a little sheet of paper EVERYDAY with pictures of the kids on it from that day and a story about what they did all day. We have a very special place. The pictures here were taken by Ms. Wesley, their teacher, and she was good enough to send them on to me. She really loves Jack and Bella. We're very lucky! Enjoy!

A nice surprise!

Not everyone may know this, but Nana Stavropoulos is originally from New Jersey. Her whole family still lives on the East Coast which makes it really hard for us to get together and see each other. This week my Uncle William,the twins great uncle, was in the area for work. He was able to extend his trip a day and spend some time with all of us. It was really great! Uncle William hadn't had a chance to meet Jack and Bella yet so this was really special. Below are a couple of pictures that we took with Uncle William and the kiddos.
This week Santa will be visiting Jack and Bella at their school so we will be sure to take pictures! I have volunteered to bake some cookies for the event and am looking forward to that as well. More to come soon!

Aunt Kaisha's Bridal Shower!

Last weekend was a fun weekend around our house. Aunt Kaisha's wedding is fast approaching so Aunt Kara and I decided to give her a bridal shower here in Kansas City. We enjoyed breakfast casserole, quiche, cinnamon roll bread pudding, potatoes, mimosas and delicious cupcakes from Baby Cakes! Mmmm.... Jack was battling a tummy virus and 2 incoming molars this day so he spent some quality time upstairs with Nana. Bella really enjoyed her girl time and really was such a big girl sitting with everyone while Aunt Kaisha opened her presents. Bella also really enjoyed the frosting on the cupcakes which you can see here. By the end she was so tired that she fell asleep at the wheel of her coupe car.

Gobble, Gobble

Jack and Bella had a very exciting Thanksgiving and got to see a lot of people! We spent the holiday in Iowa with Grandma and Grandpa Norgren, Aunt Kara and Uncle Z. Aunt Kaisha was fulfilling her duties as a nurse and was not able to make it home for the weekend. We missed her! In Iowa we got to relax, eat lots of turkey, Grandpa Norgren dressed up as Santa (!!) and we even got to see some second and third cousins. Such a good time. We spent Friday shopping in Des Moines and eating lunch at Chili's. The service there was a little slow and Jack and Bella were so hungry but they did such a good job. They even enjoyed some bites of Mommy's milkshake while they were patiently waiting. Friday evening we left Iowa and headed to Holton to see our Ohio family. What a special time this was! We don't get to see them very often but we try and talk and keep up through email and with updates from Nana. Cliff, Susan, Samantha and Jake were so excited to see the babies and we were so excited to see them! Saturday we went up to the square to see Santa and have some cookies. Jack and Bella really enjoyed the cookies. Then we walked around a little and stopped in a little children's clothing store and got some wonderful new clothes and a beautiful flower headband for Bella that you can see in the pictures. She's so pretty in it! We enjoyed lunch at Popi and Nana's sports bar and then headed back to their house for some naps. We spent the rest of the day really just being together since that's all any of us wanted to do. It was so nice and we were so happy that the Buckeyes were able to make the drive out to visit. We can't wait to see them again soon! Maybe Vegas?!?! Still working on that one with Daddy! Cliff, Susan, Troy and Wendy.....cross your fingers! I am working on it!!!! Enjoy the pictures!

Jack and Bella Playing!

Here's a little video of Jack and Bella playing/wrestling. Pretty funny stuff! We were comparing this to the video of them laughing from May, it's amazing how they've grown! They have to be months away from getting their own jobs and earning their keep!

Enjoy!

Bye bye baby mullet, hello faux hawk!

Back by popular demand is the Jack Norgren faux hawk! In case you haven't figured it out yet, Jack got his first big boy haircut today! His hair was getting pretty long so mommy and daddy decided it was time. We all loaded up and headed over to Shear Madness where we knew they specialized in hair cuts for little ones. We bought the "Baby's First Haircut" package which included a certificate, baggie of Jack's hair and before and after photos. We got plenty of our own photos too though, and video! Jack did really well with the haircut. He got to sit in a big yellow Hummer and smiled through the whole deal. We put Bella in her beautiful white winter vest so she felt special too and she even got a very pretty red sequin barrette for her hair (that mommy currently has misplaced!)and also sat in the Cinderella car. We are so happy with Jack's haircut and even though it was hard to let the baby hair go, he looks very handsome and like such a big boy now.