Today with Sutton

This evening, I decided to be intentional about taking some photos of Sutton for no reason because....well, I haven't done that for quite some time! So here's an evening with Sutton at nearly 18 months old.

He'd just woken up and couldn't quite part from the pacifier. 

After he'd eaten some dinner, he was happier. 

Tried to get him to pose by the tree...I think he looks like me here. 

This guitar is what we got him last Christmas. He loves it now. :) 

Then he had to put it down to dance to the music it was playing. 

I asked him to go sit by the Christmas tree and he did! He loves the Christmas tree. 

Not a huge fan of bath pictures being online, so I took a few, but will just post these. He loves the undressing part of the bath...he's okay with the bath itself as long as he can be standing...once his head gets wet, he usually gets mad so we leave that til last. Although today he was so distracted with toys that he barely noticed the hair-washing. Hip hip hooray for successful/happy baths!

Love you sweet boy! I'll try to take lots more photos of you during Christmas time than I have been!

Christmas Card and Life

Hello! Is everyone ready for Christmas? I feel like it totally snuck up on me this year, but life seems to go faster the older I get, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised. Here's our Christmas card this year...Merry Christmas from the Drehers!

Front

Back

Sutton is so fun these days. He's at such a great age, and we are just enjoying every minute. He gets excited about things...like we rearranged our basement during his nap, and when he got up and came downstairs and saw the changes, he yelled "WHOA!" And started dancing. Dancing is pretty much our life now. He dances whenever he hears any music, cell phones ringing, or when he thinks there should be music playing. I just love him.

Here's a video of him "brushing his teeth." Disregard all the clothes in the background.

And lastly, Adam's last day of school for the year was Friday, so we went out that night to celebrate by...getting a pet Bearded Dragon! It's actually for his classroom, but he wanted to get used to caring for it and have it used to people by the time he takes it to the school after break. So here's the un-named Dragon who's been living at our house and eating crickets (gross).

2010 vs 2011

I pulled up a photo of us from last year on Christmas to print out and put in an ornament, and holy cow! We've changed a lot in the past year! (For the better, I think.) :)

Illuminations at Botanica

So.....................

I have this really awesome husband.

He planned a date night for us. Had me mark it down on my calendar. Wouldn't tell me a thing.

Finally, the day of, I'm bugging him about what we're doing, how I should dress, what kind of food we're having for dinner.

He caved and told me we were gonna eat at the Olive Garden (I love, he hates) and then go to Illuminations at Botanica. Probably the only reason he caved was so I could dress appropriately.

Sunday afternoon, I got all dolled up for our hot date. Our babysitter arrived (aka Grandpa Ed), and we got in the car. Adam asked me which Olive Garden I wanted to go to. I said the west one, since we live on the west side. He was like "Ehhh...I'd rather get out of our neighborhood and not see any of my students, let's go to the east side."

Whatev. Sounds good.

So we drive over there, and it's raining, which I figured would ruin our later plans, so I began to look up movie times as a backup. We decided on a movie to see instead.

We get to Olive Garden and it's PACKED.

I go up to the host stand (I'm always the one who puts in our name at restaurants...is that weird?), but Adam walks right past the host stand and waves me in, as if he had a table reserved. I follow.

We wind around to find a whole table full of friends! (They're all east-siders, hence the sneaky sneak east side Olive Garden decision.) Hooray for a surprise triple date with some of our besties. (Apparently, I had a very surprised/weirded out look on my face.)

We had a great dinner and conversation (it matters not), and then we made a group decision to brave the cold and head to Botanica anyway. We bundled up and walked around Botanica in the freezing mist and had lots of fun! We took photos on our iPhones at a particularly lit up spot.

Love these girls!

I tried. Adam didn't. 

Story of our night. Adam and Luis love each other. 

"Gina, you have really soft skin!" Uh, thanks Val. :) 

 Mmm...wonderful.

The gang. Ryan & Melinda, me & Adam, Luis & Val.

Thanks for the awesome date night, Adam!

Airplanes & Dancing

The boy is obsessed with airplanes. OBSESSED. I don't know how it happened. I mean, yeah, his dad flies RC airplanes, but I wouldn't think he'd understand the concept of loving something just because his dad loves it at this age. Who knows. By the way, this video is tame compared to a lot of the reactions Adam gets from Sutton when he starts flying a plane.

And there's an airplane video that he really likes to watch (and dance to...dancing is big in our house these days) that Adam made from footage from when they went to Oshkosh this summer. He put some good songs to it, one of which is a song by Adam's brother Matt's band Carrie Nation and the Speakeasy. He loves his uncle's band!

The Unforgettable Fall of 2011

So I had this huge post all written up.

We had an extremely difficult fall. Both personally and professionally, it was just one thing after another.

I'd been thinking about the post I was going to write about it for some time. I needed the outlet, needed to "vent" so badly. So I wrote it all down. And it was long.

And then I (with the help of my ridiculously level-headed and awesome husband) realized that I could have it much worse. And I have so many things to be thankful for. I'm so blessed.

I'm completely and irrevocably in love with my life.

So I'm not gonna publish that post.

Instead, I'm going to write a post about how grateful I am for all the blessings in my life. God has given us so much, and so often I take those things and even Him for granted. I'm so undeserving.

In my version of the 12 Days of Christmas, I present to you 12 Things I'm Thankful For:

1. My beautiful healthy baby boy Sutton, who has completely changed my world for the better.
2. My amazingly handsome best friend, my husband Adam.
3. Our families with whom we all have a good relationship, and we live close to.
4. Our awesome group of friends who are such a great support system through all of life's hardships.
5. Our warm, inviting home that I absolutely still love over 3 years later and never want to move from.
6. My booming, successful photography business...I can't believe that I get to do what I love and that I have so much business I have to turn some away.
7. Being able to work from home is such a great thing, especially now that I'm a mom.
8. My wonderful new studio in our backyard...I think it's too cool for me. :)
9. Diesel. He's such a great dog. I guess I should throw Sadie in here too, though she's questionable at times. :)
10. Our finances can be both a blessing and a curse, but I'm grateful that we're able to pay our bills each month.
11. Our working cars, washer and dryer, dishwasher, water line, and heater...I'll try never again to take these simple luxuries for granted.
12. Jesus, without whom none of this would be possible. Without whom we wouldn't celebrate Christmas!

Life. Is. Good.

And to finish this post off with some photos, my two most favorite people in the world, playing together. It doesn't get much better. :)

High-fives! 

I'm a pretty lucky girl to get to live with the two most handsome boys on the planet! 

My new favorite photo. :)

The Hat

I mentioned a hat that Sutton LOVES to wear a few posts back. My parents gave this to me for Christmas last year, and Sutton found it in the closet and loves to wear it while he plays. The funniest thing to me is that he just goes about his business as if wearing the hat is completely normal.