Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas everyone! I think it is safe to say that everyone in the Donohoe household had a great Christmas! We are very fortunate to have such wonderful and generous family and friends. A lot of things felt different this year... for starters we now have Nolan! He adds so much joy to our lives. I think most people will agree that holidays are even more special when there are little kids involved (no matter how old they are)! Nolan had a great day yesterday - apparently even 3 month olds get exhausted on Christmas. It will be interesting to see how next year goes when he is a year old!

Another thing that was different about this year was that we had a white Christmas! I can't remember the last time that's happened around here. I kept looking out at the snow thinking "this is how every Christmas should be!" It just felt right.

Anyway, we hope you all had a great Christmas and enjoyed celebrating the birth of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Lazy Saturday

Nolan and I had a nice relaxing Saturday today. Nolan was dressed for a lazy day too... notice the slippers :) We started the day off hanging out and watching Christmas Vacation together. Then we did some baking while listening to Christmas songs. It was a good time. Nolan wasn't much help in the kitchen, but he was great company. Now if only I could train him to clean up the mess we made... oh well maybe we should work on walking and talking first!

This weekend we have a few Christmas parties to go to... should be fun! I'm sure we'll post more pictures soon!

1st Snow of the Season!

Last week we were fortunate enough to get some snow. For some that might not be a big deal - but we were all pretty excited around here! It is always fun to get snow in December. It makes getting ready for the holidays even better! Plus everything is more fun with kids around. Even though Nolan is not old enough to care, I was still pretty excited for him to see his first snow! We were going to go to the Christmas parade on Saturday but decided not to take Nolan out in the cold and snow. Instead we just got him dressed up and pretended we were going to go play outside (See pic below) but stayed cozy and warm inside!

More Thanksgiving Pics

I think these are mostly self explanatory...

Nolan's 1st Thanksgiving:

Donohoe family:

4 generations!

Family pic:

Thanksgiving!

This year marked our 3rd year of having Thanksgiving at our house. It is hard to believe that we have been living here for 3 years! We are lucky to have this place because it means both families - Donohoes and Massey's alike can gather for one delicious Thanksgiving meal. And a great meal it was! You can see the turkey Jack cooked in the picture... it was really good! Everyone chipped in and brought different dishes. I have to say that overall, this was probably the best food I've ever eaten on Thanksgiving. We had pretty much everything you could think of to eat - and lots of pie too! But enough about the food...

As to be expected I think Nolan stole this show this year. He may not remember any of it but I think he had a pretty great 1st Thanksgiving. Here is a glimpse of what the day looked like for him:

Taking a little morning snooze while mom & dad (Katie & Jack) cooked and cleaned:

Hanging out with Omi (Nolan's great-grandmother!)... I don't think she put him down the whole time! I'm glad they finally got to meet and spend some time together. I think they both enjoyed it.

Hanging out with Uncle Mike after dinner... this spot on the couch is Nolan's new favorite. He is only 2 and a half months old and already a regular little couch potato!

Weekend Fun

This past weekend Nolan and I got to go to Blacksburg (Jack had to stay home to work).  We got to hang out with Pat and Nina, and visit Uncle Ben at Virgina Tech:

On Sat. I got to go to the Tech game. Nina graciously offered to babysit which I think she and Nolan both enjoyed. Before the game we walked around campus, made our usual trip to the bookstore, had a tailgate party, and Nolan got to meet the Kassner's! This is what we call Hokie camo... all the maroon kind of blends in...

We made it home late Sat. night. Nolan actually slept for 10 hours in a row that night. I think he must have been worn out from all the weekend festivities. Then on Sun. Nolan got to meet the Boyd's. I think this was the beginning of a long friendship between he and Jace!

Karaoke Night

As most of you well know, Jack is a karaoke all-star. He looooves karaoke. Unfortunately for him he has not had the opportunity to do it much lately. But this past week he finally got to get back to it. Tuesday night we all went out to Hard Times cafe for karaoke night. Part of me felt like a terrible mother - I mean, who brings their 2 month old to a bar? But Hard Times has a non-smoking restaurant portion as well, so Nolan and I hung out there with some friends. Jack did a great job as usual with his singing. He did the usual Meatloaf song. Nolan got to here his dad sing in public for the first time. Lucky for him he is too young to get embarrassed yet ;) He didn't scream or anything so I will assume that he liked it!

Here are some pictures from our night out:

Random people getting into Jack's song by waiving their cell phones in the air:

Jack belting it out:

Nolan getting ready to go out to Hard Times. Notice he is wearing his camo just like any good Spotsy boy ;)

(not sure what he was doing in this picture but I thought his expression was funny)

Another picture of Nolan in his camo (with a more normal expression this time):