Surprise Luau Birthday Brunch

This morning I hosted a surprise luau birthday brunch for Sarah Jones, a girl in our church who is heading to the mission field of Honduras in a few days.

My kitchen was transformed into a tropical paradise!






It's hard to see in the picture, but on the left side of this table there are parfaits topped with cute little paper umbrellas :)


Sarah Jones, the birthday girl! We got her good with the surprise party....she had no clue :)


The guests were all adorned with leis as they entered the door :)








We all gave Sarah a scrapbook filled with pics of our church family.


The party was SO fun...I can't wait to host another get-together at my new house! We had a blast! Happy Birthday, Sarah :)

Decorating

Our little house is beginning to take shape and look like a home :) It's so fun to decorate!

I just got this family tree thing at Bed, Bath, and Beyond. Isn't it AWESOME?! I love it!

Thanks to my good friend, Becky, for giving me this shelf! My plan is to eventually have wedding pics of both sets of parents and grandparents. Right now, the picture on the left side is my parents, and the picture to the far right is my Dad's parents. I still have to get the others (hint, hint, wink, wink to all my relatives!). And, of course, Adam and I are in the middle. I love wedding pics!

This has to be one of my favorite rooms in our house -- the stamping room! :)

Praise the Lord for our new house....it's such a blessing!

Ice Skating Date

Adam took me on an ice skating date on Monday! We had some great coupons for the rink, so we decided to take advantage of the opportunity. It was so fun to skate with my hubby! :)

Our New House!

We are SUPER excited to finally be in our new house! As promised, here are some pics of the inside. There is still a lot of work to do, but at least you can get an idea of what it looks like :)

The front door leads right into the "Piano Room"...

The piano room leads into the living room area...

A mud room off of the living room...

The kitchen!

I've got a laundry room off of the kitchen...

...as well as a back porch area.

Moving upstairs....here's the bathroom

The Master Bedroom

I love that the house has these built-in shelves! The one in our bedroom is PERFECT for all my wedding memorabilia :)

The walk-in closet in our bedroom

The 2nd bedroom -- kinda messy right now, so I didn't show too much of it :)

The 3rd bedroom (which is also my craft room!)

It also has an unfinished basement and large attic. Praise the Lord for providing us with this special house. We love it!

After-Christmas Trip

We got to visit my family a few days after Christmas. It was nice to see them again! On Thursday we all traveled down to Chicago to see the Museum of Science and Industry. They had a beautiful Christmas tree display there!



Here's the ticket line....crazy, huh?






The theme for the tree display this year was "How the Grinch Stole Christmas"


They had trees decorated for different countries. Here's the Irish tree for all my Irish friends :)


The Lebanese tree for my friend, Layla :)


...and the Pennsylvania ornament on the U.S.A. tree!


The English tree was so cute! It was decorated with pics of William and Kate's wedding.


The steam machine was awesome!


Astro-NUTS :)






I really enjoyed seeing my family again! I miss you guys already :(

Christmas Day

After church on Christmas Day we decided to take a few family pictures since everyone was together...

The Burtt family


The "Other Burtts"


The Esteps


Sarah and CJ Elwood


The photographers!






Nieces and cousins :)


John and Mary Lynn (not related by blood...but just like family! :))


David and Philip


Opening presents after church...




Go Blue :)












I made our moms handmade greeting cards this year. Here's Mom Burtt opening hers...


After opening gifts, we went over to Grandma Gardner's for dinner. Uncle Ron, Aunt Diana, Ryan, and Nick were there too!





Merry Christmas, everyone!