The last few weeks in pictures...

Well, the past few weeks have been a whirlwind of traveling, holidays, and getting readjusted to life in St. Louis.  I figured I would catch y'all up on all the random shenanigans!

It really is a small world ya'll!  When I was in the airport in St. Louis getting ready to fly to Jackson for Christmas I happened to be there at the same time as my Mom's best friend Janet.  She was traveling from DC to Vegas and had a layover in St. Louis.   Now Janet and I go waaaayy back and she was basically my second mommy when I was little.  When I was 7 years old her son Erich was my best friend.  They lived just down from us in base housing when we lived in Honolulu, HI.  In the mornings when my mom had to leave for work early she would take me (still half asleep) and put me on Janet's couch until it was time to go to school.  Then I would get up and eat breakfast with Janet's family and we would all go to the bus stop.  Such good memories.  Well we took advantage of the being in the same place at the same time and sat at Chili's in the airport and caught up on life!!

Saying goodbye before we got on our planes.

When I finally arrived in Jackson my flight was late and my parents were waiting for me.  We were in the baggage claim and who did we run into....Dr. Gore, one of my dad's very favorite teaching physicians from when we was in residency in Honolulu.  They haven't seen each other in about 20 years so that was quite the reunion.  It really is a small world!

Christmas at my parents house was very laid back. Honestly I didn't take a lot of pictures and just enjoyed spending time lounging around, eating good food, and getting adjusted to the time change.

My mom's tree with all the presents

This pic below was is a good example of how the Shparago's spend holidays....napping on the couch!  I guess EJ needed some beauty rest.

Lola needed her beauty rest too!

My mom on the other hand has all the energy in the world and was so excited to have all her kids home! 

After Christmas with my family we headed to North to Pontotoc, MS to spend time with Chad's family.  David (Chad's brother) and Marcia's (his wife) lab, Buttercup, just had puppies so we spent some time snuggling on them.  Don't you just love the smell of puppy breath?

Chad's family always has a big group gathering sometime around Christmas with all the cousins, aunts, uncles, grand-kids, etc.  We eat pizza and snacks and play games.  Usually we do a dirty Santa but this year they decided to play Minute-to-Win-it....now I was unfamiliar with this game, but basically you have a minute to do all these tasks and the team that does the most wins.  We had a great time laughing and visiting with everyone!

Kaitlyn and Chad

Mattie Grace

Ella the red nosed reindeer!

Ella, Granny, Mattie and Marcia

Minute-to-Win-it stacking cups

Ella moving cotton balls with Vaseline on her nose

Marcia and Gina eating sour balls

Chad and Mattie catching ping pong balls

Cathy and Reggie throwing ping pong balls

I forgot to mention my unexpected Christmas gift....my 2002 Explorer finally decided it was time to go to car heaven so I got a brand new Explorer.  I absolutely L.O.V.E it!  We drove it back to St. Louis the Monday after Christmas and we were welcomed home by snow.

My new car ; )

Lola is a great car rider and enjoyed her spot in the back seat.  I got this sling thing that kept dog hair and bulldog drool off my new seats and she spent half the ride with her head rested on it.

Lola riding home

Of course as soon as we got home I got sick and have been battling a cough since then.  The new mugs my Mom gave us for Christmas got plenty of use since I was drinking so much hot tea!

The night before I went back to work we had some friends over for dinner and I made homemade bread and  braised short ribs.  They were soooo yummy!  I served them over cheese grits with a salad and roasted butternut squash.  It was the perfect cozy, winter meal!

The next morning I headed to my home away from home, Cardinal Glennon Children's Medical Center!  It was great to be back and see friends and kiddos that I have been taking care of for the past two and a half years.  I guess one perk of being at work at 6am is getting to watch the sunrise from the hospital windows : )

The hospital puts out a monthly t-shirt that they sell in the gift shop.  While I was in Ireland someone turned a few of them into a quilt which is now hanging in the NICU....I think this is such a cute idea!  Now I just need to find someone who knows how to quilt to make me one from all of my t-shirts!  So all you quilters out there send me a message if you take special orders!

That pretty much gets y'all up to speed!  Now it's just work, eat, sleep, repeat : )