Family, Good Friends & A Happy New Year

The week after Christmas leading into the new year was filled with good memories in the Barr house.   As we mentioned earlier, Nana and the O'bannions were so nice to pack their bags, schlep thru airports and security and get up at the crack of dawn in order to visit us in Alexandria.  Nana tells the story that she darn near missed her flight due to the new directions that Pappy gave her on how to get to the airport.   The O'bannions planned to get to the airport early as well but this darn east coast weather made the airport process very cumbersome.   At any rate, they all made it and we had a blast!   Haddie and I were happy to get more time with Nana and also hang out with our friends for the week.  Ashlynn and I got some serious play time at the park, hanging out in our basement and running our parents crazy :-).   Liam and Haddie hung out too and I'm sure they shared secret baby plots against our parents as well...hee hee.    Here are a few snapshots of everyone during that week of fun.

Love,

Emerson and Hadley

"Nana, sing me another song please"

 "uh Nana, I hate to break it to ya but, that's not how that goes"

 "Nana, here comes the good part"

 "Yea, Nana, I tried that already and my parents didn't buy it"

 "Oh NO, they caught me!" "Abort Haddie, abort.... our top secret mission has failed"

 "Aunt Rita really, where is the snow that you promised me"

 "Thanks for bringing snacks Mommy"

"Ashlynn, check it out .... I've got balls"

 "

 "I'm ready for my closeup"

 "Aunt Rita, can you tell Emerson to stop copying me"

"It's a hard life but, somebody's got to do it"

ICE ICE Baby!

NO, not Vanilla Ice but ICE the Grinch Who Stole Christmas exhibit that was featured at the National Harbor Gaylord Resort.    The O'bannion's and The Barr's piled into two cars and headed over to Maryland for one cool adventure!   Hadley and Liam stayed at home with Nana since it was 9 degrees my friends... that's right 9 DEGREES.  It had to be that cold in order to keep the ice sculptures in tact but, it was ok since we all were given parkas to wear.  The coolest part was at the very end you get to go down a slide made out of real ice.   Daddy couldn't go with me so I had to go down by myself and wouldn't you know, I got stuck!  It's ok though because they sent in the reinforcements to help guide me down the slide and once I made it to the end, everyone cheered and clapped :)  Hooray for me!!!!   Here's is a brief description of what the ICE at the Gaylord is all about.

Love,

Emerson

What is Gaylord National’s ICE!?

At the Gaylord National Resort at National Harbor, visitors step inside a winter wonderland created entirely of 5,000 BLOCKS of ice weighing 2 MILLION POUNDS! hand-sculpted by 40 international artisans and kept at a chilling nine degrees Fahrenheit. Produced exclusively for Gaylord Hotels, the attraction is fully interactive, allowing guests to roam inside, around and on-top of holiday scenes. The amazing walk-through attraction will feature famous scenes from the Dr. Seuss classic storybook carved completely out of ice. ICE! will recreate these famous scenes, and more:

• The Grinch’s frozen lair
• Christmas Eve in Who-ville
• The Grinch creating his “ramshackle” sleigh, complete with “reindeer” Max
• Mount Crumpit – where visitors can climb to the mountaintop and zip down ice slides to Who-ville
• The Grinch stealing Christmas from the Who houses
• Christmas morning in Who-ville and the famous Roast-Beast Feast!

"WHOA, Daddy, is it all really made out of ice?

"Mommy and Aunt Meredith are silly!"

"Welcome to Who-ville everyone!"

"On your mark get ready, set, GOOOO"

"Here come the reinforcement"

"I'm stuck and I can't get up"

"Look at those smiles, even in the cold"

Oh Happy Day!

On December 29th, my sister got baptized at our church in Old Town Alexandria - St. Paul's.   Mommy's good friends college (Brad and Meredith O’Bannon) were asked to be Haddie's Godparents.  Everyone was excited to learn that they accepted and would come from Texas for a week to stay with us.   Nana also made the trip out from Texas and boy was I excited to play chase with her again.   Haddie was most excited because that meant made up songs from Nana that she'd get to hear.   In addition to the baptism, we had lots more fun but, Haddie and I will share that in a couple of more posts.  Here are some photos from Hadley's special day.

Love,
Emerson... and Haddie too :-)

 We had Chinese food to celebrate the occasion afterwards.  Mommy said that since Hadley was born in the "year of the white tiger" it seemed appropriate, plus it was yummy :-)

 We also had lots of play time afterwards with Savannah, Ainsley, Francesca, Maggie,Ashlynn, and Liam

 Aunt Meredith (Godmother), Mommy, Daddy & Hadley, Uncle Brad (Godfather) & Oran (our minister)

Mommy, Daddy, Hadley & Oran