surprise!!

poppa (jason's dad) turned 65 yesterday, sept. 6th... in honor of him, teenie (jason's mom), spoiled him like crazy!! a surprise party with a bunch of friends and family at pappasitos~ a wonderful mexican restaurant in atlanta... and then, in addition to that, we all surprised poppa this past weekend at a cabin in pigeon forge! he told jason that it was his best birthday ever!

we played games, watched movies, went in the hot tub and one of the highlights was the horse-back riding on saturday. some of us were more scared than others (please no one point their finger at me too quickly : )... the whole time we were on the trail the guide would yell "tina (my horse) get a move on, stop eating" to say she was slow, is the understatement of the year, yet that fit me just fine~ considering i was contemplating jumping off of her and walking back to the stables : ) our sweet baby girl was the complete opposite of her mama~ so relaxed on henry, the horse, with her daddy that she was asleep within minutes. ha! check out the pics.

thanks teenie for a wonderful weekend away!! poppa~ we love you & are glad you felt so celebrated!!

aunt staci & bella

daddy with our sweet, sleepy girl

so tired.....

me on tina~ doing what she did best~ eating!!

uncle johnny & aunt lizzie

driving the big tractor

twins!! not really, but that is what everyone thinks : )

christian hanging out

the guys

the gals

sweet cousins modeling their hats

could she be any cuter?!?!

poppa & teenie

red bull soap box race

this past saturday we went to the race at piedmont park. we had a great time. one of our neighbors works for red bull so we got to visit with her and saw some other people we knew there. they handed out cans of red bull, pink beaded necklaces, paper fans, etc. bella loved holding everything. we visited the pits, which were fun to see, then had hotdogs and funnel cake and watched a little bit of the race. the race itself didn't start until 1pm which is bella's nap time so we only watched about 2 races and then headed for the car to eliminate melt-down : )

happy birthday uncle david!!

one of the most wonderful parts of having marni & pepere here is being able to celebrate holidays, birthdays, etc. and simply "do life together"... right before uncle david left for NYC for his first year of law school at NYU, we celebrated his birthday. bella had a blast helping blow out the birthday candles! the funny part was that nanni had brought these candles with her from her kitchen in AZ and they were trick candles that took FOREVER to blow out : )

baby stella anastasia

our good friends louie & kathy, along with their 2 sons, george & stavros, just welcomed this little girl into their family. she is beautiful and all 3 of us, especially bella, enjoyed visiting them at the hospital.

beautiful bella

the proud papa

sweet stella anastasia

bella hanging out in the hospital bed

bella wanting to reach for stella's bottle