Snow, snow, sand, and snow. Winter 2014.

The months of January and February were very cold, slow, and relaxing. The majority of our time was spent dealing with the worst winter in years that the Mid-Atlantic and North East has had. As much as we were sick of it come the end of February, it was the perfect time to spend time together relaxing and nesting. It will be a while before the quiet is back..

Our first New Years Day not in Nashville for quite some time---I'd say it was a day well spent. 

Case turned 1 month old

We made a trip to Lewisburg, PA to see my cousins and Uncle. We used to go years without seeing them but now that we are only 3 hours away we hope it's a more common occurrence. 

Getting some rest to stay up late and cheer for the AU Tigers in the National Championship game---not the outcome we wanted, but definitely a season I'll never forget. 

Definitely  not the biggest snow we got, but one of the several...

Old Man Winter

Not quite the same hammock days we used to spend in California...

Whit got the crib together in about 30 minutes and the bedding came the next day


Got out of the house for some fun at a local winery---the only picture from the day :(

 Thanks to my brothers sweet girlfriend, Anne, we got an amazing 3D image of our sweet little one at 27 weeks during our quick trip to TN in February. It was so surreal to see this much definition of his or her face. Part of me thinks this looks like a girl but then I also see some of my nephew Charlie in this picture.

 Also, while we were home my dad took Whit and I to see some of his properties around Nashville. This one here was a plot of land and he developed each of them to have streets named after all of the Holder children. This was my Court!

Uncle Whit loving on Case in his Big Cousin outfit we got him

 Finally starting to show---28 weeks.

 And another snow! This 13 incher was probably the biggest one we got and poor Whit had to dig us a walk way to get out of the house.

 Taking a break to "eat" the snow---no idea what he was doing!

After all of that snow, it was a MUCH MUCH needed time away in the sun. Whit works very hard at what he does and for the 2013 year was able to hit his sales quota. All McCormick employees who hit the quota for the year are treated to a trip somewhere. This year happened to be in Naples, FL. We definitely took advantage of the time and decided to make it a baby moon too. It couldn't have been more perfect with 85 degree weather, constant sunshine, and 5 days in a Ritz Carlton. (WOW, those places know how to do it.)

 Pool side on Day 1

 Our frequent lunch spot right on the ocean

Doing what we love

Baby Dulin is a big fan just like Mom and Dad---hopefully beach trips will be a frequent thing for us.

And a small warning for you, the picture below is about as cheesy as they get. But I couldn't help but share it. One of my most favorite things about this pregnancy has been how much time Whit spends trying to feel the baby. Any chance he gets he is right there with his hands on the belly. And the best part is after 1,000 times of feeling it move he still makes a surprised face and laughs each time. This time below he just happened to fall asleep while waiting which allowed me to sneak a picture. 

The Most Wonderful Time of Year

December is a hard month to beat---something about the Holidays that just makes all things enjoyable (for the most part!). We were lucky enough to be back home for several days in December and per usual had a packed schedule. 

Since Thanksgiving was so late, technically the first day of December was still the Thanksgiving holiday for us. We kicked off December with a baby shower honoring Hilary and Baby Case. It was held at Scarritt-Bennett and Hilary had so many people show up to shower her with love.

Hilary with her hostesses

Whit and I at the McCormick Christmas party which also served as the 125th anniversary celebration for the company. It was quite the celebration too---over 3,000 people there and the live entertainment was Earth, Wind, and Fire. 

We knew moving the East Coast would be a change of scenery for us, and definitely a change of the perfect weather that we had gotten used to in Northern California. But little did we know, we would have the winter that we had. Never seen so much snow in my life---but it sure proved for some fun snow days and unexpected days at home and off work :)

Our first of MANY snow days together 

Usually I am the one who likes to play in the snow, but since I was baking our bun in the oven it was a little hard for me to roll around in the snow. Whit took that role for us and I think did a marvelous job.  

It definitely didn't stop him from pelting snow balls at me...

Our first toy/gift for Baby Dulin from Pop (my dad)---for some reason I had always had a vision of putting this large giraffe in a nursery. 

Christmas brunch at the Foust house with some of our Baltimore friends

You never really know what goes through kids minds---and when I told the Dalton kids they had a little cousin on the way I was hoping they would be excited for this addition. A couple weeks later my sister shared this with me that Charlie had done in his Sunday School class. One of my favorite things since being pregnant was getting this. 

We had heard about Miracle on 34th Street in this area of Baltimore called Hamden so we decided to have our own little Christmas celebration together before heading home to TN. This is just one of the houses on the block, but they ALL look like this. 

The lights were so bright on the street and the streets were packed with so many people

Then we capped off the night at home with our little Henley and opened our stockings to each other.

Since May we had anxiously awaited the arrival of our newest nephew, Case. And he must have known we were coming because he decided to come into this world the day before we flew home for the holidays. Hilary had an extremely fast and wonderful delivery and sweet Case was born on December 19, 2013. The picture to the left shows a hat my mom had made for him and we were all hoping he'd get here before Christmas to use the Christmas hat. Welcome to the world, Case Blake Robinson. 

We couldn't wait to get to the hospital when we landed and thankfully the new mom and dad were fine with us coming so late. Here we are meeting Case for the first time. What a precious baby!

We spent the rest of the holidays with our families, and of course I didn't capture much of it , but at least a few to remember Christmas 2013. 

Mia loves her Pop

The Holder siblings and our significant others at Mangia---super fun night and the most active dinner experience I've ever had. Thankfully you dance for 1 hour in between courses to make room for more food. Just missed Lauren and Mike being there with us. 

Christmas Eve spent loving on some of my favorite kiddos---just missing a few of them in this photo. 

Loving on another favorite kiddo---the newest one, Case!

The inseparable duo---I'm not jealous at all (yeah right). 

The Dulins Christmas 2013
It wasn't quite the same this year at the Camden family lakehouse without the Robinsons, but thankfully we were still able to make it there to see the rest of the Whitworth family. 

Tom and Carey with the newest member of their family, Charles

The last Christmas just the two of us---I have a feeling our Holidays are about to get a lot more special. 

One year and counting...and the big reveal!

Seeing the lack of pictures we have from November 2013 shows how my attention to trying to document our life had drastically taken a back seat...but I at least got the important parts :)

My favorite day of the year, November 3rd. Hard to believe it was only our 1 year anniversary---especially after all the years of Whit in my life. It was funny for us to think back at what we "thought" we would be doing on our 1 year anniversary. Everything from a trip to Napa where we got engaged to a trip up the East Coast to see Fall season in the Cape that we had heard so much about. And as much as we didn't plan or expect to have a child on the way at our 1 year anniversary, we wouldn't have had it any other way. We got to enjoy a nice dinner at a restaurant we had been dying to try (that I actually could eat that night!) and of course as he always does, I was spoiled. 

We got another glimpse of the little one at 12 weeks during some genetic testing---crazy how much it had actually formed into something "baby-like" in just the 4 weeks it had been since we got our first look. We were really getting anxious to tell our family and friends now. 

My mythical baby bump at 14 weeks that I thought I was getting...probably more me pushing my stomach out at this point trying to have a bump :) 

It was finally time to tell our family and friends! We had waited until we had a trip planned home where we could tell everyone in our own special way and near the same time as everyone else. We were headed to TN for the "House Divided" game of AU and UT and thought we'd also make it a reveal weekend with our loved ones. 

It started with our flight arriving late Thursday night and Whit's parents, Susan and David, doing their normal pick up for us. We decided to do it first thing so I had gotten a shirt that said "Due in May" and wore on the plane home. What made it even better is they didn't even notice it at first. David, being the sweet man he is, made a comment that he thought I had lost weight. Well of course that prompted me to say "Yeah Right" and point to my shirt. At that point Susan got it and just kept saying "Really? Are you serious?" and then David caught on shortly thereafter. I think we really surprised them and it was a wonderful shock to them to have another grandbaby on the way.  

Next up, we offered to take the Dalton kids to school Friday morning at 7am since Mary-Evelyn and Jay were flying to NYC that morning also. We had a shirt made for Mia that said "My Aunt has a Cousin in the Oven" that she wore to breakfast that morning with the family. It was obvious it was an early morning before school because the kids were very slow to notice and even when they did it took them awhile to figure out what it meant. But we did get some excitement out of them (especially for a 7am on a Friday).

Mia proudly wearing her reveal shirt

Since we were already dropping the kids off at FRA, we thought it was the perfect time to also tell my mom, Gaga, that she was about to have a 7th grandchild on the way. And to my surprise she was WAY more shocked than I thought she would be. When Mia took her jacket off and had that shirt on (and she read it 2-3 times) she was in disbelief. I think maybe more so that I had waited 14 weeks to tell her. But I couldn't imagine not seeing her face or feeling her hug when I told her the news. It was worth the wait!

Gaga and Mia after learning about Baby Dulin 

Sadly, I don't have any photos of the rest of the reveals---(back to I was horrible at documenting things then). But they just kept getting better and better. We left FRA to head to tell my dad---I think we took him by such surprise he was literally speechless. So much so he called me about 8 hours later to say sorry and how excited it was but that he didn't even know what to say. That Friday night we invited some friends to have dinner with us and since we hadn't been in town for a while it was an easy way to say let's get together. SO---Jenny, Angie, Rob and his gf Mary joined us at Whiskey Kitchen. We had planned ahead and had a fun way to tell them. Whit went to the bathroom and secretly ordered 5 glasses of champagne to be brought to our table but to tell them it was anonymous. No one could figure out who had sent them, and since Houston and Grant couldn't join us they thought maybe one of them had. When we were one glass short of champagne of course someone offered theirs to me, Whit piped in "But you can't drink when you're 3 months pregnant, right?" Of course they all got it at that point and were not only so shocked but VERY happy and excited. I don't think Angie spoke for a good 20 minutes and again couldn't believe I had been able to keep it a secret that long. It was definitely a night to remember for us and so special to share the news with them in person. 

We got to meet up with the Martindale family in Knoxville tailgating for the game to share the news with them too!

 And we still had more people to tell when we got back early Sunday morning from Knoxville. Anne had offered to do a 3D ultrasound for Hilary and Cody to see Case so we stopped by Anne and Wesley's to get Anne and tell them. Wesley was now going to be an uncle of 7 and he was as excited as he gets or shows :). Anne was shocked too and couldn't wait to get me on her ultrasound table to take a look. We had planned on the car ride to meet Hilary, Cody, David, and Susan how we were going to tell Hilary and Cody. Hilary hopped on the table right when we got there and we all got to see adorable Case and how much he already looked like his dad in the 3D images. As soon as she was finished Anne said "Okay, Carla your turn" and motioned for me to get on the table. Hilary clearly thought she was kidding and just giggled and said "Ha, yeah". Anne noticing that she didn't get it, said it again in a more serious tone with a "I'm not kidding, come on Carla" to which Hilary started to get and said "Are you serious?!". She now got it and we had some tears and excitement over how close the cousins were going to be in age. I hopped up there and they all got their first glimpse of Baby Dulin. Anne got some great pictures of the baby and we decided since JenJen and Granddaddy were coming in that day for lunch we'd use them to tell them also. When JenJen and Granddaddy got to David and Susan's, Hilary and Cody quickly showed them the 3D images of Case and how big he was and looked like Cody. Whit came in behind to look and then said "Now what do you think about this one?" while showing them Baby Dulin. As with the other reveals it took a little bit for them to catch on to what we were saying but followed by much excitement and shock. Whit says that part was his favorite reveal. Not many people get to share that news in person with their own grandparents and I think it was more than special to him. Our weekend of "in person" reveals was over and we had lots of phone calls to start making. A weekend and time we will always remember.

Back home in Baltimore we picked up some nights of babysitting for the Foust family and someone wasn't too thrilled about the idea of learning to change a diaper on a 1.5 year old. 

And to top off a wonderful November we got to go back home for Thanksgiving at the end of the month to share our gratitude and love with all of those around us. We were extra thankful this year for our new blessing on the way.