The Grady Family: January 2010

Tuesday, January 5, 2010

Cedar Breaks

You are all getting too spoiled with all of these posts!

These pictures are from 9-12-09

When Kevin and I were enjoying our wonderful month long vacation in Cedar City this fall, we took a drive up the canyon to check out Cedar Breaks Monument, and it was so breathtaking!

On the drive up the mountain canyon

Overlooking the Breaks

It was another beautiful day in southern Utah!

Monday, January 4, 2010

Thanksgiving

This post is obviously late...oh well...

With so many things going on this fall, Kevin and I thought it would be best to not add a flight home for Thanksgiving, and opted instead for a last minute drive to Florida to spend the holiday with my military brother, Steve, and his adorable wife, Tracy, and our only (for now) nephew, Cody.

It was a lot of fun to see Steve's place for the first time (just a 5 minute walk from the beach!) and to have some much needed hang out time.

Steve and Kevin enjoyed playing video games...

and Cody just wanted to be one of the boys!

(notice how focused Kevin and Steve are - they were working very hard to beat something or other....)

Cody just bonding with Kevin

Christmas picture time!

(I have to admit, I was really proud of how cute these turned out...to my photographer friends, please don't judge me!

Not the most flattering picture...oh well

In Destin, just 20 or so minutes away, there is a really cool restaurant called McGuire's. It is a cool Irish pub that has not only good atmosphere, but awesome food as well.

Their "shtik" is for people to leave a dollar decorated with whatever the person wants and then the dollar is stapled on the ceiling and around the restaurant.

Supposedly, there are over 600,000 dollars bills around the restaurant...so we decided to add our own! (Can you pick ours out?)

It was a really great trip - thanks for having us, Steve and Tracy!

Sunday, January 3, 2010

2009 - A Big Year For Kevin

This has been a really big year for Kevin. I am just so proud of him and all he has accomplished and I wanted to post a few "highlight" pictures.

Kevin competed in New York for a Moot Court Competition

He trained for and finished his first half marathon.
Last Day of Law School

Law School graduation

First day of studying for the Bar
First day of work

Swearing In (this is the LAST step to becoming a lawyer!

Signing on our first house!

It's been a great year for you! I am so proud of all you've done!

Our First Christmas...at Home!!

Wow! What a crazy month! Christmas has come and gone and I know that if I don't get some pictures of our house on this blog, somebody (you know who you are!) will have my head! So, here they are!

We were lucky enough to spend our first Christmas in our home with family. Kevin's parents and little brother Brian (who just came home from his mission in the Philippines this November) flew out to spend almost 2 weeks with us and we had a great time!

It was so helpful to have my mother-in-law in the house to help pull everything together to make it a special Christmas! We make a mean team in the kitchen and everything was wonderful.

Something that was really special was the fact that for the first time in over fifty years, Dallas had snow on Christmas Eve...that's right...we had a white Christmas! How cool is that?

Here is the house on Christmas Eve

Our Christmas tree...looking small in our empty dining room

The stockings were hung by the chimney with care, in hopes that St. Nickolas soon would be there!

It kept snowing all night!

That night, Kevin and I put out the strings for Artis, Lionel, and Brian...they went upstairs, downstairs, and even out in the snow (which was more of a punishment for Kevin and I!). Kevin's dad, Lionel, said it was his first time having a string just for him!

(Kevin's family tradition is for "Santa" to have a string that leads from the person's stocking to a special present hidden somewhere in the house...it is a lot of fun and really builds the excitement of Christmas morning)