-Shirin
We have been living in our rental home on Knickerbocker Dr this whole time. However, we just bought a house in Matthews and plan to move at the end of March 2016, in a couple of weeks. Our rental home will be filled with good memories.
The boys have been going to Charlotte Prep over the last two years. Here's Cyrus last year with his first grade class and teachers, Mrs Dillashaw and Mrs Pater.
Tita also got married in late 2014. Here is a picture from her bachelorette party. The three girls who aren't me, Saskia, and Lisa are her sister-in-laws (Karen, Samantha, and Estee). I love them.
We really enjoyed our trip and stay on Sullivan's Island for her wedding. It wasn't too cold, even for November, and we all stayed together in a nice beach house.
My precious guys on the beach, Nov 2014
Before the wedding, we worked on our hair and made flower bouquets.
Getting our nails done before the wedding.
My handsome boys in their suits. They both held the rings for the bride and groom.
Daniel and Tita's wedding
We still play a ton of board games with the boys. They are getting quite good.
We still have three furry babies, Satin, Earl, and Atticus, who still crawl all over everything. And, Kai has blossomed into quite the artist.
Their first season of soccer in Charlotte in 2014 was with Charlotte-Mecklenburg city soccer. Since then, they've played YMCA soccer with their school teams.
Thanksgiving, 2014 was quite a bounty, as Gabriel is demonstrating. It's been great having Daniel join our family for all our holidays. Thanks for marrying him, Tita! :)
At the fire pit at my parents' house.
Family is the best.
A pilgrim for a Thanksgiving play.
Kai's pre-K class sang us songs for Thanksgiving, 2014
All of Pappap's and Grandma's grandsons together at Thanksgiving in FL, 2014. Loved seeing Cruz.
Gene with his boys.
Brendan and his serious girlfriend, Meredith at our campsite for Thanksgiving.
Silly cousins.
Playing Mario brothers.
Connect Four tournaments are really fun!
I did my annual continuing education in San Diego, Dec 2014. Since I had a free hotel room, I was able to get Tita and Lisa to tag along. It was SO fun for all us gals to have some time together in a beautiful place (when I wasn't in class).
We spent a lot of time in a hot tub, meeting nice guys (who didn't hit on us or were gay!) :)
Going out on the town, San Diego, Dec 2014
My sweethearts at home. You can see our Christmas tree in the reflection of the window (Dec 2014)
In first grade, Cyrus started to have homework. To get Kai ready for that practice as well, we always sat him down with workbooks while Cyrus did his work. He was SO good about it and is now to this day great with homework. :) So cute.
We enrolled Cyrus in the YMCA basketball league. He didn't love it but got WAY better over the season.
Basketball player, 2014
Somebody sneaking candy from the gingerbread house, Dec 2014
Since we travel every Christmas to FL, we usually try to do our own small family Christmas celebration early. This is Christmas in Charlotte (early), Dec 2014
Christmas 2014
We also did Christmas early at my parent's house with Daniel and Tita. Here are some pics from that weekend:
In Dec 2014, the boys took their first flight to FL and had a ton of fun doing it!
At Pappap's and Grandmas!
FL is hot, even in December!
Bren and his dog, Luna.
In 2014, the boys stayed an extra week in FL with Pap and Grandma. Then, Gene flew back with them. They had a lot of fun.
If cats could get married, I think Atticus and Satin would put a ring on it. They are total lover boys. :)
Shortly after moving in, we got the boys bunk beds. Cyrus is usually on top, but it's a double, so every now and then, they sleep together. This must be from Jan, 2015, because they are wearing the PJs they got from Grandma/Pap at Christmas.
We had a couple of weeks of really cold weather (below 10s to teens!)
The board games continue. This is one of Kai's favorites: Wrath of Ashardalon.
David is only 30 minutes away now, so he gets to come hang out a lot more than before and the kids LOVE him!
The boys did a season of gymnastics at the YMCA in the Spring of 2015. They were great, but since it's almost all girls doing it, I just didn't bother to reenroll them. It's really expensive too.
For a while, my dad came up and picked up the boys every Friday. Then, when Cyrus started soccer practice on Saturdays, Kai and Baba got some alone time. It was so nice to see Kai getting so much attention.
Cyrus really solidified his love of reading. Stink is one of his favorite books.
Despite working full-time and traveling a fair amount for my job, I still cook a lot of healthy stuff for my family. This was one of my crazier hauls from the grocery store. Somehow we ate it all.
The boys making beet chips.
We've been lucky that my parents are willing to come up to Charlotte most weekends to play games and have lunch with us, if we are all in town and not too busy. Ignore my dad's unwillingness to smile in this pic. He's glowing inside.
I think this was Jan, 2015 when I went to DC for my work trip. I got to see my college BFF, Sarah VanWye. She was working at a court right across from the White House. Now she's teaching legal writing at Howard.
We also met up with my other college bestie, Saskia. She was pregnant and couldn't drink, but we all met for drinks and dinner and talked for hours. Good friends are priceless.
In February 2015, it snowed in Charlotte while I was on a business trip. Luckily, it was still on the ground so I got to enjoy it at least a little, with the bubsies.
We have a creek nearby our rental home on Knickerbocker that we often walk to so the boys can play in it. This was in March, 2015.
There's an awesome Children's Theater in Charlotte. We went to an awesome Hungry Caterpillar puppet show there in spring 2015.
In Spring 2015, I took a week off with the boys for Spring Break just to do mom things with them. Being a working mom has always weighed on me and my feeling that I'm missing a lot of their childhood. This was our trip to the Columbia zoo. We had a lot of fun.
Ides of March in FL, 2015
The boys LOVE playing with their cousin, Morgan.
