A year in photo's...

2011 has been a pretty awesome year, and instead of typing all about the most awesome things that happened, I decided to just show you a picture from each month.

Enjoy

January:

After Cuinn's busy time of Christmas in '10, we decided to take a weekend to ourselves. We dubbed it, "Our last ever vacation as non-parents." We just went down to Niagara for the weekend, but it was so amazing. So relaxing. So romantic. We're thinking of making it a yearly tradition to do a weekend together every January.

February:

Aislynn was due to join our family on February 28th, so my work girl friends threw me my baby shower early in February. There were a lot of people and we got very spoiled. I couldn't believe how generous people were.

March :

March 9, 2011 at 11:42 pm, Aislynn Ryder Simpson was delivered by Dr. Le. Cuinn and I became parents and our lives have been forever changed. I had no idea how much love my heart could hold for a person so tiny. March was definitely the best month of this year. My parents also came in March, and we were so fortunate to be able to have them dedicate Aislynn in our church! Our church doesn't do child baptism, they do something called a dedication. Basically it's a ceremony saying that Cuinn and I are choosing to give Aislynn back to God and that we are going to raise her in a Christ filled home. It is such a blessing to have my parents able to perform this ceremony for us. They married us, and now they have dedicated our child. Their first grandbaby!

April:

Cuinn's mom meeting Aislynn for the first time.

I turned 24 on April 30th, this year! Unfortunately, on my birthday we were moving. So it was full of sweating, packing, driving and loading/unloading. My brother and his girlfriend and my friend and her boyfriend all helped with the move, thankfully. It could have been a lot more stressful what with a little tiny baby, but they helped us out so much. Cuinn's mom also came in April. She did much more than her fair share of packing for us when she came. I don't think our move would have happened so smoothly if it wasn't for all the help that we had. Cuinn then surprised me with a small lunch party with a few of my friends the next weekend for my birthday. So it wasn't technically in April, but since it was my fake birthday, we're gonna add it in for April.

May:

In May we celebrated our 2 year anniversary. We were settling into our new home with our new baby. We didn't know ANYBODY here, so we got all dolled up, took our baby and went out for a fancy dinner. With Aislynn. I thought it was kind of fitting though. We were celebrating our life together as a family, and Aislynn is such a big part of our little family. It was nice to celebrate all together.

June:

In June, Cuinn's brother A and his girlfriend L came to meet Aislynn. They live far, far away in a land called British Columbia, which is still in the same country, but feels like it's worlds away. We had such a great visit with them, and it was awesome to get to know L a little better since we don't know her THAT well. Considering that she lives a million miles away. Aislynn fell in love with L and every time she would hold her Aislynn would fall right asleep. It was a new mother's dream having L here. A loved playing with his new neice. I have never seen A as gentle and loving as he was with Aislynn. It's true that babies bring out the softest side of men. (I hope I didn't embarrass A. And if I did, well, too bad, he's my brother in law, I'm allowed. Ha ha!)

July:

July was Canada Day. One of my favorite holidays. I am the most patriotic Canadian you will ever meet. I love my country and I am so proud to be Canadian. I live in a fantastic country where I am free to be who I want and not have to hide anything. I was so excited to share this day with my new babe. She loved the fireworks. All the colors and shapes. They didn't scare her in the least either, which was a huge plus! 

August:

August was Cuinn's birthday as well as our tiny towns annual festival. Which literally brings in thousands of people. Which is a huge deal, considering our tiny town's population pretty much doubled when Cuinn, Aislynn and I moved here. It was also the first time I got to go out without Aislynn. I went out with my sister in law to the town's dance that was happening during the festival. We had a few too many and I was out of commission for the next day. I kinda found out that weekend that my partying like a rock star days are over, and it's odd, but I didn't feel any kind of sadness about that. I think I was just relieved. Although I did have a rockin' time with Amanda. 

September:

In September, Cuinn went away to his yearly conference. I really missed him and his help. The good thing about him leaving? He went away and came back a winner of the 2011 All Star award for his company. I was so proud of him. He has worked tirelessly for his company and it is so awesome that he was noticed for all of that hard work. 

October:

This was the month that we subjected our child to the same awful traditions that millions of moms around the world subject their children to every year. We put her in an embarrassing costume and took pictures of her.

But doesn't she make the cutest little chicken ever?

November:

This was the start of Cuinn's busy season at work. So I became a retail widow. It's what a few of us retail wives call ourselves from October until January. I have to say, I'm so glad we moved to the sticks, because it has been no where NEAR how busy it was when we lived in the city. My hubs actually made it home for dinner! Seriously, this Christmas has kind of cemented in our minds how good of a move this was for our family. We also had our first snow fall, so we bundled up Aislynn and brought her out to see the snow. It didn't matter that it all melted that night. We also went to the Christmas parade. It was so much smaller than the annual festival parade, but it was still awesome. Cuinn had to help put out a fire on one of the floats though. He's my hero.

December:

Cuinn's dad meeting Aislynn for the first time 

Of course December was filled with family, fun and food. Cuinn's parents came and Cuinn's dad got to meet Aislynn for the first time. We enjoyed Aislynn's first Christmas.

So much happiness in 2011, there were a lot of rough times too, but Cuinn and I have come through it all, still in love and still so happy with what we have. We are looking forward to the joys and challenges of 2012.

2011 has been a pretty awesome year. How was yours?