12 Hill Happenings of 2012

THis was a part of our Christmas card this year, but I thought it would be fun to share on the blog too.  God was
definitely good to us in 2012. Here is our list of 12 Hill happenings in 2012:

1.       We celebrated Alethea’s first birthday February 21^st, 2012 full of fun, family, and friends.
2.      Ben and Cori started and completed P90X together during the first 3 months of the year.  It was a lot of hard work, but really paid off, especially for Ben.  We both got toned, but Ben lost about 35lbs in the process and we both really enjoyed the time spent working hard together.
3.     In April, Alethea and I got to participate in a fun Guinness Book of World Records event called the Great Cloth Diaper Change.  It was an awareness event to show how awesome cloth diapers are (which we totally agree) and we had fun setting a record in the process.
4.    Ben was promoted to division director at work which means he is in charge of leading 13 or so other people and making sure they do their job correctly.  This has been a very fulfilling position for him as well as a resume booster.
5.     Ben and I celebrated 5 awesome years of marriage on May 12^th, 2012 and look forward to many more years of adventuring and raising a family together.
6.     Cori got a sewing machine for her birthday and made her first sewing project ever, hooded towels for Alethea’s baths.  She is hoping to make stockings before Christmas arrives too.
7.     Cori got to be a part of the planning process for a large outreach at church called Mission Charleston.  This was a really neat experience and really gave Cori a great outlet for ministry and ability to use her organizational talents for the Lord.
8.     We went to Disney World for the first time as a family and we took along my parents as well has Ben’s sister and his mom.  It was such a fun time and it was so exciting to see just how much an 18 month old can love Disney (as long as the characters don’t come to close, lol).
9.     As a family we have worked through a lot of stressful and busy times created by Ben’s rigorous graduate school schedule on top of a full time work schedule.  It has been a very big growing experience and we are closer as a family because of it.  Thankfully he only has one more semester left, starting in January!
10.  Ben has been going through a year long process of improving his health and jumping ability to meet his dunking goals, which has always been a dream of his.  He finally saw the first big fruits of that when he dunked with 2 hands off 2 feet in October.
11.    Alethea has grown like a weed this year.  She started the year at 30.5inches, 20lbs 9.6oz and is finishing off the year at 35.5inches, 26lbs 3.2oz!   She started out the year with only 2 teeth and now has 16!  She started out the year saying only a few words here and there and mostly making one sound to communicate and now she mimics everything we say (in her own way of course) and has a vocabulary of close to 50 words.
12.   We found out October 21^st, 2012 that we are expecting a new addition to our family.  Baby Hill 2.0 is scheduled to arrive before the end of June 2013!
God has really blessed us this year.  What an awesome God we serve!**