What a difference a year makes!

One of my aunts from Texas gave me and J The Family Christmas Book shortly after our official first Christmas together in 2003. It's got space to record 25 years of Christmases, and I've been filling it in every year. When we pull out our Christmas decorations, I enjoy flipping through the book and reading entries from previous years.

Up until R was born, most of the flipping through didn't look too different. I mean, from one year to the next, J and I didn't change that much, and the pictures reflect more the changes in scenery--we've always spent Christmas at someone else's house, whether it was my parents' house, J's parents' house, or my brother and sister-in-law's home.

But now, we're seeing real dramatic change from one year to the next. Check out these pictures of R from last Christmas versus R this year-- holy cow.

What a difference a year makes, when you're talking about going from 6 months to 18 months.

THEN:

NOW: