Mister W loves his little brother. Whenever sweet little man is set down he is never alone for long because one or both of his siblings are on him like glue. This day it was mister W.
You gotta watch big brothers though. You never know what might happen!
Miss L LOVES school. In fact, that might be a huge understatement. She loves her friends. She loves her teachers and she loves when she gets a special job. Her class has a "pet" that they get to take turns bringing home. We had our turn in early December. Miss L was beyond excited to have him and even though we lost him for a day, it was very fun.
In late November we broke down and purchased an ipad. They've been out for a while and even though Brad loves his gadgets we just hadn't gotten there yet. After hearing so many great things and reading so much about how great they can be for kids with sensory issues (particularly visual and auditory processing difficulties) we went ahead and took the plunge.
It's been fantastic. Miss L loves doing puzzles and playing "games." There is so much to do and I'm so impressed at how she does all of it without much help. Her favorites right now are Handy Manny "Find It" where she has to find a certain tool from a competing background (perfect for that visual practice!), a simple dot to dot game and Dora's rhyming game. Even mister W loves it and has a few games that he is able to play.
They continue to be two peas in a pod. They do pretty much everything together and are wonderful playmates (most of the time). This day they were sitting on the bottom stair and miss L was playing a game on the ipad while mister W was pretending to play her leapster (possibly the most awesome hand me down we've ever gotten! I love that thing for doctor's visits especially!) next to her. I had to snap a few photos because they were just so sweet.
During all this excitement sweet little man was taking a bit of a rest.
...and Daddy was working from home. We love the new job!
It's just amazing to think about where we were last year at this time to where we are this year! Last year mister W was just learning to crawl! He was still sleeping in our bed at night and nursing often through the night. We were just starting the process of learning about sensory processing disorder and trying to get to the bottom of miss L's speech difficulties. This year she's been discharged from OT and speech! (not to mention the fact that we were surprised by my pregnancy with sweet little man and now he's the one sleeping with us!) WOW! It makes my head spin to think of all of that!
So this Christmas has been so special for lots of reasons. Miss L is really starting to understand the entire Christmas story and why it's so important for us. She not only knows the characters but what their roles are. She enjoys hearing the story of Jesus birth and talking about it and this makes my heart smile since that's something we are really trying to emphasize in our family traditions. It's just magical to hear her talk about it.
It's also just infectious to see how excited she and mister W are about the whole thing. Last year miss L loved Christmas lights and displays and this year she and mister W sometimes wake up in the morning asking to go see lights. This has made it even more fun when I come across something for the kids to do to just get the things together and do it. They just get so excited! I have wonderful memories of childhood Christmases, but I have to say that being a parent of small children at Christmastime is way better even than being a child at Christmas.
This year I came across an idea to make salt dough ornaments with handprints on them. I took the kids handprints last Christmas and they are so precious to me. I knew I wanted to do something to take them again this year and salt dough seemed like the perfect thing! The kids helped me make the dough and I decided to try and tint it red (which didn't work as well as I'd have liked it to). While I was baking the ornaments the kids played with the extra salt dough (perfect for mister W since he's a play dough eater and this tasted so terrible that he didn't taste too much of it). I left the room for just a moment and came back to this:
Mister W had gotten the food coloring off of the kitchen counter and not only emptied it onto his salt dough but also tasted it as well. He is so easy going that I sometimes forget that I can't leave him alone for a second! Luckily, the food coloring came off fairly easily during the mid-day bath that immediately followed.
I never did take a photo of the finished ornaments. I'll have to do that. Even sweet little man's handprint turned out great and I think we've found a new tradition!
We've been busy clearing out the front yard of all brush, leaf litter, etc. We don't want any place for mice and their ticks to live and thrive. We plan to spray in the spring (which we had so hoped to avoid) but we don't want any critters to feel invited in the meantime. Brad has been working so hard on the yard so we've been celebrating with hot chocolate and spiced cider when he comes in. I'm pretty sure that the kids like this as much as he does!
When Brad and I first moved out of our first apartment and we were really out by ourselves we purchased an artificial Christmas tree. We picked the biggest most beautiful tree at the store and it has been way too big for every place we've lived (with the exception of one!). This year we planned to purchase live tree for the first time, but since the winter has been mild so far and we are particularly worried about bringing ticks and other buggy things into the house we decided just not to chance it. We decided to purchase another artificial tree. This time we got a pre-lit extra slim tree and it is AWESOME!
The tree comes in three pieces. It couldn't be easier to set up!
The kids enjoyed decorating the tree.
After that amazing weekend full of salt dough ornaments, tree purchasing, light hanging and shopping, Monday came as a shock to everyone. Mister W was sad to see daddy pull away in his car to go to work. :o)
...but it has to be done! Sweet little man continues to grow and develop. I know that I'm paranoid about things but Lyme does cause developmental problems and delays. With treatment it's unlikely that he'll have problems, but it is possible. I know that there is no way to predict the future and that we'll just have to deal with any situation that arises in the future (just as with anything else!) but I find myself looking for each little developmental cue. He sleeps well and is now smiling and watching us just like he is supposed to. We are so very blessed!
Here's a photo of him just after a bath in his bed. I hope his hair is always like this. :o)
This last week was a doozy at our house. Between the two of us, one adult was out of the house every night from Tuesday through Saturday. We tried to arrange it so that we were both here for bedtime (or when I went out Thursday with my AWESOME mom's group at church I took sweet little man with me) but it just didn't work out every night. So Friday night we decided to set up blankets and pillows on the living room floor and have a special movie night while Daddy was out at rehearsal.
Last year miss L saw "The Polar Express" for the first time and it's the only movie I ever remember her crying when it was over because she wanted it to keep going. Her Mawmaw bought her a copy of the movie and we watched it a few times. This year we turned it on a couple of weeks ago for fun and between miss L and mister W we have watched it almost everyday since. They love the train and the suspense. I have to admit that I'm getting a little bit tired of the music stuck in my head, but I enjoy watching them watch it every time like it's the first time they've seen it. So... it was an easy choice for movie night and they laid and watched the whole thing, though neither fell asleep (which surprised me!). It was an easy bedtime after that.
Saturday night Daddy had a concert. I realized that this was actually the first time in seven years that I haven't attended, but it was just going to be too hard for me to manage all three kids while Brad was on stage. Since Brad had to leave early we ate dinner and then decided to make some cookies. This was an idea that I stole from a friend on facebook (one of those awesome mom's group moms!) and it was seriously the best! The kids were able to do almost every part of the "cooking."
(don't judge us for our meal choice...)
We started laying out pretzels. (and eating some...)
When that was done we topped them all with hershey's kisses.
(and we ate some of those too...)
In fact, I'd told both kids they could have one hershey's kiss each since I knew I'd be putting them to bed by myself and sweet little man can be unpredictable in the evenings. I kept seeing mister W with one in his mouth and since he had a hard time unwrapping them I was really surprised at how many it seemed he'd had when I knew that miss L had done what I'd asked and only eaten one. I asked her if she was giving them to him and she told me no. I then realized that I'd been putting hershey's kisses on the same pretzel over and over and he was taking them as soon as I looked down to unwrap another. I have no idea how many he had and I feel so silly for taking so long to figure it out! It was so funny.
We watched them "bake" in the oven (just stick them in two minutes at 290 degrees).
Then mommy followed up putting a single m&m in the center of each kiss and pressing them down. They are perfect! I think that the real recipe calls for round pretzels but we had twists and they worked great. We're still eating them!
Sweet little man (shockingly) was awake the entire time but content and happy to sit in what we have dubbed the "magic cradle." In fact, as soon as I started talking to him this is the response I got.
Daddy got home from his concert and sweet little man was STILL up! The boy is a night owl, different from his brother and sister who went to bed early, but that's fine with me. I think it's when we get our best time together. He continued his smiles for daddy.
Sunday came and we stayed in our pajamas all day! We started by watching some Christmas shows and eating in front of the TV (a huge treat at our house and something the kids think is too fun).
Then a doctor and a cowboy did some stamping at the kitchen table.
Finally we finished the day decorating cookies. We've done this almost every year since miss L was born (I think we only skipped the first one), but this was the best year yet. She sat for nearly two hours and decorated cookie after cookie. She didn't even sneak too many tastes!
We worked hard on our cookies!
We made a gingerbread family.
Miss L was particularly proud of her red tree.
This one has a zipper. :o)
Mister W even got in on the action.
He really liked the m&ms.
...and the eating.
Daddy made a robot.
We made lots of cookies!
Merry Christmas and see you soon!
