Christmas 2008

OK, so I am WAY behind on all this Christmas stuff. The week has been busy and I haven't been feeling too hot so blogging has been pretty low on my list of tasks to accomplish. However! We did have a wonderful Christmas.

The kids slept until just around 7 and then woke up. I keep waiting for the year that Andrew tries the 12:01 am business that Reece and I tried growing up. I mean come on, it is TECHNICALLY Christmas!

Zane seemed really into the opening of presents this year. To start with Santa brings unwrapped presents for the tree and this year he brought a Thomas toy for Zane and a big kid bike for Andrew. I don't know what it was but it took Andrew about 10 minutes to even notice the bike. Eric and I could hear him say. Zane! There is a bike here. I think maybe it is for me! Too cute!

Lucy got some girly stuff for Christmas. Princess cups and a super cute doll. Although honestly she seemed to get the most joy out of stealing the boys toys from them. What a pesky little sister!

Andrew was pretty excited to get a new big Lightning McQueen puzzle. It is the first (and only) one that I have found with 300 pieces that isn't totally girly. Is it so strange that I have a BOY that likes doing puzzles?

Andrew on his new bike. The only thing that sucked is that he couldn't ride it for the first few days. Too much snow! It was a bummer and he was kinda disappointed. It should be better in a few more days when the snow is completely gone!

All in all a great Christmas. Hope yours was wonderful as well!

Stairclimbing and a Whale Spout!

So this week Lucy has achieved a new milestone. Climbing up the stairs. Frankly it has shocked me at how long it took her to get up the guts to try it. But now she feels brave enough and is off to the races. And let me tell you, she is fast. If the boys run upstairs you can almost guarantee that she will be after them. There is not place safe from a little sissy these days! Also last night while I was nursing Lucy before bed I was playing with her hair just wishing that I could put it in some type of pony/piggy tail configuration. (One of my favorite things to do and one of the reasons I was so excited to have a little girl!) I have always tried when her hair is dry and it just slips and slides everywhere. Well last night I had washed her hair and lo and behold if it wasn't long enough to bunch together when it was wet! I immediately decided that today would be the day for Lucy's first real hairdo. I have been dying for this day!


So here is photo of Lucy's first hairdo. I tried to get a picture where you can actually see her but her hair is pretty light and it is kinda hard to tell. You can see it against the stark whiteness of the snow though outside. It was funny, I don't know who was more excited for her hair me or Andrew. He is very opinionated about girls having long hair. It just cracks me up because I honestly don't know where he gets it from. Eric isn't really that way at all.

Watching? Christmas Specials

Tonight the boys stayed up to watch the new Muppet Christmas special. Unfortunately Zane fell asleep at about 7:40. We tried to wake him up to watch the show but the lure of sleep was just too overwhelming. Hopefully he won't be too upset about sleeping through it tomorrow. Andrew is enjoying the show though. I mean seriously, who doesn't love the Muppet's?

Let the Fighting Begin!

So the in the last few weeks Lucy has definitely taken on the role of the little sister. She has discovered that if she finds a toy or book or anything that matters to Zane she can get him to scream. It is hysterical to watch her. First Lucy will look for something that belongs to Zane. Next she picks it up and examines it. Then she gets his attention by shrieking and waving said object until Zane notices. Then the fireworks begin. Zane heads off like a charging bull to take whatever it is from Lucy. Lucy spends the whole time screaming like someone is murdering her. Zane ends up stopping inches from her crying because he knows that if he actually hurts her then he will be in super huge trouble. Usually by this time either Eric or I have noticed what is going on (Zane is not the most easy to ignore child in the world) and we tell him to take whatever it is from her, just gently. Lucy gets a stern "NO MA'AM!" from us and that is usually the end of the problem. Until the next time at least!

A Step in the Right Direction

Well it appears it is a week of Lucy posts! Last night Miss Lucy took two steps to walk to her daddy. He was tempting her with a brownie. I guess it just goes to show that she is definitely a member of our household. We are all easily swayed by the sight of food. Anyway, I know that we will be in trouble in the next few weeks for sure. She is destined to be mobile before her first birthday guaranteed!

Determination and a Mommy's Need for Sleep

So last night Eric and I chose to do something that we should have chosen to do several months ago. We decided to let Lucy cry it out in the middle of the night. I kept thinking that maybe she was hungry or thirsty or scared in the middle of the night and she needed me and then went back to sleep on her own. She has been putting herself to sleep for months at bedtime with no problem so I thought there must be some other explanation. Sadly I was wrong. Some nights Lucy will wake up twice and other nights (like Saturday night) she will wake up every two hours and need help falling back to sleep.

For me this is absolutely unacceptable. I need more sleep than that and it didn't seem like anything I was doing during the day was helping. I tried extra water, snuggles and food near bedtime. Finally I had to admit it. I have a little lady that just wants me to help her get to sleep.


I don't call myself the mommy with the heart of stone for nothing and I decided that Eric and I would let her cry. And let me tell you cry she did. Lucy woke up at 1 and I think the last time I heard a whimper out of her was around 3:30. It was rough for all of us. Somewhere around 2:45 Eric asked me how long we were going to let her cry and I told him until she falls asleep. Mercifully the boys didn't hear a peep of it. They slept through the whole entire incident. I am sure we will have to repeat this process tonight. Possibly all week. I am just completely done with the night feeding bit with my almost one year old. Neither of the boys had this problem. Once they started sleeping through and were eating cereal they were done and the nights of uninterrupted sleep returned for me. I am hoping for a quick return of sleep again this time for sure!

A Snowy Day

Today we had our first snow of this winter season. It was super wet and super sloppy but snow is snow and two little boys were ecstatic to go and play in it! On a side note I finally figured out how to take good snow pictures that don't look too dark with my camera. I just have to over expose them a full step and they turned out great!

Last year we bought a 10 dollar toboggan from Joe's. It is probably the best money we have ever spent. The boys adore it and Eric is totally happy to go out and drag them around. Then they all come in a have hot chocolate which is a huge hit as well.

A new type of Rudolf?
Pulling a one person sleigh?

Hope you all have gotten out to enjoy the beautiful snow as well!

The First Report Card!

I have been seriously remiss in my blogging duties lately! So sorry about that! Andrew brought home his very first report card this week. Funny I didn't realize that he would have a report card at all. Anyway, he has done beautifully. The card does not have A/B/C/D type of grades but rather 1,2,3,4's. Andrew received 3's across the board which means that he is using each skill consistently. Can't say that I am expecting more out of him than that. He also knows all his sight words (there were 6 for this trimester) and recognized all his upper and lower case letters and all but one of his letter sounds. (I wonder which one he didn't get?) Eric and I need to work more with him on counting to 100 but that was the only thins that seemed to be even slightly behind where it should be. Also with his behavior at school he received all "Outstanding" scores. It was nice to read all the nice comments about Andrew. All in all a fantastic beginning to his school career! Great Job Andrew!

Building a Gingerbread House

Yesterday we got the boys their annual gingerbread house to put together (thank you Costco!). We ended up not having enough time to build it and decorate it last night so Eric put it together with the boys and then this morning they got to put all the candy on.

I think this may be one of their very favorite things to do during the Christmas season. They always look forward to it and Andrew starts asking about it from the minute he sees the houses at the stores.

The boys and the final product.

I don't know how it is going to go next year. Lucy will be able to help a bit and it should be interesting to see if fighting breaks out. This year she didn't seem to be interested at all. She was just as happy to play on the ground and watch Eric and I race around. Now the fun part begins, eating the candy!