Look Who's 3!!!

My little boy turned 3 today. It's true what they say...Time really does fly. We've got some exciting plans this year for Logan. We may enroll him in a gymnastics/preschool class and of course, there's potty training. I'm excited to watch him grow this year. It's fun to learn things all over again from the perspective of your kids.

We had a little party for him this morning. It wasn't anything too spectacular, but it was fun. He got lots of presents. His favorite was the computer his grandma and grandpa H gave him. Once he saw that, he didn't want to open any of the other presents. We had to hide it and tell him he could have it once everything else was opened.



He loved being sung to. I've never seen him so excited before.


And of course, his cake was a big hit too.




Happy Birthday to my sweet boy!

Christmas 2010

Christmas was awesome this year. We started Christmas Eve by going to Buca Di Beppo for dinner with Sam's family. Afterwards, we went to his parents house where we had the kids (and Sam) participate in the Nativity. I have to admit, I've not seen a cuter Mary or shephard. Joseph was pretty good looking too. ;)


After the nativity, we opened some presents. Logan was thrilled with the thought of opening presents and wanted to open all of them. It took awhile to get the kids to settle down when we got home. Bedtime was later than usual, which made for a later morning. We had a good time opening the presents that Santa left behind at our house. He brought Livi a ginormous doll house that both kids fell in love with. They even tried climbing into it themselves. (Good call on the doll house Santa!)




I'm not sure how it happened, but Logan sure did get a lot of good stuff this year!
You can't tell from her expression, but she was so excited to get this from Grandma and Grandpa H. She absolutely loves it! Coloring and music are 2 of her favorite things, so it only makes sense that she would love the Crayola color wonders toy.


Once our presents were opened, we drove back up to Sam's parents house to visit for a bit and open more presents. (The kids were pretty spoiled this year.) One of my favorite gifts that Logan got from his Grandma B was a photo book of his "Awesome Summer". It's something that he can keep for years to come and one day show his kids. It was brilliant!

We travelled to my parents house later in the day where we enjoyed a delicious dinner, time with family, and yes, more presents! I really wanted to not have the focus of Christmas this year be on presents, but it was worth it to see their faces. We had some fights over toys, and a few tantrums, but overall, I think it went pretty well.

Merry Christmas!

A Goodnight Story

Last night, Olivia was having a hard time going to bed. I would hold her, she would scream. I would put her in her crib, she would scream even louder. Finally, I gave up and let her go into Logan's room to try to sleep in the toddler bed. Logan was thrilled to have his sister in his room. She just wanted to play. She jumped on the bed, laughed, held teddy bears...finally she got into bed with Logan. They seemed content, so Sam and I left them. I was standing outside the door for a few minutes when I heard Logan ask Livi a question. "Do you want to read 'Goodnight Moon', sweetheart?" And then I heard him "read" the book to her. (He has it memorized.) It was such a touching moment. I was so proud of my little boy. Such a wonderful big brother!

Logan, I love you so much!!!

The night didn't go that smoothly for much longer. Soon, Olivia wanted out of the room and eventually went to sleep in her own bed. Logan was very upset that she left. He kept crying for "Eeya" to come back to bed with him. I'm so glad that he wants to share his room with her. One day it will happen. But for now, I'm not ready for her to sleep in a toddler bed. I'm just fine with her being in the crib.

Here comes Santa Claus

Today we had our church Christmas party. We had breakfast, enjoyed looking at displays of different countries and their Christmas traditions, and even got to visit with Santa. Santa, of course, was the highlight for Logan. It's all he talked about on the way there. He just wanted to see Santa. But when we pulled into our church parking lot, we had to wrestle with Logan to get him out of the car. He was determined that we had tricked him into going to church. We had to reassure him over and over again that, yes, Santa would be coming by. When Santa made his grand entrance, both of my kids were in complete awe. Olivia started laughing and ran right for him...Logan wasn't far behind. However once they got closer to him, they both froze. I should be more sympathetic to my kids. Afterall, a guy wearing a big red suit with a white beard can be intimidating. But I just thought it was hilarious to watch them react in such a way. We had to force them into the picture. Olivia screamed her loudest scream and Logan clung onto Sam for dear life. Maybe next year it will work better.

12 days of cookies, not so much

The 12 days of Christmas cookies hasn't gone over very well. Here's a rundown of what's happened so far.

Day 2... we just put frozen cookie dough on a cookie sheet. Still yummy, but not as fun.

Day 3... we decorated Nabisco Nilla Wafers with red and green frosting. This, the kids did enjoy. It was a fun time and maybe something we will do again. It was easy and didn't require baking any cookies.




Day 4... we didn't do anything. But some friends of ours came by and delivered a plate of cookies. Does that count?

Day 5...nothing. :( It's sad but true. We just weren't home enough to do anything. But that's okay by me.

I'm not sure anything will get baked tomorrow either. Honestly, if it wasn't for this nasty headache I've had for almost 2 weeks, I might be in more of a baking mood. But really, I'm just trying to survive hour by hour. We have enjoyed other Christmas activities though. We have looked at neighborhood Christmas lights, decorated some ornaments and colored lots of coloring pages of Christmas stuff. We've had fun so far with Christmas activities, cookies or no cookies. :)

12 Days of Christmas...Cookies

It's a lot of cookies, but I found this idea in a magazine and thought it sounded fun. My kids aren't quite old enough to enjoy the making cookies part, but they sure do enjoy eating them. Today was Day 1. We made "Twinkly Trees". I don't think they turned out quite as well as I would've liked, but they look cute enough.

Logan did his own tree. It's the top left.

Garden d'Lights

We went to the Bellevue Botanical Gardens tonight to look at their light display that they have each year. 5 years ago, Sam and I went to the garden to look at the Christmas lights, and it was here 5 years ago that he almost proposed. (He chickened out though and didn't propose until much later that night.) We had a great time. The kids absolutely loved the lights. One thing I should mention about our venture was that it was raining. It wasn't your typical Seattle drizzle/rain, no it was downpouring rain. We were soaked after just a few minutes. Still we had fun and the kids enjoyed jumping in the puddles while we waited for Sam to bring the car up. We may make this an annual event...then again, we might look for other light displays closer to home.

I don't have many pictures of me and the kids, and tonight I remembered why. I had to hold them tight just to stay in the picture. And of course they wouldn't look at the camera, that's just not near as fun as running around in the rain.

He only thinks he's ready

Logan wants to go to school. The past couple of days he has put on his backpack and shoes, yelled out "good bye" to me and gone to the front door to leave. Today he even grabbed a book (a cook book, but still a book). Only he's stopped because we have the doorknob childproofed and he can't open it. He begs me to let him go to school. I think it's great that he wants to go and learn. He understands that at school you learn things and get to play with friends. I feel bad, I would like to enroll him in preschool, but he refuses to be potty trained. I've told him that if he learns to use the potty then he can go to school. He told me "I have to think about it." I think it's pretty straightforward, but apparently, he needs to mull it over.

How my almost 3 year old thinks...

One of my black friday deals was a dual DVD player for the car. It's nice, it's portable, and the screens fit on the back of the driver and passenger head rests. We tried it out for the first time last Tuesday when we had to pick up Sam from work and head to a doctor appointment for Logan. The kids enjoyed every minute of being able to watch a movie while sitting in the car. And honestly, it was the best drive I've had in a long time. No screaming, crying, hitting, whining...it was great! Today Logan was begging to go to his "carseat". Here's the conversation that followed:

Me: "Why do you want to go in the car so bad?"

Logan: "Want to watch Cars in my carseat." (Cars is what I had playing on Tuesday)

Me: "I'm sorry bud, but we can only watch movies in the car on long road trips, like to daddy's work or Grandma and Grandpa H's house."

Logan: (a long pause as he looks on thoughtfully) "Logan wants to go see grandma and the kitty cat" (my parents house)

Me: "Are you sure you want to see grandma? Or do you just want to watch the movie in the car?"

Logan: (Another thoughtul pause) "Nope, want to see grandma....and watch Cars"

I love how he thinks. He took his time in answering my question, as if getting the right answer would allow him to ride in the car. Needless to say, we didn't go to my parents house today, but I did cave and took them with me to donate some unwanted items that we had lying around. We took our time, and I let him watch his movie while we did so.

Baking Cookies

I know, I know...shocking! To think I actually had time to have the kids help me bake cookies! It was fun. Okay, in all honesty though, it was frozen cookie dough that I bought from a school fundraiser, already shaped and ready to be placed on the cookie sheet. So that's what we did. I opened the box and the kids put the cookie dough on the cookie sheet. Once it was in the oven, the kids just sat and watched them bake.



The excitement was too much for Livi, she just had to dance and hop around. At one point she even demanded for me to open the oven door and get the cookies out.



You would think that once they were done that she would want to eat one, but she didn't. She just wanted to look at them. Logan on the other hand, couldn't wait to devour them. :)

A visit to the ER

Olivia had her first (and hopefully her last) ambulance ride this morning. When I wasn't paying close attention, she had gotten into one of the kitchen cupboards (not unusual) and pulled out a couple of things. One item she pulled out happened to be a blade that went to a hand blender thing. It's not very big, but it's very sharp. I saw a few of the bowls she got out and didn't pay much attention to anything else. I was busy getting dinner into the crockpot and planning a trip to the mall to let the kids play at the play area. Just as we were getting ready to go, I went to do last minute diaper changes. Olivia started to scream. I still hadn't noticed anything unusual, she always screams when she doesn't want to be disturbed. It took me a few seconds to realize her foot had been cut. I had no idea what or how it happened. Logan had to show me the blade. When I took a better look at her foot, I realized this was bad...very bad. It had cut the bottom of her foot about a quarter of an inch deep and it was a long cut. I made some frantic calls to family to get help. Then I called 911 when I realized there was no way I could drive her to the ER while putting pressure on her foot. The EMT were quick to respond and we were on our way. Olivia loved the ride. She even got a stuffed animal from the crew. We got checked into the hospital and we were both well taken care of. I had my mother-in-law follow us there. I knew I wouldn't be able to handle this alone. It was nice to have that extra support. Olivia did very well. She was so brave during the entire time we were there (which was almost 5 hours). She received another stuffed animal from the volunteers that were going through the halls of the ER. The staff and volunteers were absolutely wonderful and made things easier to handle. I think I had a worse time of the whole ordeal than Olivia did. But several hours and 5 stitches later, we were on our way home. Once we got home Olivia was her happy little self. You wouldn't know she had gotten hurt, except for her hobbling around on her toes. She's a brave little thing. Much more so than I am.

Thanksgiving

This year Thanksgiving brought us great food, wonderful family and lots of snow. We woke up to a few more inches of snow on the ground, so we spent the morning shoveling snow off our driveway and Sam's brother-in-law's driveway. We were having Sam's family over to our house for dinner and wanted to have at least the driveways clear for parking. Logan was an excellent little helper when it came to clearing his uncle's driveway. He spent a good amount of time outside. He can never seem to get enough.



The afternoon came and so did the family. After some struggles of getting up the snowy/icy hill everyone had arrived safe and sound. There was so much food to go around. It was amazing. I didn't get any pictures of our feast, my kids made it pretty much impossible for such things. Later on we got the computer out and through the awesomeness of webcams we spoke with family not here. It was so cute to watch the kids gather around the computer to talk their cousin, Bailey, and Uncle Joel.



The rest of the day was spent watching old football games and talking strategy for black friday sales. My sis-in-law (Lina) and I were actually crazy enough to go out in the early morning hours to shop Target and Kohl's. We had fun. It was pure craziness and we aren't sure we'll do it again (too early) but we just might be that crazy again. Afterall, we scored some good stuff.

Snow

It snowed yesterday...a lot! Well, a lot for around here. It was beautiful to watch and fun to play in, but horrible to drive in. Today we've been snowed in our house. The roads are all covered in ice. And since we live on a hill, driving down and then back up is not something I would like to try and attempt. The temperature has been in the low to mid 20's. Yes, the 20's. CRAZY!!! We are not prepared for that kind of weather. I am lacking a winter coat for days that are that cold, no one has snow boots, and Sam doesn't have gloves. Oh well, hopefully it won't last for too long and we can get the ice to melt a bit before everyone comes over for Thanksgiving. I much prefer the rain and 40 degree weather. :)

Our house, just as it was starting to snow.
The trees next door. I thought they were pretty.





The kids just loved it. Logan kept asking for the snow to "turn on" if it stopped snowing. This morning he wanted it on again. I'm okay with it being "off". We really didn't get much, I'm guessing maybe 2-3" at most. It's the ice that's the problem. Oh well, it will melt one day.

What they do for fun

I think my kids are getting bored with staying inside during rainfall and cold weather. I've taken them to different malls to play in the play area. I'm just running out of ideas. There isn't a whole lot of free things to do inside for little kids (at least, not that I know of). So until I figure something else out, this is what my kids have been up to.

Logan loves to play with his cars and trucks. He has those rugs with the street and buildings on them, but instead of playing with those, he has chosen to play with the rug. You can make mountains out of it, you know.



Olivia loves to color...so much so that I have to keep my eye on her or else her artwork ends up in places I don't approve of, such as the stairs, walls, table, floor...you name it, she's drawed on it. Even as I type, she has found some more crayons and putting her artwork on a wall I just cleaned. Ah, it never ends.




( One of her first watercolor and crayon "drawings")

I'm hoping that the winter doesn't last too long, but that's just wishful thinking. I guess I better come up with some solutions, and fast before we all lose our sanity. :)

Conversations with Logan

Logan has been having some pretty interesting answers to questions I've been asking him lately.

Me: What's your favorite thing about our new house?
L: It's beautiful...and leaves (we have trees around us finally and he loves watching the leaves fall)

Me: What would you like for Christmas?
L: Candy! And see Uncle Dan, Hannah, and Jane (we don't know if we'll see them or not, but he sure talks about them a lot)

Me: What do you want for your birthday?
L: BALLOONS!!! CAKE! CANDLES!

Me: Do you want to take a nap?
L: No, but mommy does. (stated very matter of factly, and he's right)

Halloween

This year was interesting. We took the kids "trunk or treating" at our church's party. That way it was limited to how many places they could go and not get as much candy as they probably would have if we had let them go trick or treating. Olivia was not a happy camper since it was near her bedtime. This girl loves her sleep and doesn't like change from her routine. But she made a cute little ladybug regardless. Logan was a little more cooperative this year with the costume. He wanted to be a penguin. It's his favorite bird, animal, whatever. He made a cute penguin. It took some convincing to get the costume on, but once we had reassured him several times at how great he looked and that he would soon be getting candy, he was happy.

Goodbye Bothell, Hello Snohomish

I have had mixed feelings about moving. This house was our first home with kids. It's where our two kids took their first steps, said their first words...lots of memories. It's hard to say goodbye, but we have been looking forward to new adventures.

October 23...what a day! We woke up early to finish packing. Sam left to get the rental truck early in the morning and I tried to get as much done around the house as two toddlers would allow. Around 10am we had some guys from church come and help us load up the moving van. It really helped us to have so many come and help. What a relief! Even Logan wanted to help. He was really good at making sure his toys got put on the moving van.



I left the house around 11:30 to take the kids up to Sam's parents house. I had to get to the new house by 12 for the cable guy to come and to get the house semi ready for the move in. The day went by much faster than I had expected, but things went rather smoothly. We had lots of help show up on the unpacking side as well. It was a very long day. A couple of mishaps happened along the way. Sam lost his keys and I lost a few boxes that I have yet to find. Sam's keys ended up in California, but we got them back. Guess they wanted a vacation.


Our Snohomish home is bigger and has lots more room for the kids to run around inside and out. It's been an adjustment, but I think once we get things unpacked and cleaned up it will feel more like home instead of a house. Snohomish is a cute little town with lots of charm. We really like it so far. It's definitely different, but a good different.

Last walk in Bothell

I had been taking the kids on daily walks around our neighborhood in Bothell. I decided I should take pictures of where we walked. It is just too pretty to not document. It was sad, as it was the last time we'd be walking this route.






After the walk, we played at the neighborhood park. It has been a favorite of mine and the kids. It was easy to get to, and we spent many afternoons playing there, waiting for dad to come home.