How does she do it?

This is what I do all day. Mostly anyway. I spend my day trying to clean up the house and all the usual stuff but every few minutes when Grace is out of my sight and being quiet, I have to find her to see what she's doing. This was about 60 seconds after the last time I had checked on her. What I would like to know is how did she get in that drawer without any of the others open? I'm assuming she stepped on what's next to the dresser but that's still quite a stretch for those little legs. Especially since that is not a very stable surface to boost herself off of. The point of putting her hearing stuff on the dresser was so she couldn't reach it. I suppose if I found a way to secure it to the ceiling she'd find a way up there too.

When I snapped the shot I was purposely trying to avoid getting that blue thing in the picture because I was embarrassed that I even own it but it's time to come clean. I made a purchase from an infomercial! This was a long thought out purchase. Several years probably. In fact, I don't even think the infomercial was still playing on TV when I bought it but I was so convinced that this was the solution to my fat thighs...in fact I'm still convinced it's the solution. I just need to actually use it. It is the Bun and Thigh Roller. Just saying the name...can't you see how you can just roll off the fat? Right. Anyway, I used it 2 days in a row sometime in the last month and it was about 2 years before that that I had last used it. I just can't bring myself to give it away since it's never really gotten a fair shake to prove it can do it. If I could just give it those 5 minutes a day...

chuck mangione

I hope that you are lucky enough to get Chuck Mangione's "Feels So Good" playing when you view my blog sometimes. It just started to play while I was working on changing my Christmas background and it made me happy. It's the kind of song that makes me want to get up and dance...the kind of dance where I pretend like I'm mocking the goofy song playing but really I'm serious about my moves. You've all done it I'm sure.
and P.S. if "Sir Duke" by Stevie Wonder doesn't make you dance in your chair at the computer, then you are a robot with no feeling!

whirlwind trip

Well, I realized today as I was uploading pictures from my camera to computer that I didn't take any pictures of Christmas. We have some video but I don't know how to get it off that camera yet. One day. Anyway, we took a fast trip to Vegas last weekend and had so much fun. We left Friday afternoon and drove to Mesquite. The next morning we finished the drive to Vegas and went to see Seigfried and Roy's Secret Garden at the Mirage. It was not the same as the last time we were there since that was pre-tiger bite incident but they have their big cats in their secret garden now and it's still really cool. They study dolphins there too and it's fun because you get to be right up next to the pools...although you're not allowed to reach in to touch or anything like that. Whenever the dolphins would pass Grace she kept saying, "whale!" I finally convinced her it was only a dolphin.
I was trying so hard here to catch the dolphin swimming past us and keep Grace in the picture too but I got half of both of them.

When I checked the weather before we left it was supposed to be high 40's in Las Vegas and so I just brought sweatshirts for everyone. We really needed our winter coats. Brrr! Everyone else went to the football game Saturday night and had to wear long johns and hats and gloves, etc. It is not supposed to be in the 30's in Vegas! The kids and I stayed warm in the Venetian watching movies.

If you look hard you can see a tiger sleeping on the tree above our heads.

These lions were soooo cool. The picture doesn't really do it justice but when you saw them you were like, "no wonder this guy is king of the jungle." They were awe inspiring animals.

oj fuzz

Every morning this week I've been gagging down the last bit of my orange juice because no matter how often you stir it up and twist the top of the pitcher to the strainer opening, you still end up with a glass full of pulp. It seems to get worse as you get to the bottom of the pitcher too. Even though I stir it up every morning before I pour. I just couldn't bear going to another store with 2 children just to get pulp free juice so I told myself I could handle the pulp. No. I still don't like it. I was a fool and now I have a Costco size load of OJ to go through...

Is it 3:30 yet?

The most common thing I hear Grace saying these days is, "cut, cut, cut" and signing with her tiny little fingers the action of scissors. Ah, yes, she has discovered the fun that scissors can be. I was dumb enough to let her help me snip the threads on some stuff that I was sewing and it was downhill from there. I have tried to supply her with lots of scraps of paper to "cut, cut, cut" but her interest in those wanes and she moves to other things...for instance the candyland cards that she just ruined not 2 feet away from me because I was focused on the computer and not if she was still playing the game or not! She didn't tip me off with her "cut, cut, cut!" I can usually tell when she's doing something naughty because I can hear from the other room, "No, Gracie!". It's like she's battling another personality when she's scolding herself, yet continuing to do what she's not supposed to. Anyway, I've become to reliant on the fact that she'll rat herself out obviously since she was right behind me when the candyland incident happened. Oh, well.
This week has brought about a new challenge with Grace. It's been coming on slowly but I'm afraid to say that nap time is gone!! Any day in the last week that I have allowed her to take a nap, she has been up until midnight that night! She was always a late bedtime kid anyway but this has gotten ridiculous! Yesterday was the first day without a nap and by 8:00 she was CRANKY! But she was asleep by 9 (early for her usual 10 or 10:30) and she slept until 8:30 this morning, except for whatever time it was during the night that she woke up and turned on the flashlight next to her bed, carried it across the room and left it there before returning to her bed for the rest of the night. We'll see how tonight goes but 2 is just too young to stop napping!!
Anyway, here's some more pics of what's going on around here.


Lucas is nearly 5 months now! Yikes! He always has a smile for you though. What a happy guy! This is one of his favorite places to be these days...in the Johnny Jump Up. I had hopes that he might not be as "active" as Grace but signs are not pointing that way.

2 steps to get ready for swimming in the winter... 1-brush your teeth and 2- put on your boots.

Here we are working on Lucas' stocking. She of course had her own scissors that she was cutting scraps of fabric with. We have decided that our office is the room of perpetual disaster. I keep buying things to organize it and then more things show up to junk it up!

Lucas has been hinting to me he's ready to start some solid foods...

Grace was trying out some career options. Yesterday she was a doctor AND a baker. If you ever need her to listen to your heart or lungs, she loves to do it!

now to find some frames...

John took some pictures of my kids on Saturday and they turned out so cute that I had to share some here. The trick was getting Grace to participate! She did pretty good though. I think I'm starting to get her to smile on command when there's a camera around. She knows that she can see herself on the camera though so she mostly ends up walking towards you before you can snap the picture so she can grab at the camera.

Thank goodness for binkis because Lucas was sooo mad right here. Grace was busy covering her eyes and saying, "boo!"

This is a classic look from Grace and I'm so glad it's been caught on camera!

fashionista

"Boots!" This girl loves to accessorize...especially in Mom's stuff.


"These are my teeth, mom!"

"Can I please be done standing here!"
I was testing out some shots of Grace in front of the tree for our Christmas card. She was pretty patient!

'Tis the Season...

I always take these pictures too late...I should have taken it yesterday. I thought our neighbor's tree looks so cool with the snow from yesterday. We had so much snow we required 2 shovelings (thankfully Loyd Dille snowblew our driveway the 2nd time around)! This is the biggest cherry tree I have ever seen by the way (with really yummy cherries too!)
Everyone is napping right now and it's nice and quiet. That is a rare thing to get everyone to nap at the same time! So in the quiet I've been wondering how in the heck I managed to get poo flipped on to my lip while changing Lucas' blowout about 30 minutes ago...I think it occurred when I pull off the poo covered sock he had on...it was a major blowout. I've also been thinking how lame that lady is for scolding the Applebee's email (those of you who got it know what I'm talking about). Are you kidding me? Is this the first time you've seen one of these things? Was she mad because she tried it and didn't get her $50 in 3 minutes like it promised? Give me a break lady. Just delete it from your inbox and get over it. It reminds me of the people in the grocery store who always have something to say about how angry my screaming child is (I discussed these people earlier today). I usually just smile and say nothing to them but in my head I want to say, "Oh really? She's mad? I hadn't noticed. Maybe that's why she's crying and screaming and punching herself in the head, all while trying to climb out of the cart and run away! Thanks for the tip. Now why don't you let me with my 2 gallons of milk ahead of you and your cart ready to feed an army?" But I guess I'll just continue to smile and say nothing. It's probably best.
On to merrier things though, we had a fabulous lesson today as a combined YW that the 1st counselor (Stephine) taught. It was our Christmas lesson and she talked about knowing Christ and living so that people who know us, will want to know Christ, because they know us. Hopefully I can embrace that attitude this Christmas season!