Saturday, December 24, 2011

Merry Christmas!

Another exciting Christmas is upon us!  Last year I thought Christmas was just the most wonderful thing because Maddie was finally old enough to start getting into the magic of it all.  Well, I've gotta say that this year just might top last year.  Maddie hasn't missed a single day on any of her three advent calendars!  She was counting down the days and near the end (1-4 days) she started jumping with glee over how close it was til Christmas.  Tonight we put out reindeer food that's sprinkled with glitter so the reindeer could find our house easily.  We also put out milk and cookies for Santa.  Maddie added the sprinkles to the cookies and told me she had to add lots of sprinkles because sprinkles are Santa's favorite.  Well, "Santa" sure did enjoy those cookies!!  This is the first year that Maddie will really understand what gifts are from Santa and what gifts are from Mommy and Daddy and other family members.  She had a few gifts she specifically asked Santa for, so those will be labeled from Santa.  All the others are coming from us.  We didn't really know how to handle gifts.  We want our girls to enjoy the magic of Santa, but we don't want them to think all gifts just come from elves at the North Pole.  We want them to understand that Mommy and Daddy (and other family) think about them and love them and want to pick out special presents for them.  So this year our girls are getting two gifts each from Santa and their stockings will be from Santa.  Everything else is coming from the people who love them.

I got a little sidetracked...sorry.  Let me get back to the magic of Christmas through the eyes of a 3 1/2 year old.  Maddie was so excited to do the reindeer food.  She was so antsy as soon as we got home from church this evening she wanted to put out the food.  Then we had to finish Santa's cookies.  Then The Sound of Music came on tv and she had to watch some of that (she doesn't know it yet, but she's getting that movie from Great Grandma Reese tomorrow!!!).  When I finally took her up for bed, well after 8:30, she was still so giddy and silly with the excitement of Christmas.  But then a little fear set in.  I told her if she was lucky she would get to hear Santa's sleigh bells as he flies away from our house (thinking I would jingle some bells before I headed to bed, whether or not she heard them).  Ooops...wrong thing to say, Mommy!  She started getting worried.  She didn't want to hear Santa's sleigh bells because it might wake her up and she will be scared.  I had to tell her I'd leave a note asking Santa to keep his sleigh bells quiet as he flew away from our house.  I guess that worked because we haven't heard from her yet.  But who knows, she could still be up in her bed just worrying and watching out her window in case Santa might come in her room (we had to close her door tonight so he wouldn't go in her room...we normally keep it cracked open a little).
Well, I hope you all have a very Merry Christmas.  We'll take lots of pictures tomorrow and try to post some soon!

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

A Post all about my Sadie Mae

Sadie is 15 months, 2 weeks and 5 days old today.  She is at such a crazy age!!  She keeps me busy keeping track of her all day.  I just never know where to find her.  Some of her favorite spots are in our master closet, digging into all of our shoes, of course, playing on the treadmill in our room (hey, at least someone's using it!!), playing in the laundry room if I forget to shut the door, sitting on the bathroom floor looking at books if we've left the bathroom door open, or just sitting quietly and playing with toys or looking at books in the playroom or livingroom.  But seriously, it's those quiet times that freak me out the most!!

Sadie is much more of a visual child than a verbal child.  She really observes things to see just how they work.  She's fascinated by moving parts and wants to figure them out.  She's content to be left alone to play by herself.  She will sit quietly on the floor pressing the same buttons on a toy over and over again.  She really is just intrigued by how things work.  I love it!

Even though she's not as verbal as Maddie was at this age, her vocabulary is constantly expanding.  She now says:  Daddy, Mama, hat, juice, more, cookie, cracker, cupcake, elmo (this is her favorite, and clearest word!), diaper, quack-quack...it seems like there are more, but I can't think of them right now :)

She knows where her head is, her tongue, her ear, her head, her hair, her belly, her toesies and sometimes her nose.  Cutie pie!!

She knows what sounds ducks, cows, bears, birds, dogs, cats and pigs make.  It's so cute to hear her!  I'll try to get a video some day soon.

Unfortunately right now my little one is sick again :(  Remember last fall when she was having some breathing issues and was diagnosed with bronchiolitis?  Well, she ended up on breathing treatments with albuterol for a while until she finally started feeling better.  You guessed it, we're doing it again.  My poor baby!  She had some cold symptoms since last Wednesday or Thursday, but I just thought it was associated with teething as she was working on cutting two.  By Sunday I could feel her lungs kind of rattling (the doctor said her lungs sounded chunky).  I kept waiting for it to get better and yesterday she finally started coughing to get some of it out.  But she had a terrible time sleeping last night so we decided it was time to take her in.  I'm glad I did.  She's only had 3 breathing treatments today but I can tell she's already feeling so much better.  She's back to playing and laughing like her old self already.  YAY!!

Well, here are a few pictures of my sweet angel for you to enjoy.

A cute pose by the Christmas tree...

First time jumping at Jumpalooza...

Hanging out in the playroom...

And since I never posted pictures from Halloween, here's my little cutie in her costume...

Thursday, December 8, 2011

December Pictures

Oh my goodness!  My girls are a HANDFUL!  I wanted to get a few cute pictures of the two of them together for our Christmas cards (yes, I'm getting a late start on this...).  Sadie had a rough night of sleep last night and it definitely shows in the pictures.  I'm not going to share the ones I used for the card, but here are some of my other favorites (and favorite outtakes!!)








Monday, December 5, 2011

All about Maddie on her 1/2 Birthday

What makes you happy?  Being with Daddy.
What makes you sad?  When you give me time outs.
What is your favorite thing to do with Sadie?  Playing puzzles.
What's your favorite thing to do with Daddy?  Playing dot paint with him.
What's your favorite thing to do with Mommy?  Going to school.
What's your favorite breakfast food?  Golden Grahams.
What's your favorite lunch food?  Peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
What's your favorite snack?  Apples.
What's your favorite supper food?  Beef Stew (although she has actually never eaten it...)
What's one food you REALLY don't like?  Zucchini.
What's your favorite thing about school?  Going to chapel.
What's your favorite book?  Peek-a-who?
What's your favorite thing to watch on tv?  Team Umizoomi (no surprise there...that's what's on tv right now so it's freshest in her mind!)
What's your favorite movie?  Snow White
Who's your best friend?  Cadence and Sydney (the identical twins in her class...she has no idea which is which so she always includes them both)  :)
What do you want to be when you grow up?  A Police Officer so I can help people who are sick.
What are you best at doing?  Painting
What is your best memory?  Going to Aunt Cindy's house.
What's your favorite toy?  Books
What's something Daddy tells you a lot?  About loving me.
What's something Mommy tells you a lot?  Don't hurt Sadie.
What's your favorite song?  Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.
If you could change your name, what would it be?  Paggy
Can you tell me three things about yourself?  Getting boo boos, going to school and playing with Sadie
Now, tell me something funny.  Doing knock knock jokes.  How about this one, "Knock knock."  "Who's there?"  "Computer"  "Computer who?"  "Computer Elmo".  HAHAHAHA!!!!


And now, since Christmas is coming, here are some things Maddie has asked for for Christmas:

A drum set
An iPad
Puzzles
Elephant
A real tiger
A plate
A toy computer

3 1/2 years old

Maddie is exactly 3 years and 6 months old today.  After today she's closer to 4 than to 3.  Oh goodness!!  It's been a while since I've posted a "Maddie-isms" post so I thought I'd do a small collection of those for you :)

Maddie continually impresses us with her use of language.  She just seems so much smarter than the "average" 3 year old.  When I was pregnant with her, I used to sit and imagine how life would be when she was an infant, a toddler, a preschooler, etc.  I can tell you, she has FAR exceeded any expectations I had!  I didn't think I would have actual conversations with her until she started Kindergarten (if that soon!).  We talk about all sorts of things.  And it's not just, "Mommy, tell me about princesses" or things like that.  She asks me questions!  She wants to know the things I like, she wants to know about me when I was a little girl.  She wants to know about herself when she was a baby.  Her little mind just works in amazing ways.  We have a back-and-forth conversation about things on a regular basis.  I'm pretty sure she would rather sit and talk to me than to go play with friends.  She's amazing! 

Another thing I expected for quite sometime is the improper use of words.  Most kids take a while to learn the proper tense.  They say a lot of things like "sneaked, growed," (I can't think of any more examples right now).  Maddie told me, "When I go to see Santa he's going to tell me, 'My, how you've grown'".  Some mornings when she wakes up she tells me, "Mommy, I grew last night when I was sleeping!".  She blows my mind.  And one day I took a Skittle out of her little bag and fed it to Sadie.  She asked me what Sadie was eating.  When I told her it was one of her Skittles she said, "You snuck one from me?".  SNUCK?!?!  How did she learn that word??  Amazing!

Some other phrases she's been shocking us with:

"At that point".  As in, "I will stop sucking my thumb when I'm 4 because at that point I'll be too big"
"Matter of fact".  Yesterday we told her to put a music box back at the store because we weren't going to buy it.  She put it down and said, "Maybe we can get it next time we come.  Matter of fact, somebody else might buy it. But I REALLY want it!"
"Oh my gosh".  Not 100% happy with this one...but it's kind of cute. 

Some other quotes:

"I was about to say, 'Let's skip brushing teeth tonight," but then I remembered we had sugar.  I don't want to get any cavities."

Me: "Maddie, what are you going to play today?"
Maddie: "Snakes"
Me: "How will you play snakes?"
Maddie: "Well, I'll just slizzer around on the floor."

Maddie: "Mommy, you know I burned my thumb on the toaster?"
Me: "Yeah, that was a while ago. Is it still hurting?"
Maddie: *sad look* "Yeah, it's hurting morning, noon, and night."


Maddie: "Knock, knock"
Me: "Who's there?"
Maddie: "Banana"
Me: "Banana who?"
Maddie: "Banana you glad I didn't say orange?"


Maddie:  "Mommy, when I was in your belly, what did I eat?"
Me:  "You ate whatever I ate.  When you were in my belly you had an umbilical cord that was like a straw from my belly straight to yours.  So that's how you ate anything I ate."
Maddie:  "Well, you should've ate a plate so I could put my food on it."

That should do it for now...Happy Half-Birthday, my sweet girl!!

Here's a picture of my sweet girl today...all ready to head off to school :)

Saturday, December 3, 2011

Buddy Walk 2011

What a day!  We left the house around 7:30 to head down to Minute Maid Park for Houston's Buddy Walk.  Getting out of the house at that time was surprisingly easy...the girls both slept in a while so we had a chance to have ourselves completely ready to go before they even got up.  Once they were both awake, they immediately got dressed, played around in the house for a few minutes while drinking their morning milk (Mommy and Daddy had their morning coffee, of course!), then it was time to get in the van and head on our way.  The girls enjoyed watching Frosty the Snowman on the way and ate a breakfast of dry cereal.

We ended up getting to the parking lot at the stadium shortly after 8:00, maybe 8:15ish.  We met up with friends of ours in the parking lot and headed over to the meeting place for the walk shortly after.  The walk officially began at 9:00 so we had time to enjoy playing in the lot for a while.  Maddie was over the moon with excitement when she got to see Mickey and Minnie Mouse!!  Sadie was happy, well, I'll say "cautiously happy" to see Elmo.  She LOVES Elmo but seeing him in person and giant-sized was a lot for her little 15 month-old self to take in!  Mommy and Daddy were just happy the girls were having a good time, and we were SUPER happy for the PERFECT weather!  It was in the mid-60's to low 70's all day.  We were perfectly comfortable for the walk because there was a gorgeous breeze blowing with the sun shining the perfect amount.  Seriously, we couldn't have asked for a better day!!

So, I'll tell you a little about the little guy we were walking to support today.  Little Luke was born 18 months ago today!  His mom and I met through a playgroup and have known each other for just a little over two years.  We hit it off from the beginning and have always gotten along, although we haven't had all the time in the world to get together!!  It's been such a blessing knowing this family and getting to know sweet little Luke!  He has two big brothers, Jacob (6) and Brian (soon-to-be-5) who absolutely adore him and protect him already!  They're a great family, raising three incredible little guys.  It was our honor to support them and walk as part of team "Luke's Skywalkers". 

Here are some pictures from the day!

Meeting Elmo 


 All the kids in their Star Wars capes!


 The team banner


 Can you see the excitement in Maddie??  She LOVES Mickey and Minnie!


 The whole fam!


 My littlest Jedi


 Daddy and Maddie at Minute Maid

Friday, December 2, 2011

A Revival!

After taking 6 months off, I thought I'd bring the ol' blog back.  I'm not sure if anyone is still checking in, but that's ok.  If I don't know anyone is reading, I won't feel like I have to "filter" what I write.  I can be myself and not feel like I have to say certain things to "impress" or to avoid offending people.  :) 

My sweet Sadie turned 15 months old today and I feel terrible that I haven't been documenting her growth...Also I've been horrible about getting pictures out to grandmas so I thought this would be a good way for them to see the pictures.  I haven't been posting as many pictures to facebook due to security reasons, and I'm honestly thinking about deleting the facebook account altogether.  I'm a little too addicted.  Seriously.  It's bad.  I need to quit cold turkey!  But I'm just not ready yet... ;)

Anyway, I don't know how frequently I'll be updating the blog but I'll post when I can, more as a document for my girls to look back on than anything else.

Tomorrow we're doing our first Buddy Walk here in Houston.  We have some sweet friends who's 18 month old baby boy was born with Downs Syndrome.  We decided to join their team to walk as part of "Luke's Skywalkers" tomorrow.  I'm super excited and pumped to be a part of such an awesome event!  Please pray for us as we take the girls and don't really know what to expect!

Look forward to pictures of that...