Sunday, December 25, 2011

Weekend Wrap-Up: The Christmas Edition

Ever since Thursday, the big birthday, things have not slowed down.  Not one bit.  So here is a rundown of our Crazy Awesome Christmas Weekend.  And, just an FYI, I can't promise complete or coherent sentences because I'm uber tired.

Friday:
Auntie time with Yoda and Wadi.  Bridal shower for Ellen Suurmeyer.  Fun evening with the Suurmeyers at their weekend rental house.

Yoda and Wadi


Helping Ellen with the Gum game
Hanging with Boom and Barb

Fun in the wooden kitchen
Saturday- Christmas Eve Day:
Fun at the condo.  Church.   Yummy dinner.  Presents.  Christmas Cookies.

Entertaining Great Grandma Henderson

Boom's Christmas Cookies!

Callie and her presents

Goofy!!!
Sunday- Christmas Day:
Santa came!  Train set!  Fun, brunch and presents at Grandma and Grandpa's (with Sydney too!).  Family time at Nana and Papa's house.  Family time at condo.
Santa gifts on the chair

So excited for the train set!

Christmas tree at G-ma and G-pa's house

Callie got the letter "W"!

Helping give Sydney her bottle

Reading with Seamus

Emily and Amy!

Hanging out with Donald

Three tired peeps
Sunday night:
Toddler asleep before 8pm.  Mommy and Daddy exhausted but happy from toddler wrangling and days on the run. Thankful for how easy it is to (and how much we like to) spend so much time with our families.

Many more weekend (and other December) pics can be found at our Shutterfly Site.
For some reason I can't figure out how to get the pics in the right order...but they are all there somewhere.

Saturday, December 24, 2011

Merry Christmas!!!

We feel so blessed this year, and wish everyone a wonderful and happy Christmas!

Showing off her sparkly new party shoes

Merry Christmas!
Ho-Ho-Ho...YAWN.
 The Weekend Wrap-Up tomorrow is bound to be...EPIC.  We have been on the go and enjoying this crazy time of year! :)

Thursday, December 22, 2011

Birthday Festivities

The Party People

Eating with Bops

Then eating with Pa, Nana and Papa

"Pup-Cakes!"

Callie is 2!

Somebody loves Boom's cupcakes

Time for presents!

Her loot

New slide- way more fun than the look on her face conveys
It was a fantastic day all around.  Thanks to our awesome families for their love and support tonight and the past 2 years.  Callie is one lucky 2 year old!

Happy Birthday Callie!!!!

Our beautiful little girl is 2 years old today.

I'm at a loss for what to say, besides we have been so unbelievably blessed to have such an amazing little one in our lives for the past 2 years.

If I go any farther than that I'm going to start bawling, so I will end this birthday post by saying,

Callie Joy, we love you and are so proud of you!

And now, a look back at the birthdays so far:
12/22/2009

12/22/2009
12/22/2010
12/22/2011!
 

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Frosty

Nothing starts a (snow-less) winter break off right than a toddler singing her version of "Frosty the Snowman."

Sunday, December 18, 2011

Weekend Wrap-Up

Christmas. Break. Is. So. Close.

This weekend was fun.  Callie spent the night with Grandma, Grandpa and Auntie Cat on Friday night.  Chris and I went to my staff holiday party.  It was great...and then we got to sleep in a little bit on Saturday morning.  And then I got to clean for a couple hours before she was dropped off.  I always have the guilties when we do things like that, but really, it is necessary in order to get some stuff done.  Plus, she always has a blast with her grandparents and aunties.

Reading with the girls and Pa
Saturday was Mommy-Callie day while Daddy had to work.  Since it wasn't too cold out, and it had snowed a little bit, we went on a walk to the mailbox.
 After nap time we headed to the condo for playtime, dinner and the Holidazzle parade downtown!
Checking out the circle of friends Boom made
Choo Choo!

Watching the parade
Today was a reminder for us why we usually stay busy.  I woke up to my Google Calendar Email saying "You have no events scheduled for today."  That doesn't happen very often.  So we bummed around, made a trip to Ikea, and then spent most of the rest of the day at home.  Except during nap time, when I went Christmas shopping with Mari. The main problem was a certain toddler decided to only sleep for 1 hour and 20 minutes, and therefore was awake from her nap by 2:30ish.  That is pretty early.  And since we didn't go anywhere, Destructo-Cal came out to play. She was going going going NONSTOP.  Since it was so nice out, she got to run a little bit outside, and bask in the 40 degree December sunshine.

But that didn't last long.  Thankfully Grandma, Grandpa and Uncle Dan stopped by later this afternoon to provide some distractions. And then thankfully there was a Dora Christmas special on at 6 that forced her to sit still for a little bit.

My project of the day (besides finishing up my Christmas wrapping) was to start redoing the nook in our basement.  I always tried to avoid taking pictures of it, but you can kind of get an idea of the "before" from part of a picture I cropped:
Yuck.  Waste of space.


 Today I made it look much much much much better, and a way better use of space with a toddler around.

So much better!
Crafty Mommy did a bulletin board!
 To finish off the space, we need to get a new light fixture (you can't see it in the pictures but it hangs down pretty low- Chris nailed his head on it already and I've ALMOST nailed my head on it about 14 times).  Also, Callie will be getting a train set for Christmas, so we'll set that up for her on the left side of the nook on a new Ikea table Christmas morning.

One of my goals for break is to go through all her bins of toys, put away the ones that are no longer age appropriate, and organize the ones that are.

Two more days til break.

Four more days til 2-year-old birthday.

Six more days til Christmas.

Saturday, December 17, 2011

Timing is Everything

Background information:
A good teaching strategy when working with kids with short attention spans is to use a timer to let them know how long they need to be working on something.

Conversation just now:
Callie: 5 minutes.  Poopies.
Me: Are you going to have poopies in 5 minutes?
Callie: Yep.

Conclusion:
It has become apparent that I (unknowingly) apply my good teaching strategy to my short-attention-spanned toddler.

Result:
The whole basement is stinky.  I think the timing was about right.