Valentine's Day Pictures

So, these were not supposed to happen, let alone work out as well as they did, but such is my luck.  Daddy has been traveling quite a bit lately, and will be leaving us again the week of Valentine's Day.  To be clear, I HATE Valentine's Day, but being the mother of two girls on a holiday that features pink/purple girly-ness, it is my lot in life to do it up right.  I got a very last minute idea in my head last Friday to take the girls to JCPenney's for Valentine's Day pictures.  It was literally as we were getting ready on Friday morning that this idea popped into my head.  I threw their newly purchased novelty character Valentine's Day t-shirts and a couple of combs into a bag and away we went.  I didn't even have an appointment for pictures until just before lunch, but everything fell into place quite nicely. 

I had the afternoon off of work - Hannah had a doctor's appointment already scheduled to have the stitch removed from her forehead (oh, did I not tell you about that?  what?  would you not normally schedule pictures until facial lacerations have healed?  lame!).  So at 1:45 my baby was having a stitch plucked out of her head and by 2:30 we were at the mall having a quick snack before our photo shoot.  I am just trying to frame the context here to give you some idea of how low my expectations for success were.  The bar was set at approximately zero for taking away anything salvageable, but at $4 per portait sheet, I really had nothing to lose.

So the photo shoot begins, and Hannah immediately starts screaming when the photographer touches her.  I am not the slightest bit concerned about this, as I mentioned previously that I had zero expectations for this working out anyway.  But then something miraculous happens - Hannah becomes cooperative!  For perhaps the first time in her life, she behaves on cue!!  There was truly some higher power involved here.  Anywho, I ended up with like 5 billion photos that I don't need, but it was a very successful shoot and will hopefully make for a nice surprise for Daddy (and probably the Grandma's as well - they tend to covet cute pics of the girls together).  See below for a small sample of the pictures.

Megan & Hannah Pictures - November/December 2011

Please see the attached for some recent pics of our little ladies.  We had a wonderful Christmas with them - each year gets more and more fun with all the Santa magic.  Megan has been totally into it the last couple of years - now she is just getting harder to trick.  Hannah absorbed a whole lot this year as well - any person with a white beard was automatically labeled "Santa" and followed by a jolly "ho ho ho".  She's got the belly to pull off quite the realistic impression, too.  

 

http://www.kodakgallery.com/gallery/sharing/shareRedirectSwitchBoard.jsp?token=285849165311%3A609703898

We kept very busy with pre-holiday activities - a trip to the GR zoo for Christmas with the Animals (we also find they have the best Santa in town - the ones in the mall have turned into real scheisters these days), Megan's preschool Christmas program, a whole lot o' baking (Megan and I made 12 batches of cookies for 5 families in our neighborhood for our very own "12 Days of Cookies" - we delivered one cookie per family member each night for 12 nights, solidifying our Favorite Neighbor of 2011 award), and a visit to Frederick Meijer Gardens to see the Christmas trees from around the world.  All these activities were made that much merrier by the fact that we've had no significant snowfall in our neck of the woods yet this winter - YAY!

On Christmas morning, each girl had a couple of gifts in front of the fireplace to open from Santa, and taped behind their stockings was a letter from the big guy himself indicating that he'd left quite a big surprise for them in their playroom downstairs.  Daddy went down first in order to "check it out" (a/k/a set up the video camera) and captured some priceless footage of two shocked little girls when they saw a massive dollhouse in the middle of the room. That was their big (literally) gift this year - on Christmas morning they were down there for 20 minutes on their own playing contentedly while I enjoyed breakfast of non-soggy cereal.  In my opinion, the thing paid for itself right there.  Another highlight of the letter - Megan had decided that in addition to leaving out cookies and milk for Santa, we should also provide a healthy option.  She chose broccoli - I could go on and on about what a hypocrite this makes her, but that is neither here nor there.  Anywho, Santa's letter included a thank you for the milk and cookies, and also a note that he doesn't really like broccoli, but ate it all up because he knows it's good for him.  She cannot seem to get this part out of her head.  We have discussed it every day since Christmas - "remember how Santa didn't like our broccoli?"..."does Santa gets snacks after dinner if he doesn't eat his broccoli?"... etc, etc.  The girl cracks us up.

The whole family suffered a round of the stomach flu between Christmas and New Years, which made for a very low-key week at home.  As I happen to suck at being low-key, I was the only person in my office this morning who was enthusiastic about being there.  I am sure we will look back on our downtime one day and appreciate it for what it was, but today is not that day.  For their part, I believe the kids were both awfully excited to get dropped off at school this morning, too.

In other non-holiday updates, we remain convinced (and totally unbiased) that both of our little beauties are extremely talented geniuses.  Megan is so, so, sooooo close to reading on her own.  She is doing 3-4 pages at night of her stories where she insists on sounding out every word and putting the sentences together before she gets frustrated with our slow pace and lets me take over.  Books with words that repeat over and over she can do all the way through - she is quick to pick up on these "sight words", as they call them in preschool.  It's very exciting to see this process unfold.  She is starting dance class (a ballet/tap combo this time) this Saturday, which will last until the recital at the beginning of June.  She is very excited to be back at it and is especially thrilled about her "clicky shoes" - I'm assuming her instructor will correct the tap lingo, for now I just think it's cute.  She is very into the movie "Matilda" (based on the book by Roald Dahl) and we actually picked up the chapter book at the library last weekend - she is tolerating a chapter a night of her first non-picture book very well.

Hannah is stringing together 3-4 words at a time kind of suddenly.  Tonight was "Lacey bad girl bark" for instance, which was a well articulated summary of the situation.  She's in rapid vocab expansion mode and is also extremely musical.  She doesn't know all the words to her song, but girlfriend can keep a beat - it's generally pretty easy to tell what she's singing based on her rhythm.  Pattycake and Frosty the Snowman are quite popular at the moment.  At 20 months, we haven't wanted to move her to her big girl bed yet, but will likely get to work on that shortly here.  She's also developing a pretty strong preference for immediate diaper changes after she's gone potty - this weekend she would come find me with a diaper in her hand when she wanted to be changed.  This probably means potty training is just around the corner for us, but I think I'm less eager about that process than I am about the thought of giving her the freedom to roam in a big girl bed.  We'll keep this stuff as close to her second birthday as possible, if she'll allow it.

Hope you all had a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Family Pictures - 2011

We went last month to get updated family pictures taken.  The goal was to beat or exceed last year's sister shots:

I know, I know - lofty goal.  But I think we did it!  Hannah was mostly uncooperative - we have a lot of shots of her walking away from the camera - but she happens to be highly adorable, so I think that compensated for her lack of posing.  Follow the link for the proofs.  We couldn't have been happier with how they turned out on a very cold, blustery day in Michigan.  Thanks Emily Rae Photography for a wonderful experience!

http://www5.snapfish.com/snapfish/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=8234705014/a=104359154_104359154/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink/COBRAND_NAME=snapfish/

Megan & Hannah Pictures - Fall 2011

Please see the attached for some updated pictures of the little ladies.  Our fall has been a busy one (odd since I felt like we did virtually nothing all summer), but filled with lots of fun.

 

http://www.kodakgallery.com/gallery/sharing/shareRedirectSwitchBoard.jsp?token=172275684311%3A1305461410

 

Megan attended Family Camp with Grandma and Grandpa Purdy, which starts the week before Labor Day.  The camp is located in Pentwater, right on Lake Michigan, and Kyle has gone every year since he was born (the Purdys have been going for over 40 years themselves).  Anyway, it's a very special place and it's fun to see Megan make her own memories there.  She stayed up there all week long, most of the time without Mom and Dad, and had the time of her life.  Hannah, being a total disaster at this age, sat this year out (which of course has nothing to do with Mom being less than enthralled with the camping scene, obviously...), but we look forward to letting her have the experience next year.  

 

Megan also gave soccer a try for the first time this fall.  She played on an under-5 girls league, and Kyle was her coach.  It went about as well as we expected it to go - she is very into her uniform (surprising as it wasn't pink and/or a dress) and loved her teammates and practicing before the games.  When it game to actual game time however, she would freeze.  For the first half of the season, we could barely get her to stay on the field and run with her team.  We saw a lot of improvement in the last few games, however, and by the end she was a pretty willing participant.  We're hoping to sign her up again in the spring (though I believe Coach Kyle has announced his retirement), to see what a second try at this might look like.  I don't believe we'll have this anxiety experience with Hannah, who had to be physically restrained in order to keep her off the field and on the sidelines.  Our little brut is ready for combat now.  :)

 

Soccer ended the last weekend in October, which gave us just enough time to fit in 10,000 Halloween activities.  Megan went as Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz.  Hannah was a scarecrow.  (I do so love costume themes that come along with multiple children).  After a brief breath-catching, we now have them both in Saturday swim lessons.  Hannah has been a bit aprehensive about the water - a blessing as she is not the slightest bit aprehensive about any other form of danger - but she did great in her first lesson last week.  She is now flopping down on her belly in the bath and blowing bubbles and sticking her face in the water, which I take as a sign that she is looking forward to tomorrow's class.

 

In other news, Megan is making great strides with her reading.  She is very focused on learning all the words to her favorite stories - many of which she has memorized already, but now she wants to know letter by letter exactly what word she's looking at.  She's doing a lot of sounding out and can navigate her way through the DVR menu to turn on her own favorite shows by doing that.  It's pretty exciting to watch - I think we'll be sending a full-fledged reader off to kindergarten next year. 

 

Hannah is now 18 months old and funnier than ever.  Just in the last couple of weeks, I've noticed a major jump in her communication skills.  She's trying to repeat just about any word she hears, and her list of ones she knows is expanding rapidly.  She loves baby dolls, books, and anything her big sister has.  She continues to be our wild child, though seems somewhat more tame to me recently (this could be wishful thinking on my part as I will be on my own with them all next week as Kyle travels for work).

 

Anyway, we are all doing well.  I'm loving my new job, and Kyle just made a career switch as well - he has now joined the ranks at BDO.  They began pursuing him about two seconds after I left, and since we knew from personal experience that it was a great place to work, it really wasn't a tough decision to make.  He started a few weeks ago and has been enjoying the experience thus far, which I will assume will continue at least to next week as they are flying him to Vegas for 5 days.  Jerk...

 

The next time you hear from me it will probably be post-Christmas (didn't we just do that?).  Hope everyone enjoys the holiday season!

 

Love,

Nicki, Kyle, Megan and Hannah

I Am the Walrus

Stupid nursery project #202:  Decorative pillows for use on baby's rocking chair.  I happen to be in possession of two perfectly goods ones from PBK that will be out of our lives shortly.  Though I hate to recover their expensive pillows rather than just buy new cheap ones, for the sake of simplicity I'm going for it.  As mentioned in my previous post, baby's quilt features a walrus.  Throughout our lives, my sister and I have had a thing for odd animals - I can think of at least two childhood stories that involved us rolling around on the ground laughing hysterically about a hippopotamus.  Given this history, the walrus is of great appeal to our demented little minds.  As such, it is only natural that one of baby's pillows incorporate the walrus.  Unfortunately the rest of the world doesn't seem as intrigued by walruses as we are, and several shopping trips and google searches for "walrus fabric" has left me empty-handed.  That's where felt comes in handy.  I discovered last night I apparently have some magical creative powers with making things of felt (yet another stupid human trick that will fail to make me rich). 

Starting with this as my guide (see cute fuzzy walrus middle row, right)...

I drew this pattern...

Which I then used to cut out the individual felt pieces, which eventually turned into this...

I love him.  As I am not yet able to sew (it's on my short list of things to take up), this is all I can show for now.  I intend to hand stitch the pieces together (this one I can do - the only skill you need to excel here is anal-retentiveness) and apply it to the recovered pillow (picture to follow) with iron-on adhesive.  Wish me luck!

Going a bit nutty

So, I have this wonderful new job.  It is challenging and rewarding and best of all, actually happens between the hours of 8-5 (okay, 8:30 if we're being honest) with very little noise outside of that.  And it's at the same place - every day!  It has taken the pace at which I was running and slammed on the brakes...hard.  I love that.  Problem is I'm just not very good at going slow.

Enter:  My sister is having a baby and I am not having any more babies.  This has translated to a fall full of projects.  Projects which have been over-complicated by my tendencies towards OCD and self-inflicted psychosis.  The list is as follows:

A big girl room for my Hannah, now 18 months and an avid climber - not a good combination.

Starting with this...

We made this...

Note that we are still avoiding transitioning her until absolutely necessary.  A monkey with that kind of freedom is not my idea of a good time.

Shortly after this came "Operation Decorate My Future Niece/Nephew's Nursery".  After some gentle persuasion, my little sister (future mommy to aforementioned future niece/nephew), went with this adorable set from Land of Nod:

While this set is great (I mean, the walrus alone was enough to sell me), it is lacking in coordinating decor.  I have now set out to over-complicate design the perfect wall decor, furniture, lamp, etc. combo for this precious baby's quarters.  Armed with fabric swatches from the set, I have visited 3 fabric stores, Home Depot and even had some Craiglist adventures - all this in the very early stages of this mission.  More to follow on this topic to be sure.

Meanwhile, I happen to love indulging my own children with my crazy craft ideas as well.  We've done a little upgrading in Megan's room - finally completing the theme of her own pink polka-dotted living space with a few ice cream/cupcake touches on the walls.

I also repurposed the fabric previously thrown on a plain corkboard into a french memo board for her room:

While pleased with the results, it unfortunately resulted in the below injury to my thumb (WARNING: beware seam rippers - they are not nearly as innocent as they appear)...

Latest in the series of my bad ideas creative undertakings is an attempt to try my hand at painting furniture.  The eventual goal here is to repaint our oak colored changing table to a burnt orange color for use in my future niece/nephew's nursery.  Prior to ruining anything, however, I experimented with an oak shelf from inside Megan's hope chest (if all goes to plan I will eventually change this whole thing into a pink addition to her bedroom).

Before

After (still drying)

In the midst of all this redecorating nonsense, it happens to be Halloween around these parts.  Let us not forget about the school pumpkin contest.  The theme was your child's favorite book.  We used little pumpkins (2 for $1 at Meijer), some acrylic paint and a little red felt to create these:

Pinkalicious Cupcake Pumpkins

A Very Hungry Caterpillar

As I couldn't even secure my own children's votes for the contest, not sure how well we'll fare amongst the preschool crowd, but Megan and I had a lot of fun working on them together, and I was very happy with the results.

Anyway, just a glimpse of the madness I've created for myself (all since Labor Day, I might add).  I am hoping that my adjustment to a slower pace will come eventually... this little urge to craft/construct is even scaring me a little bit.  Yikes!

Fall brings the urge to blog…

Well, I was certainly well-intended when I created this thing last year. I even thought about it a few times over the last twelve months. Ironically I logged in for the first time exactly one year after my first post. It must be something about the changing seasons that gives me the urge to write. Apparently the urge goes away as quickly as it comes on. Whoops.

Anyway, now that I've had a year to reflect, I have come to the conclusion that my original thinking was sound. I should write stuff down somewhere. I am a pretty diligent facebooker, but this forum allows me to capture more details, pictures, etc. I should definitely capitalize on that. Now where to find the time? That should also be easier. The kids are getting older, sleeping more regularly (though my youngest still has the tendencies of a morning person, I am working hard to squelch those). I recently took a new job that has greatly simplified my day-to-day life (note that my husband is taking my old one, which will complicate his somewhat – but whatever, that's his problem). I should be able to do this. And I want to. My kids are cute and funny and witty and smart, and their actions and observations do not fit nicely into the pages of their baby books. I WILL get this done.

More to come (in 2011, even!), I promise.