Cardboard Castle

Down at the D&M complex we had a delivery that had some HUGE boxes.  We took advantage and made Molly her own little castle.  That's what she was calling it anyhow.  She had a whole story line going where everyone was Rapunzel and she was trapped in her castle.  I think boxes are the universal awesome toy...some of my favorite childhood memories are in boxes. Ramsey might feel differently since she remembers finding me in my box down at the paint store infested with ants.

We're getting a new roof put on the house right now and because that makes a lot of racket we hung out at the store and YSB last week.  It's made me seriously consider whether working (taking the girls with me of course) would be at all possible.  Being at home with two small children ALL the time can be a little maddening.  Yes, I would still have them with me, but just a change of scenery as well as having a few more faces to look at might be nice.  Another added bonus that I hadn't considered might be a cleaner house.  The first day we were out of the house Jonny came home and asked me who had cleaned the house.  Of course no one had cleaned the house, we (Molly) just hadn't been there all day making messes.  So yeah, maybe we'll start going downtown and screwing up the office instead.  Ha!
Papa and the girls

Maggie frequently gets that deer in headlights look.

Molly might hate me someday for posting this picture, but she was cracking me up the other day with her insistence that she get her "newspaper" before she used the potty.  She's been getting really good at using the big toilet by herself and can even manage it with out a step.  There was one incident where she fell in.  She was pretty upset, but I have to admit I thought it was pretty funny.  When it happened she she kept going on about how she would "never" fall in the toilet again.  "Never" "forever" and "for hours" have all made their way into her vocabulary.  She's "never" going to cry again (yea right!) and anything she likes doing is going to be done "for hours" or "forever", which makes sense since I'm pretty sure that hours feel like forever when you're a little one.  It's interesting to see the concept of time start to show up.

Maggie has been going crazy around dinner time, and she sits up pretty well now, so I thought I would let her give rice cereal a try.  I think she spit most of it out, so I decided that, despite her enthusiasm, we'll wait a few weeks before we try again.

Molly has 3 dance classes under her belt now and I think it's going pretty good.  She still needs to work on listening (what a surprise) but she participates and seems excited to be there.  There's a recital in June and I've paid for the costume.  Should be hilarious.

Dancey Dance

I've been thinking that Molly should probably try out a dance class for awhile now.  She's always showing off her moves for us and she loves to use the porch at the two story as a makeshift stage for her performances.  Yesterday I called to see about getting her enrolled and BAM!  Next day she's in a class in a leotard with brand new ballet slippers.  Needless to say, it was hilarious.  I think for her first day she did pretty good though.  Especially for a kid who I'm convinced is the worst selective listener ever..."Huh?"  I didn't take any pictures of the actual class (would it be weird if I did?) but here she is afterwards sporting her new duds.

Maggie might as well be mobile these days.  I can put her down, leave the room, come back in 5 minutes and she'll be 3 feet from where I left her, going after some random toy that probably says 3+ on it.  I may have to hide every one of those toys until a later date.  Hopefully that doesn't start a riot in the house.
Here she is hanging out in the playroom in her Bumbo.

Joining in on one of Molly's tea parties.

These books are Molly's favorites (This is our latest blog book).  Why shouldn't she love looking at pictures of herself?

So, the other day she saw this post in her book and saw how she was eating her baby food with a straw.  She then followed me around begging me to let her have applesauce with a straw.  I got her a little cup full, but Nooooo!  She wanted it out of the jar...just like the picture.

Permissive parenting?

Seriously I can't say it enough.  Maggie is the sweetest thing ever (Since Molly).  Do you know what she did tonight after I pushed her past bedtime at Molly's dance class and then fed her in the car (not as nice as the boppy)?  She drove all the way home almost completely contentedly, and then went to sleep by herself in the Amby.  She doesn't do this all the time or anything, but sometimes, she does and it blows my mind.

It was a tad bit chilly the other day.  I took advantage and had her wear my old baby hat.  I think she looks cuter in it than I ever did.  I'm pretty sure my Mom agrees.

I'm not going to complain too much about this since I've pretty much been waiting for this day Molly's whole life, but last night Molly broke my heart a little.  After I read all the bedtime stories, she asked me to stay for a little bit.  I did and while I was laying with her I was thinking about how nice it was since she was mellow, sleepy and snugly.  As if she could read my mind, she said "Mama, you should go now".  Made me a little sad.  Tonight she fell asleep in the middle of the story and so I said "Goodnight Molly, I love you" I thought she was completely out so I almost got a little teary when she whispered "I love you too" eyes still closed.  Funny how they can erase a whole day of "pain in the ass" with one little gesture.

Strolling

I wasn't going to do it, but after taking a walk the other day and using our terrible Cosco umbrella stroller to push Molly around, I broke down and bought a double stroller.  I'm glad I waited since I haven't seen this one before and it's pretty nifty.  It's arranged so Maggie's seat is higher than Molly's so it isn't like pushing a bus around and the back seat reclines enough that you could supposedly put a newborn in it...although I'm not so sure about that.  Maggie however sits just great in it.  We took a walk to try it out and I had hoped that Maggie might take a little nap, but instead Molly passed out.  Right now we're at this weird place where she probably still needs a nap, but doesn't really want to nap.  Since bedtime has been such a bitch in the past, I can sort of get on board with the whole no napping thing since I can get her to bed on her own by 8:30.  If she for some reason naps, we're up until 10 and it doesn't seem to change her 7-8 wake up time.  Jonny had proposed a compromise of letting her nap but then waking her up after an hour, which actually does seem to work, except it is nearly impossible to wake her up.  Today when we were going down some steps in the stroller, her head flung all the way up to an upright position and then slammed down on the front bar.  She flinched, but didn't wake up.  The other day she passed out on the couch and when I went to get up I accidentally rolled her off. She fell face down into a ceramic bowl full of popcorn and didn't wake up.  She didn't even wake up when Jonny and I, instead of helping move her back onto the couch, stood there and laughed at her.  When I do attempt to wake her up, it requires all sorts of special treatment.  Juice is alright, but not as good as chocolate milk.  Chocolate milk is good, but not as good a dumdum.  You never know what it's going to require from day to day.  I've joked that only way I could consistently get her up from a nap would be to put cigarettes out on her, but since neither of us are into smoking or child abuse, we're just going to have to wait for this phase to work itself out.

No naps for Maggie, but as usual she was all smiles!

Maggie's been enjoying the jumper.  Molly would like to be enjoying the jumper, but so far we've been able to prevent that from happening.  When we first set it up, we had it apart so we could clean it and there was the hole in the center which was easily large enough for a 2 year old to occupy.  My Mom watched them the other day while the hole was still available and Molly stood in it trying to get my Mom's attention while my Mom ignored her (letting Maggie have things is kind of a struggle sometimes).  In the end, she stood there for a half hour...pretty stubborn.

Maggie has gotten really good at trying to sit up.  I can even get her to balance and sit by herself for short periods of time.  She's pretty pleased with herself when she does.

That's a pretty conniving look she's sporting there.

Christmas Movies

Well I did a little better at taking pictures at Christmas than I did at Thanksgiving, but not by much. I guess I just got too caught up in all of the fun we were having to be bothered to find the camera. I did manage to take a few movies though that are kind of funny if you happen to be interested in Molly.

Granny and Maggie on Christmas Eve

Gran and Maggie, also Christmas Eve

Little Christmas Cheese Log

The Lucia Bread...tasty!

The beginnings of the mess.

So we had a little bit of a rough start Christmas morning. For the record I didn't go in and wake her up, she was talking in the monitor before I went in there. It took her a little bit to figure out what day it was. I think having her daily question of "Santa's here?" turned down so consistently had finally broken her down.
The Stocking!!! Lots of fun!
Another year in the books! Who knows what fun is to come...

Festivities

So, what have we been up to?  It's been two weeks since my last post and the only reason I can think of for not getting it done is that my biggest blog fan is here visiting us, so what reason do I have to post?  Things are starting to look festive around here.  This has little to do with me, and almost everything to do with my mom who has been scurrying about the compound decking the halls, doors, fences...I'm pretty sure the HOA is going to come down hard on me for not decorating my exterior at all (my house is the dark spot on the map) but you can be sure I'm going to come down hard on them if their shit isn't down by the 2nd of January.  Actually I love looking out at all the little white lights my mom has everywhere (colored lights are apparently against our CCRs) and Molly and Maggie are definitely on board as well.   Big thanks to Gran for making spirits bright around here.

Baking with a two year old is super fun.  If you haven't tried it before, you can come and borrow mine.  You should know that she's a fantastic listener and never eats all the dough.  Wait...

Here she is all decked out with her fancy apron and her baking boots.

A week or so ago, Jonny took Molly to the light parade they have downtown.  She loved it.  So much so that she passed out on Jonny's shoulder on the walk home.  We were actually able to put her PJs on her and tuck her in without her waking up.

Here's our picture from our Christmas card.  If you're not in AZ, sorry for ruining the surprise.  Also, if you're not in AZ, sorry, you might not get the card until after Christmas since I was late getting them. 

Surprise!

A couple days last week it almost felt like winter. It rained and then the next day it was foggy.  Looked kind of pretty.

Molly's ready for dutch Christmas.  She got up on the counter, took the bag of "cuties" and stuffed her shoes.  Just a side note to anyone who is judging me for letting my kid wear Crocs, this is why I love them.  ME:  "Molly put on your shoes"  MOLLY:  "Okay".  End of interaction. 

We're all very excited to have Chris and Stephanie here for a whole week!  Molly and Maggie both love having them around and the rest of us think they're alright too!  Can't wait to share an awesome Christmas with them.

I'm the worst elf on the shelf mom.  I have hardly moved him at all this past elf season.  I think this is his 5th and probably last place.  I'm going to have to up my game next year.  I'm pretty sure she's going to hold me accountable then. 

Plastic Tree

O plastic tree, o plastic tree. I really f@#$ing hate you! Next year my desire to not vacuum everyday might be outweighed by my hatred of this tree. Actually now that it's up, it doesn't seem so bad, but when it was being put up and I was reminded of all it's shortcomings...a portion of lights with a short or something, various holes that I could excuse in nature, but seem unnecessary in a man made tree, a top that doesn't work with our star, and instead of smelling like pine, it smells like dust. I admit, I was filled with a frustration that can only be brought on by a major holiday.
I started decorating the tree Sunday evening after everyone was asleep, but I thought it would be fun to let Molly help me a little, so I saved some special ornaments for her to help me with in the morning.  I'm not going to say that I regret this, but I will say it made things more difficult. For every ornament that went up, 3 came down. No one can accuse me of taking the "Christ out of Christmas" for as many times as I said "Jesus Christ Molly".  Whoops.  Can't wait to hear that one fired back at me.  Why is it that all of the things you say that they repeat back to you have to sound so hilariously adorable for better or worse?

One for the tree

Three for me

It only took 24 hours to complete the masterpiece, ha!
Can you spot the dead lights?  Should have taken this picture 1 minute later.

Other festivities include:

Maggie's outfit

and Santa!

It's also been kind of cold (those of you from places colder than Yuma-everyone-can laugh) so it's starting to feel Christmasy!

Ya Ya Roly Poly

Here she is, making it happen! She's also been going from back to belly when she's in her crib, although I think she's been cheating and pulling herself over by grabbing onto the little mirror toy we have in there.

Here's Maggie in her crib, almost having completed a back to belly roll, but as you can see, she got her foot stuck in the little ring on her toy.

This past week has been full of missed photo opportunities, although when you think of the ridiculous number of photos people have of their kids nowadays, it hardly seems like the end of the world that I didn't document Thanksgiving. There's a pretty good chance that there are 0 pictures of me as a kid on Thanksgiving (there could be an errant Polaroid somewhere I suppose) and yet, here I am, still breathing.

So, I missed Thanksgiving completely, and I might as well have missed our visit with the McBurgorris clan.  As an afterthought we tried to get them together for a picture, but since they're all 2-3 years old, they weren't having it.  I also think that at that point Landon and Molly were finished with each other.   I admit it, my kid can't share.  I'm told this is typical, but it still drives me nuts.

So here are the boys, and Colbie's legs.

And here is Molly...sharing is hard.

Regardless, we had a good time hanging out...even Molly.

The next day, we went to the park, and since it was a bit windy, we took a kite.  I thought maybe I'd get a nice picture of Molly helping us fly the kite.  I was of course being ridiculous to think that could actually happen.  Molly was mostly interested in conquering all of the slides and running away from us in that huge dark maze of a castle they have at the playground.  This was the best I could do. 

I thought today, that she was actually going to wear the headband.  She was so excited about it, talking about how it matched, and how it was her crown, but fast forward 5 minutes, it's in the sandbox.

This was pretty funny.  Maggie's scalp is always getting dry so I'm always having to oil it up and brush it.  She liked it so much this time, that she passed out while I was brushing.

So, Christmas is the next holiday, I'm hoping I'll do better, especially since these are Maggie's firsts.