'Tis Definitely the Season!

Addie Kate truly got into the decorations this year...

My little Christmas ham!

(See the Fisher-Price manger scene on her table behind her? I LOVE it! It has been a great toy for her to assist in learning the Christmas story. AK was also given a precious [breakable] nativity from my Aunt Sharon and Uncle Al for a baptism gift (she was baptized at Christmas time, not that that matters - our pastor teaches us that the nativty should stay out year round). Funny thing is - my mom and I saw the nativity that she was given in a cute little gift shop in Columbia and just told ourselves, "we didn't need it." Imagine my surprise and excitement when I opened up that gift! I have to keep it out of her reach, but when we walk by it, she asks to look at the angel, baby Jesus, Mary, Joseph, the camel, sheep, and the three wise "mans." She still has a little trouble with remembering the shepherds' names (but I still thought that was pretty darn good for a 2-year old - and she learned that in one weekend!). Her nativity will be hard to part with when she's older! I just LOVE it! I also have a beautiful Fontanini nativity, which Addie loves, but it is also out of her reach! She makes sure that we look at them all quite often regardless. And I made sure to put her nativity that is from Aunt Sharon and Uncle Al in a place that we pass all the time. For her first Christmas, I bought her a stuffed-type nativity that's in pastel colors and all fits in the barn and closes. She's never really played with it until this year, but this year I on purpose put away the Little People princess castle that stays out in her room, and put that out in it's place. It matches her decor and tree, and she loves it. I guess I've gone a little overboard on nativities, but I can't imagine a better "decoration" for this season!)

And one little funny from my Addie before I go on - apparently Addie knows who the baby Jesus is in all of the nativities, and that Mary is his Mommy and Joseph was his daddy, etc., but she doesn't really understand who he is just yet. She was looking through a picture wallet that I had of her, that has mostly her baby pictures in it. She keeps it in one of her purses now, just like Mommy (in other words - it's no longer mine- ha!). The other weekend my parents were keeping Addie and she got the wallet out and was looking at the pictures with my mom, telling her who each person was (not hard - they are all her). She went, "Addie, Addie, baby Addie, baby Jesus, Addie..." Precious!

AK took the meaning of "stockings" to the fullest extent. (Tommy and I were working on some kind of decoration and she was playing alone in the living room. We both thought it had gotten quiet, until we heard a little shuffling sound behind us...)

She loved playing with the garland that was supposed to go on our Clemson tree... (our loft is pretty much all decorated in orange, Clemson paraphenalia, so a red and green tree just didn't go!) but I didn't like it on there, so it became a great toy for her. She thought it was one big necklace! (And no, the Clemson tree wasn't in her room - she just drug that garland all over the house!)

She tried to help me decorate her Christmas tree, but her little fingers just don't quite have the dexterity that it takes just yet. I love her Christmas tree. We have four Christmas trees in our house, and hers is my favorite. (Her bedroom is also my favorite, so that probably has something to do with it!) Her tree is just so girly and pretty. It also has a compilation of her ornaments and some of mine from growing up. I collected Madame Alexander dolls as a little girl, and Mom started me the Hallmark series of ornaments. Also being a little girl, I loved Barbie, so Mom started me that series. (As I got older, I got pickier with the type ornaments went on my tree - I was excited to put these on a little girl's tree!) I'm not a big theme person, but I dearly love nursery rhymes and her bedding is a nursery rhyme toile. Hobby Lobby last year and this year put out glass ornaments that are nursery rhymes and I LOVE to get her some each year! Glass ornaments are my favorite, and I was nervous about putting them on her tree, but she's done great with "look, not touch!"

Merry Christmas! I hope all of you enjoyed decking your halls as much as we did this year!

(Note - this blog is about a month behind in posting! We have to decorate early in our house, due to always being out of town on Thanksgiving, and the Clemson/Carolina game being on Thanksgiving weekend. I don't think it's worth doing if you can't enjoy it for at least a month!) (And yes, apparently we stayed in our pj's the whole day on this day! And no, all of those containers and other miscellaneous junk is not usually all over my house!)

Addie-lou Who

When I picked Addie up at the babysitter the other day, her hair was in this (terrible, awful) ponytail-thing up on the top of her head. Addie loved it - obviously she didn't know how she looked - just like Cindy-Lou Who from The Grinch! She continued to like it and play with it until I had to take it out (you know, before we had to go in public), then she screamed her precious little head off. I hate those cheap, rubber kind of rubberbands - ugh!

Then yesterday, I went to pick her up, and it was like that again! Addie called it her ponytail, which I did think was precious! But, the babysitter told me when she went to fix Addie's hair, Addie told her "Mommy said no hair again" or something to that effect - which was completely right. As I was fighting to get the first "Cindy-Lou Who - do" out, I told Addie "Next time she does this, you tell her Mommy said no!" Well, apparently we are there - as in, we are already in that place where she remembers, weeks later, what Mommy said, and tells people that! I was a wee bit embarrased, but whatever! I specifically didn't say anything to the babysitter for two reasons - #1 - I was glad she cares enough about my daughter to do these kind of fun things with her, and #2 - Being a teacher, I know for a fact that teachers can (not always) treat kids differently that have nit-picky parents, and I do not want that. That doesn't mean I don't say things to her, by no means, I just pick my battles. I refuse to be one of those parents!

So for now, I'm just going to enjoy my "Addie-Lou Who," and continue to cut those rubberbands out, not try to unwind them!

(I love this picture - I'd like to thank I took it with my fancy new camera, and that I knew whatever technique made the sun shine on my little stinker's face like that, but I didn't. It's my old camera and she just happened to be running away from me and the camera took the picture at that time!)

Seriously? She likes TV this much?

We put off allowing Addie to watch TV for a long time, but now we don't mind as much if she watches a small amount. We really keep an eye on how much she's watching - it doesn't matter if it's educational or not - what matters is the "vegging" out and not having independent play or playtime with parents or even communication while the television is on, and the bad habits it forms. So, when we do allow her to watch TV, she is sometimes very into it (most of the time though, she's playing and doing something else, which I like, but not when I need it to be a babysitter - ha!). And I'll be the first to admit that we have to use the DVD player in the car now that the passy is gone. We travel way, way, way too much to expect a two year old to sit in the car like an adult. Thank heavens for that thing (although the passy sure was sweeter!)!

The other day I peered around the corner and saw this:

Honestly, I'm not even sure this was one of her television programs! It looks like some kind of cocmmercial -ha!

Playtime...in the Garage!

We are so fortunate to have a 3 car garage. I honestly do not know what we'd do without it. We plenty of junk for a garage before we had Addie, but when you add 4 strollers (yes, we had 4 at one time, it's now only 3 b/c the baby stroller has been put in the attic), a wagon, a car, buckets, shovels, sidwalk chalk, bubbles, big bubble wands and pans, balls, golf clubs (kid golf clubs that is, adult golf clubs have long been in our garage!), tricycle, baby doll buggy, etc.... I just don't know where we'd put it. I guess we'd have to get a storage building, because I refuse to park in the driveway!

Anyway, the garage also serves as a great play area when it's too dark, cold, or windy to play outside otherwise. Addie and I had a great time playing in the garage the other day, while Daddy was cooking dinner. Tommy walked outside to see Addie pushing me on her tricycle, thus the pictures/camera that isn't usually present during a typical outside playtime. I put Addie on the tricycle to show her what to do (she's still too small), then I sat on it to show her what to do (and I'm definitely TOO BIG!!! I had to spread my knees so far out to keep my feet on the pedals that I was almost doing a split!), and she started pushing me, and pushing me fast! We went from one end of the garage to the other and she loved it!

She then wanted to bounce on the balls like she had done with Cody over Halloween. I did it with her, and it was all great and fun until she fell back and hit her head HARD on the concrete. I was terrified (and immediately put a bike helmet in my Amazon cart for Christmas!) and playtime ended immediately. She's pretty good at that - getting a solid, immediate end to something! Fortunately, she was just fine, just scared. Me too.

Here are some pictures - again poor quality, but I wanted to document this anyway!

Here's the only picture Tommy was able to get of Addie pushing me on the tricycle:
And us bouncing on the balls - she was having so much fun!:

And this picture doesn't show much of anything, but was right before she decided to bounce on that ball all on her own, and also when she fell!

Operation Christmas Child

I'd never participated in Operation Christmas Child before now, mostly because I never had a convenient location to drop off the boxes. This year though, St. Peter's was doing it and our family chose to make a box for each of certain members of our family, in lieu of gifts. I think this is far more important than giving someone a gift that they truly don't need. We are so very, very fortunate, I feel we really need to help those who aren't. This is just one very small way, but I figured we can do more each year to slowly change the way many of us feel about Christmas. Now, let me state here that we always, always do donations of many different sorts at Christmas and throughout the year, this was just the first year we have done this one.

Addie didn't help me put the boxes together too much, but she did enjoy putting them under the Christmas tree at church:

I love it - she's putting presents under a Christmas tree in a turkey dress!

While we were waiting on my dad to bring the car around (because we had SO many boxes to donate - yay!), Addie found it fun to try to push the button for the "alligator," known to the rest of the world as an "elevator!" Until she actually did push the button and the elevator started to move - then she freaked out!

Pushing the button for it...

then running from it - ha! My girl HATES loud noises of every single kind!

Happy Birthday Baby Grady!

Baby Grady (as Addie refers to him) turned one a few weeks ago. Addie enjoyed seeing and playing with some of her best friends again! Somehow I didn't get a picture of Grady, but he was just as cute as ever! Happy Birthday sweet boy!

Addie and Aiden playing with the Thomas train stuff (I know nothing about this stuff!)

Addie loved this laptop - I think Santa Mimi is getting her one for Christmas!

Break-N-Bake

When Addie and I were in Lexington last, we had dinner at my parents' house with Uncle Paul. After dinner, he and Addie made some cookies. I thought they were so cute "baking" together (our favorite kind of homemade cookies - the break apart and stick on the pan kind). And props go out to Uncle Paul who caught Addie from falling off of the counter, all while still holding the cookie pan in his hand! She gets all excited and starts wiggling, without realizing she's on a counter!

(Please excuse my picture quality - mine has been on the fritz and still takes great pictures, but sometimes it takes some finigiling to do so. Never fear, Mama bought herself a new big-girl camera the day after Thanksgiving! Merry Christmas to ME!!!!)

Do The Funky Turkey!

I had found a picture of a pink and green appliqued Christmas tree paired with a pair of pink and green pants, with the legs being different colors. I put mom on the task of making it for Addie, and when she had made the pants, I also snuck in having her make a pink and green turkey for double duty with the pants. The outfit was so cute and cozy! Thanks Mimi!

I love these pictures of her trying to see her turkey!

Kindermusik

Addie Kate has been taking Kindermusik since September. Because the parents are so involved in these classes, it is quite hard for me to take pictures. I didn't manage to snap a few the other day. We have stopped with Kindermusik for the holiday season and will resume in January. Addie absolutely loves it. She gets to sing and dance, two of her favorite things. She continues to sing the songs at home. We have the CD's that go with it, but I keep forgetting to pull them out. I definitely need to do that over the weeks we don't have Kindermusik so that she won't forget them.

Two funny/ sweet stories:

1 - I love this one. We do a lullaby of some sort and "rock" our children during the song. We do a lot of repetition so that the children can become familiar and learn the songs. The one we started with was "My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean." This song is also on a CD that we listen to in the car. Well, I was rocking Addie during the song and couldn't see her face. The director came over to me and told me, "She's singing it, she's singing the song. That is the sweetest thing I have ever seen." I too am amazed at how quickly Addie catches on to a song and memorizes the words. (Just over the weekend she learned "Rudolph" and can sing almost every single word!)

2 - At our 2nd Kindermusik class, the director paused for a minute before moving on to the next song, which was one where she asked the kids how they wanted to sing it. Addie yells out (Let me note here that this class is for 18 mos. to 4 years, and Addie is the 2nd youngest, at that time being 23 mos. old.) "Ring Around the Rosie!" Sweet thing! It wasn't time for "Ring Around the Rosie" - we do that at the end - but the director promised her that we would do it!

Here are a few pictures of one of our days at Kindermusik. Pardon the quality - it was very hard for me to snap these few! (Oh, and on another day when I didn't have my camera, AK was doing something adorable and the director asked me where my camera was - ugh!)

Marching with the rhythm sticks

(Yes Mom, her outfit is that wrinkled. I apologize!)

Princess Castle

Addie's MawMaw, Granddaddy, and Aunt Christie gave her this princess castle for her birthday! She loves it! I can imagine being a little girl and liking something like this. I think the older she is, the more she'll like it - once she realizes it's a place to escape or play on her own. As for now, she just likes climbing in and out of it!

Addie doesn't have anything with the Disney princesses on it, but she is slowly starting to recognize them. She is so funny -she'll go around it and point out the "prinpress," but when she gets to Snow White (the only Disney movie that she's ever watched - and probably won't again for a while - that witch is mean!), she'll say, "That not a prinpress, that a Snow White!"

Like her outfit? To copy her style, sweat out a fever from Fifth's Disease during your nap, have your daddy get you up and change you into your Halloween pajama bottoms, and the shirt he got you from Singapore. Don't worry with the hair - it totally goes with the ensemble.

Oh, and the princess castle does not reside in our living room, but fits nicely in the playroom now!