Christmas Highlights

These are so out of order but I don't feel like taking the time to rearrange them :o)

New Shoes from Aunt Char

She got a candy bracelet in her stocking and ate the string! Joe had to go rooting for it stuck in her teeth!

A little spoiled over the last few days getting rocked to sleep by anyone willing

Stocking surprises and her giant Christmas gift from Mom and Dad was a new table and chairs

Playing with her new kitchen cabinet from Aunt Kara and Uncle Ben. She LOVES it!

Mom & Dad got Annie a craft kit complete with her own pack of mini post-it notes!

Always enough laps to go around

Dads gift to Mom. Photo courtesy of Krissy Livingston Photography

I made Elly, Dora & Anella hats and tutu's. I wish I had a better picture of them but this is all I have :o( They turned out adorable! I am overly proud of myself :o)

Amelia doing what Amelia does best

And lastly we joined about 500 other children for Lyla's Second birthday party and cookie decorating! As Kerry put it so well, it was good to spend time with the people we call our best family friends yet only get to talk to a few times a year!

All Things Christmas

Seeing the Trains

A pre-lunch cookie!

Magical!

Trying to get her to talk to "Hoho" at Festival of Lights

Its the most wonderful time of the year... and yet nothing changes here on the homestead it just gets more snugly warm with a fire burning and pine scented :o) Christmas the past two years has really made me reflect on Christmases past and how I would like family traditions to play out in the future. As certain ones of my siblings start their own family traditions and don't come to my moms on Christmas day (some come for dinner) I assure her that I always will. She says I wont always feel that way but we will see.
I will take a sort of Christmas Carol theme here.
Christmas Past- when we were little we traveled over the river and through the woods to grandmas house. About a 4 hour trip come rain, shine or snow. I LOVE traveling, especially for the holidays! It is magical. We found out once we were grown that one year my dad built a false bottom in the back of our conversion van in order to hide our Christmas gifts without us knowing. I think my dad loved to travel as well, it must be where I got it. Although he would get extremely tired of riding in the car with the five of us by hour 3.5 and we all had to shut up and no more talking until we got to our destination. We would sing songs, play car travel games like the "ABC game" and the "license plate game". One year, we were pretty old so it was probably the last trip we all made together, my mom tried to get us to write "the Glenn Family's 12 days of Christmas" we only made it to 7... ask anyone in the family and they will simply exclaim "SEVENNNNN!" hehe sorry that is probably funnier to us kids than you blogging friends.
Grandmas house was Christmas Magic! Probably the closest thing to actually being in the North Pole. There were presents galore around what in my memory was a 45 foot tree (turns out its not, go figure) Our own hand made stockings with our names on them hung on Christmas Eve by my Grandpa who would inevitably staple his finger with the gun almost yearly. Family gathering and exchanging gifts, Grandma forgetting where she put the gifts and having them handed to you for hours afterward with a "here I forgot this one" or even better, opening something only to have it taken out of your hands and thrust into someone else's with a "oops thats not yours" I loved that crazy old lady but why were we so surprised to find out she had early Alzheimers? :o)
After we were all starting to graduate and in College and getting married mom decided to start our own family traditions at home and not travel up until new years. I was particularly missing Granny one Christmas day at Moms when she and Grandpa pulled into the driveway! Surprise! I cried! :o)
Last year Grandpa let us girls pick out some of Grandmas Christmas decorations to have as our own and buddy how I cried when I was getting them out to decorate a few weeks ago!

Christmas Present
Our family tradition now is to get together at mom and dads with our siblings usually the Sunday before Christmas and spend the day exchanging gifts, playing games and eating too much (I do wish I could break that last one) Its fun to watch the kids and enjoy each other's company. Its crazy because there are so many of us and its just our immediate family!
We also get together one day and bake cookies which is always eventful with so many little ones all running around apron clad on powdered sugar highs.
Joe and I exchange gifts on Christmas eve but only because that's about as long as we can wait. The girls get a stocking from "Santa" Christmas morning and this year Annie is getting a gift from us for the first time! This year we went to festival of Lights at the zoo where Annie nearly lost her toes to frost bite and screamed the whole time just to exclaim tearfully between hiccups as we left "dis is so fun mama". We also attempted to drive around the neighborhood to see Christmas lights which she also cried through and it gave me a new attitude towards doing anything with a 2 year old. Keep the expectations low!
Today we went to Krohn Conservatory to see the nativity scene and the pointsetta display and then Downtown to Duke to see the train display where they handed out the most amazingly good cookies I have ever tasted! Annie loved it, but again keeping the expectations low we only stayed at both places about 1o min each. She asked if we could get Pizza for lunch so we decided to try out the new Mellow Mushroom in Wilder. It was very tasty although with our love of a Large Dominos pizza for $6.99 we just couldn't justify spending $12 on a small.
We spend a day with Joes family as well eating snacks all day along with a huge tray of chick-fil-a nuggets, you can't go wrong and there is something to be said for not having to spend time in the kitchen! I love that we have separate days to spend with each of our families and not having to rush around. Christmas Day our family and Kelly spend the day at Mom's in our jammies watching Christmas movies, making a gingerbread house and then we have dinner with whoever wants to come over that night, usually just Kara's family.

Christmas Future
Obviously I have no idea how it will go but I anticipate not much changing. I love the little traditions we are building and hope that they will become sweeter each year as the girls build their memories. Now that I am a mother I have a new found appreciation of the Christmas story and Annie is enjoying me reading the story to her as well as pointing out "Baby Jesus and MaryMama!" in every nativity we pass. She told me the other day "Joseph took Mary to Bethlehem" I am so proud of that little girl!

Big Girl Talk

I just wanted to remember this conversation that happened in the car today

Annie playing with a elf doll that she calls "shelf"

Annie: "Mama Shelf sleepy" "Shelf needs bwankwet"
I dig around in the diaper bag and hand her my nursing cover "here's a blanket for Shelf"

a minute later
"I feeding Shelf Mama" I look back to see her with the nursing cover properly draped around her shoulders and her nursing her elf and just smile... she has never done that before.

a minute later
"Mama Shelf Stinks!" "Shelf potty Mama" "Shelf potty cause he's a big girl... a big kid..."

Update in Pictures

Only plays with her toes when they are bare

Here's Joe's attempt at a Christmas picture

Has anyone seen Mia? She can only go backwards at this point

First attempt at food. Sweet potatoes were not a hit. Oh well

Dear Jesus please forgive Mama for not praying before our breakfast tea party... and Annie for emptying the salt and pepper shakers on her plate of eggs when Mama walked away.

An impromptu tea party at Mamas feet while she makes dinner

The most awful Christmas cookies you have ever tasted but they were still fun to put sprinkles on!

Bullet Points!

An attempt to get a good pictures of the girls resulting in tears and exasperation :o)

• I noticed yesterday that my neighborhood friendly Fed Ex delivery man is a runner, a sprinter even! I have never noticed his quickened step before so I am going to assume it is either A) necessary to sprint in order to get all the gifts delivered this time of year. B) He is working on commission based on number of packages delivered! To prove to you just how fast he is, I saw him coming up the walk yesterday with a very large package that I didn't want to try to lift into my house. So I opened the door and asked him to put it in the entryway. He obliged and then turned and leaped off my front porch and then ran to his truck! And I saw him do it again at the neighbors this very morning so I know it was not some strange dirty diaper smell coming from my house that caused him to turn and run so fast :o)

• I tried all of Elly's hand me down jeans on Annie earlier this week to see if by chance any of them would fit... they all went up to her armpits and the crotch was at her knees! What is it about little baby pants? I need to share them with a cloth diapering friend who's extra padded baby bottom would take up all the extra space :o) Anyway I am going to assume the following conversation was as a result of 4 pairs of jeans not fitting Annie. She came into my room a few days later as I was trying with no success to fit into a pair of pre-pregnancy jeans as I was taking them off she looked at me and said "whatsa matter Mama no fit?"! NO Thank you teeny tiny bottomed child they DON'T fit!

• I wanted to get the girls out of the house for a little while today so we ventured 3 miles up the road to the Library. I told Annie we would get some new Christmas music to which she replied "Yeah Christmas mucous!" ewwww not exactly. Anyway Annie has only been to the library once and she was running all over the place with excitement so I considered strapping her into the stroller but I just didn't have the heart. So immediately upon arrival she went over to the puzzles, great, Ill peruse the music and I can keep an eye on her from there! I could even go a little further and still see her reflection in a glass door. However when she was being so good with a few puzzles and I decided to wander a bit further I returned to see her throwing all the board books off the shelves. She managed to clear half the shelf! I was SO embarrassed, I helped her stack the books (she was confused as to why I didn't want her to re-shelve them) and made her apologize to the librarian for pulling them all off! Then on the way to the car she ran into the back of me because her adorable snow hat fell over her eyes and she wiped out hard core in the parking lot and ended up sprawled on her back! She immediately jumped up said "I donk mama" and ran to the car saying "this is so fun!" Oh and I left after paying my fine without any books or music!
  

• While jumping off the coffee table onto the couch (and I wonder why she is out of control at the library) Annie stopped and pointed to my face. We had just had lunch and so I thought there was something on me. I was going to let her brush it off my face until she stuck her finger up my nose and offered to pick it for me! Gosh what a thoughtful giving child I am raising!

Ann Girl

So I went to get Annie out of bed yesterday morning and she started talking and pointing as soon as I came in the room. This is rare for her to just launch into a story the second she sees me she usually wants to see Mia and that's all (love :o). Another rarity is that I couldn't understand what she was saying. It was like she had decided to pick up a whole new vocabulary overnight and my mommy translation ears were not educated yet. She was pointing to the corner of the room and all I could make out of the whole story was the word "man"... ok my daughter is pointing to the corner and saying "blah, blah, blah, man mama!" I eerily looked into the corner of the room behind the chair and said "what man Annie?" "Jesus mama!"! YIKES! Well... ok, I suppose there could be creepier men in the corner of her room behind the chair. So I was totally weirded out by this experience although happy to know that Jesus hangs out in my baby's room while she sleeps.

Until later that evening when I asked her what song she wanted to sing I was enlightened as to what on earth she was talking about that morning. She was not pointing she was holding up two tiny fingers saying "we little man was he" You see the man was Zacchaeus along with Jesus and they weren't in her room those pointing fingers were the motions to the song they have been singing in Sunday School! I never did like that song when I was little because a wee little man who was a nasty tax collector just didn't sit right with me. I think I missed the point to the story and dwelled on the mans sin issues instead of what the Lord saw :o) However hearing my baby say "sycamore tree" is just too cute!

10 Things I Am Thankful For

I just thought I would take this opportunity to jot down a few things that are swirling around it my head on this Thanksgiving eve.

1. Chai Tea which I am enjoying right now on this rainy evening.
2. My first baby who wanted to be rocked to sleep and would still prefer it at 2 years old. My second baby who just wants to be laid down in bed to fall asleep on her own... and therefore I get more done :o)
   
3. A hard working hubby. Although I struggle with all of the projects that he says "yes" to I have learned a lot from him about selflessly serving others and his "just do it" attitude.
   
4. Parents who have approximately 36 people for a sit down meal every Thanksgiving since as far back as I can remember!
5. Organizational skills which I did not get from my mother (wink, wink, just kidding mother) and the love of using them to bless others... seriously do you need anything organized? I would love to do it for you and its even better if you have a little money to spend on fancy organizational items like baskets and totes!
   
6. My funny Grandpa Neal who I have enjoyed getting to know better as an adult but can still lay my head on his shoulder or let him scratch my back :o) I love going to visit him and the rest of my moms family because it is the one place on earth I can feel like a carefree kid again. I can't wait to go up for Christmas/New years next month!
   
7. Joe's Mom who is an amazing wonder woman with so much energy and pretty much has a grandchild at her house at all times yet willingly takes on more house guests at a moments notice.
   
8. The heart that the Lord has instilled in me to teach my girls about Him and His Characteristics. Although Joe is much better at it than I am so I am thankful for a parenting sidekick.
   
9. My siblings all of them for individual and wonderful reasons. They all teach me so much about loving the Lord in their daily lives. Kelly who sums up the term "wears her heart on her sleeve" She loves the Lord so obviously and I can be so honest and real with her. Plus she is super fun to live with right now because of fun wedding plans! Donald for his hardworking servants attitude and no nonsense ways. Lauren for her strong back and brilliant mind who is always teaching me something about perseverance and discipline gratefulness to the Lord. Kris who is paving the parenting road ahead of me and constantly amazing me with her ability to teach her children at all times. I strive to be the graceful and attentive mother that she is. Kara who is everything that a big sister should be and more. She is a tough, tough person and so broken for the Lord at the same exact moment! She is so much fun and exciting and loves serving her friends and family and creating memories and doing it all in such a Proverbs 31 kind of way. This list is by far not exhaustive!
   
10. For what hair I have left because gosh darn it has been shedding like crazy in this postpartum time around and since the bible says that He knows every hair on my head I would like to take this opportunity to say "Please sweet Jesus leave just a few!"