Curls

"Where did you get all those curls?"

If I had a nickle for every time I heard that we wouldn't have to save for college! I must admit that I am a little bit jealous of my daughter's beautiful curls. They are shiny and bouncy and all I have to do is get them wet and brush them out to make them look like this.

I love those sweet little ringlets...especially since my own hair is the exact opposite.

Another reason I am thankful for Bug's curls is that everywhere we go, as those of you with more than one child know, a baby gets all the attention. Complete strangers come up to us ALL the time to ooh and ahh over Boo, but thankfully they usually turn and see Bug's curls and start oohing and ahhing over them too. This helps cut down on any jealousy issues.

It will be interesting to see what Boo's hair looks like when she finally decides to grow some. Will it be curly like Bug's or straight like mine and her Daddy's? Only time will tell, but I can't help but cross my fingers, hoping that she'll get her sister's beautiful curls!

P.S. Bug is not really listening to anything...whenever Daddy leaves his ear buds plugged into the computer she likes to put them in her ears and pretend like she's listening to music. :)

BWF Smackdown

Last week our adorable nephew, Waylon, and his mommy got to come spend the night at our house!

Auntie Nae has recently started a lia spohia jewelry business and I decided to host a show to help her get started. I was so impressed with how well she did! She was extremely professional in her presentation, but at the same time it was very casual and relaxed. I'm sure you'll be spotting me in lots more jewelry in future pictures b/c I got a ton of it! Being a hostess is definitely the way to go! You get tons of deals, plus you get a percentage of your show sales. I'm really excited to get all my jewelry and can't wait to start wearing it. Thanks Danae!

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Anyway, while we were having our party T had the babies in the nursery. Apparently the babies were having a little smackdown competition in there...and T, being a dad, just took pictures. :)

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And now! It's time! For the BWF (Baby Wrestling Federation) Smackdown!

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In our left corner we have Waylon, weighing in at 18 pounds, and measuring 29 inches. And in our right corner we have the "Boo", weighing in at 17 pounds, and also measuring 29 inches. Let the games begin!

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And the "Boo" makes the first move...crawling toward the competitor with lightening speed.

And she comes away with the first point.

Wait! This isn't ultimate fighting! I see an illegal acquisition of a weapon!

She's got him down!

Foul!

And with that...the ref calls the match. Waylon is the winner by default.

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Now on to some more humane games.

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The contestants put aside their differences and decide to work together. The Boo is going to try to teach Waylon how to crawl.

Well, the crawling lessons didn't work out so well, so in the morning Waylon decided to teach Boo how to walk! He started walking over Thanksgiving...at 9 months!!!

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"See, ya gotta move that foot first, then the other, and you just keep goin."

Bug wanted to get in on the Waylon fun!

And it's nice to see that after all that roughhousing and poor sportsmanship the babies can still be friends.

Check back for the next match up...scheduled for Christmas 2010.

"Laugh With Me!" - Part 8

October 6th

We were looking at some pictures that were taken before Bug was born. She was looking for herself. We've been over this time and again..."You weren't born yet" sometimes she accepts this explanation and sometimes she doesn't.

K - "Where's me?"

Me - "You aren't in these pictures."

K - "Why not? Did you forget me in your tummy?"

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October 13th

I think I have mentioned this one before but sometimes Bug will say something that we say to her but is inappropriate for a child to say to an adult. I always try to explain why she shouldn't say such things while trying not to laugh. We were having a conversation about something she wanted and I told her no. She was getting frustrated that I wouldn't let her have it and said, "Don't argue me!"

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October 16th

K - "Is Jesus bigger than God or is He shorter?"

Me - "Umm, the same."

K - "Can I hold Jesus in my hand?"

Me - "No, the bible says that He is so big He can hold us in the palm of HIS hand." I picked up a crust of bread that Boo was eating and put it in my hand. It's like we are the size of this bread in His hands.

K - "Ohhhh, now I get it. Jesus is like when I eat my crust!"

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October 20th

We were riding in the car K pipes up with, "Mom? Can I be a dog when I grow up?"

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October 22

We took my Grandma out to lunch.

Once we were done she said, "Mmm, that was good. I gobbled up my food."

K - turns to her, very seriously, and says, "Mama! Don't gobble your food, you might choke!!"

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October 24th

In the car

K - "My tummy hurts."

Me - "Why?"

K - "I think I ate too much JUNK!"

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October 28th

K went to the bathroom wearing pjs. I was on the computer and she comes galloping back into the room, wearing nothing but a cowboy hat, and yelling, "HOWDY PARTNER!"

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October 30

K - "Daddy is this a mustache?"

(fingering T's five o'clock shadow)

T - "Sort of."

K - "It's really frickly! Are freckles frickly too?"

Molar Fun

We have 10 teeth! Boo seems to be keeping up with her month status: 8 teeth at 8 months, 9 at 9, and now 10 at 10. Unfortunately for us, this time it was a molar. Not fun. Poor baby had a hard time of it. The first thing I noticed was that she wasn't nursing well. She acted like she was teething but I couldn't see anything, until I looked way back and saw the bloody, swollen lump on her bottom left. Poor thing. It has been several days of fussiness, poor nursing, and night waking, but I think we are finally over it. Now we only have...what, 10 more teeth to cut? Oh joy.

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I tried and tried to get a picture of the new molar, but she was having none of it.

Daddy finally busted out the relentless tickle fingers which was a good mood improver but didn't work very well for a picture. :)

Open, open, open.

Nope.

We finally just had to pry her mouth open. Of course, she wasn't all that excited about the change in method, but we at least got a shot. That just looks painful. Ouch.

Thankfully a bit of tickling and some infant Tylenol took care of the discomfort. :)

Hopefully the matching molar decides to wait awhile before making it's appearance. I don't know if I can handle another week like this one anytime soon!

Gingerbread

Every year I am always on the lookout for fun Christmas traditions to add to our repertoire. My mom and I spotted this gingerbread kit in the store and thought it would be a fun one to start with the girls.

I think K consumed more sugar than she put on the house. Every time I looked up she had something else in her mouth. Goofball. :)

She was very precise about her "pat-rern".

And was quite pleased with her finished product.

Boo's favorite tradition this year is snuggling.

Does anyone have any fun ideas for Christmas traditions that we could borrow?

Bear

K found something the other day that instantly shot my sympathy meter for Koala through the roof. This...

Isn't that the most adorable furry face you've ever seen? No? Why not? Is it the missing nose? It used to be a velvet chocolaty brown. When that wore off it was a black mesh. A few years later it was just a brown plastic nose. Then, after an encounter with a new puppy, the nose disappeared completely leaving a crusty brown and white hole. So other than the nose, most adorable? Still no? Is it the grungy, shaggy gray fur? It used to be white. You can still see the white if you pull back the seams.

This was my Bear. Creative name, I know. He was given to me for Christmas, by my Aunt Karen, in the second grade. It was love at first sight. I slept with him almost every night for the next 15 years. In fact, my new husband had to request that I stop sleeping with him when we got married. I took him to college. I took him on vacation. He was my baby. He was so big and fluffy that he was kind of like an extra pillow and I could never get comfortable when sleeping without him.
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I went to my scrapbooks and found a picture of him in the first one I took down. (I happen to have 24, 25? scrapbooks, one or more for each year of life...that is a dedicated mom!)
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Here we are, gliding peacefully through dreamland together. Apparently we were going skiing. In New Mexico?


Here's Bear sitting on my bed in my first college apartment.

And proof that my husband wasn't always against him. :)

And here's some proof that I wasn't the only one taking a "lovey" to college. My roommate had a doll on her bed too! Haha. Maybe she can tell us the story behind it in the comments? :)

So there you have it. I will now be much more sympathetic to my daughter when her beloved Koala gets left behind. Because you just can't replace those memories of your first love.

Trimming the Tree

As soon as we got home on Sunday we started to put up all our Christmas decorations. We got the tree all set up so as soon as the girls got up from their naps we could start decorating. The first order of business was the Santa hats. For some reason we always wear Santa hats while decorating the tree...and listen to Christmas music. It's tradition. Boo wasn't too keen on the tradition of the hat. She did NOT want to wear that thing!

We tried to keep it on long enough to get a picture but she was a master at whipping it off.

This one was taken mere nano-seconds before the hat was off once again.

Daddy finally pinned her hands to her sides so I could snap a pic.

Bug was very "helpful". Actually she did really well decorating the tree, she just didn't do very good with the ornament box. She pulled the cardboard layers out so all three tiers of ornaments ended up all piled up in a tangled mess at the bottom. Ugh.

After I got it semi-sorted out we started hanging them on the tree.

Two of my loves.

She takes this job pretty seriously! :)

All the ornaments are up...time for the star!

There it goes!

Ta-da!

(and yes she is wearing a hot pink shirt w/red checked capri pants when there is two feet of snow outside...and yes, she dressed herself!)

I tried to get a sister picture to commemorate the 2010 decorating of the tree.

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As you can see it did not go over so well.

Maybe next year.