Saturday, December 26, 2009

Happy New Year and Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas everyone (and now Happy New Year too)!
A post in bullet format, or it'll never get done!

- The above is the best "together" picture I've gotten lately. With Sam crawling and cruising everywhere, she's not easy to get in one place and Katie either turns her head like she doesn't want her picture taken or tries to grab the camera to take some pictures of her own. Taken Dec. 23rd at Home Depot.

- Sam got her 5th tooth on Christmas Day...which explains (I think) her fussiness during Xmas Eve mass and Xmas morning (nap struggle).

- Katie did lots of Christmas baking

- Lots of evenings out! Lots of generous gifts!

- We listened to Fred Penner and Anne Murray CONSTANTLY.

- We made gingerbread houses with Jo-Anne and her girls G and C. They have a very cool trampoline, some dress-up clothes and Sam's first time crawling up stairs.

- Auntie Alli came home for a few days!

- Sam loves Peek a Boo.

- Katie fell asleep in teh car lots but still won't really nap.

- We walked a few blocks through Candy Cane Lane (lots of Christmas lights) and Ben and Katie caught snow on their tongues. Afterwards we went to a nearby church and looked at their (somewhat legendary) display of nativity sets/creches.

- Both girls had Christmas dresses.

- Sam practiced walking A LOT...she can walk with a walker toy now and cruises along walls as well as furniture. Gets up and down with ease...is fast fast fast.

Had a lovely holiday...busy with lots of fun and family. Many more pictures are coming. And more "bullets" if I can remember them. =)

See you soon (and hopefully more often) in this new year.










Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Cute...

I'm in the kitchen doing dishes and Katie comes in, not wearing pants because she took them off earlier. I'm ok with that since though it's -20C outside, it's quite nice inside. (Pick Your Battles)

She says "Hey mom, you stay here ok, I'm going to go pee all by myself!" (wagging her finger at me the whole time).

Cute things like this happen all day long.

Also...Sam is now comfortably pulling herself up to standing on whatever is nearby. And walking from couch to chair or person etc. if she's holding on to something. Kind of scary, but a wonderful sign of independence. Make no mistake, I mean wonderful for her, not for me. Seriously, we have come to the conclusion that we had no idea what childproofing was with Katie. I'll need that cloning thing they talk about to get through this upcoming toddlerhood.

(Katie's also a bit like my spy...she tells me when Sam starts to eat something off the floor...I love it!)

ALSO...while I'm here (doing this 2 second update) Sam officially grew her 4th tooth the other day! Yay! (or did I mention this already?). Back to the dishes!

Friday, December 11, 2009

A nice thing...

I have another blog post started with various minor things that are maybe a bit tough lately...but wanted to post about this instead:

Currently, part of our "go to bed" routine includes me nursing Sam on our bed, while Ben gives Katie a glass of milk in the living room and brushes her teeth. Most often Sam's still nursing when Katie finishes and they stop by the room and Katie stands by the door and says a variation of the same thing. Always "I love you", usually "I love Sam" and "Sam loves you too" (as I had said this back to her when she first started doing this). I'm not sure how much Ben prompts her as they walk to the door, but lately she's also been saying "I love you reading, I love you feeding Sam, I love books, I love you playing, I love you when we paint"...and maybe a few others that I've already forgotten. It's funny because you never quite know what she's going to say and sweet because you do sense true feelings (I think!).

And no matter what time we're waking up in the morning (4 or 5am), how much we don't like washing our hands or getting dressed to go out in -20C, how much we're falling on the floor... That goodnight always makes me smile.