Before we all implode or combust or something tomorrow.....

Since the world is ending tomorrow, I had better catch ya'll up on our month thus far.

We made wreath cookies.  My mom made these when I was little and used redhots for the berries.  Hers turned out less army green than mine but they still tasted yummy.

Here's our tree all lit up in it's glory.  Notice I only included the top half that's out of my little elves' reach.

And here are some nativities.  I'm getting quite a collection without meaning to.  My next door neighbor brought over a snowman nativity so now I'm up to 4.

 This is the one I made. It's my favorite one.

Sarah loves the tree the most. When she was just 2 months old, we would lay her under the tree and she would look around and kick for the longest time. That year, I almost left it up into January because it was so helpful. Now it's her self-proclaimed job to plug it in every morning (yes morning, not evening). She instructs us to say "oooooo" when she turns on the lights.

My kids love to draw. Like a lot. I have more papers with drawings than I know what to do with. The walls of my house are turning into art galleries.

 I love to watch Henry settle down on his tummy and be all serious-like with his pen.

So which horse would you guess was drawn by a 4-year-old? If you said all 3, you'd be wrong.  Two of these were drawn by adults.  College-educated adults.

Sarah is talking to her dad on the phone.  I don't remember what they were talking about but I sure love how all her attention was on him.

 She pulled out the drawer to make her own little phone-spot.

Henry loves nativities. Well he loves little animals.

My sister and her boys included Sarah in their gingerbread boy making.  Sarah wanted to make a gingerbread girl which meant lots of rainbow candies.

We went to the Riverwoods to look at lights. I like to go to SLC but this year it wasn't going to happen.  These in Provo hit the spot and it was closer, free to park, free horse-drawn wagon rides and lots smaller for little legs to walk.

You get to watch me learn how to take pictures of moving things in low light. Lucky you!

This is my favorite photo of the night.  Sarah was trying to warm her hands without "the fire burning my eyes."

So Sarah got this idea in her head that she can fly if only she practices.

 "I'm trying to be magic but I'm not being magic."

And Henry's love for his blanket is growing.  It's getting to Linus proportions.

 (Minus the thumb-sucking.)

12.12.12

Since posterity will want to know what my kids were doing on this momentous of days....

They were just being cute and messing up my house.

We also went grocery shopping at Macey's and got free cookies. I took a nap, Sarah watched the Grinch for the 10th time, and Henry finished off a bag of goldfish without my knowledge. 

Thanksgiving and caving into the demands of a preschooler

Thanksgiving may be old news but since my motto is, If I don't blog about it, it didn't happen, here's Thanksgiving.

The Monday before Thanksgiving we made this awesome turkey for FHE. And check out Sarah's equally cool turkey crown she made at preschool.

 This is the day before Thanksgiving. I sure like November days when we can play outside in short sleeves.

 Goof-ball

Henry LOVES his sister and loves when she plays with him. Notice his tongue? That's how we know he's concentrating.

I'm waiting for the episode of Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood about not picking up your baby brother. If Daniel sings it, she'll listen. I already have the lyrics to the song:

Don't pick up your brother. 

He doesn't like it 

and neither does Mom. 

Big brothers are for hugging, not lugging. 

(The songs on the show never rhyme either.)

 Cute little stinker that never listens!

I made Sarah and any other niece and nephew I could snatch color turkey napkin rings for Thanksgiving dinner. Everyone had to wait for them to finish up to actually set the tables and eat. They were a hit. At least I'd like to think so.

 On the back they wrote something they were thankful for.  Here's one of Sarah's.

 Turned out cute huh?

Here's Henry. That's the last of the pictures I took on Thanksgiving. Once I started eating, I didn't stop for nothing.

The day after Thanksgiving we went to Krispie Kreme after the Dye family party.  Sarah picked this snowman doughnut. She didn't want to eat it that night or the next day or the next day. I told her she needed to eat it. "But I'll miss it," she says. "Well if you don't eat it, it will go gross and we'll have to throw it away anyway," I explained.  Now imagine the conversation continuing for several more minutes, she saying the same thing, me trying to reword what I'm saying in terms that will help her understand that she cannot keep her doughnut forever, no matter if she eats it or not. 

We get nowhere so I decide to just stop talking to her about it.  Then Justin comes home from work and after dinner the subject gets brought back up by me (because I think she eating it will be less traumatic than me chucking it so I'm really trying to get her to eat it before it would make her sick) and the tears start flowing. Justin and Sarah have a nearly identical discussion/argument to what she and I went through that morning.  See in the picture how it looks like she's been crying?  She had.  A lot. Reminded me of the Great Balloon Loss of October 2012. Somehow Justin gets her to eat the doughnut. He takes lots of pictures of her and her precious snowman doughnut to remember the good ol' times and she eats it. And I just realized she hasn't brought it up since. Hasn't wanted to see the pictures and hasn't wanted another one. <shaking head>

I made this nativity out of wood blocks for the kids to play with. Sarah didn't quite understand the story behind them and sang "Mary had a little lamb" while playing with them on the stairs.

 That turned into playing a London Bridge is Falling Down-type game while singing Mary Had a Little Lamb.

 I sure loves me some getting-along kids.

Our neighbors across the street had their tree and lights up November 1 or something obscene.  Then two weeks before Thanksgiving, houses all over the neighborhood are lighting up.  That's fine, free country and all but it made Sarah very persistent that we get our decorations up much earlier than I like. (I just get tired of them by December 26 so I wait as long as possible). I think she thought we were the last family in the world to have a tree.  I'm more of a wait-until-December type and Justin is a don't-you-dare-before-Thanksgiving kind of guy so we've never had a problem waiting until December. November 30 I caved much to Sarah's delight.

Henry and Sarah actually make a good team. He likes to pull them off, she likes to put them on.

 

Our tree looks good on the top third, bare on the bottom third and totally full in the middle which is where Sarah puts the ornaments after Henry pulls them off so he won't do it again. Someday I'll have a stunning tree with coordinating ornaments perfectly placed. And it will be boring.

Sarah is just super excited about Christmas this year.  I think this is the first year she remembers Christmas from the previous year. She's been asking a lot of questions about babies and Santa and both topics make me uncomfortable. I believed in Santa when I was a kid and it was all good and fun and I wasn't traumatized when at 8 I figured it out.  But I just can't bring myself to lie to her when she asks about him. She's full of ideas from watching Frosty and Rudolph and I can't bring myself to perpetuate the myth. Am I taking this too seriously? Should I just have fun with it? Yesterday in the car she proclaimed "I love Santa" and I got jealous. If she asks if Santa brought such and such toy in past years I always tell her no, mom and dad gave that to you. Is that bad? What are your thoughts on Santa? Do you downplay him?  It's not a "true meaning v. Santa" thing for me, I just feel weird lying and I want the credit.

Random Goodness

I know Boho chic is a totally sincere style but whenever I see someone with their hair like this, I have to laugh.

Because that's how my 4-year-old does her hair.

Last weekend when it snowed, my kids were totally excited.  Well, Sarah was excited. Henry hadn't seen snow before (in his baby memory). Henry's snow clothes are little big.  His pants kept sliding down over his big boots making it pretty hard to walk and his coat was so long, his hands didn't reach the end. We didn't have to bother with gloves.

You can't ask your 18-month-old if he wants to go sledding and expect him to be excited.  You just have to put him on the sled and hope the traumatization is kept to a minimum and if not, then you hope their baby memory doesn't carry over to next year.

 He liked it. He didn't smile or laugh but he gestured to go again.

Sarah, the snow pro, was all over it.  Whenever it would stop snowing for 2 minutes, she would ask all paranoid if the snow was melting.  She's having a hard time today now that the rain melted away all that remained.

We went inside and had hot chocolate. Henry liked the chocolate covered spoon we got as a neighbor gift last Christmas. I love messy faces.

I taught Sarah to vacuum.  The vacuum is at least twice her weight so it makes manuevering a little difficult but she likes to help and do big things. I don't understand how someone so messy can love to clean so much and yet not clean up their own stuff when I tell her to.

This picture is a little old but it's never too late to post an awesome picture of something random on your baby's head.

Henry turned 18 months on Wednesday. This age is bittersweet for me because it seems like they shed their baby-ness at such a rapid rate from here on out.  He's such a sweet boy.

He says dad all the time and has said mom a couple of times but not for a couple of months. He says egg, cheese, hot, and waves good-bye.  He says the word "off" all the time and it could mean "take my socks off" "put my socks on" "take off your jacket" "open this jar" "open the front door" "put my shoes on my feet" "put my socks on my hands" "open the toy box" and many others, depending on the context. I remember Sarah saying more words at this age but I think that's a boy v. girl thing. He "talks" all the time, even to strangers. It's funny to watch people try to understand what he's saying to them. I have to tell them it's just baby jibberish. He loves to tell stories and tell me all about his night when I get him out of his crib in the morning.

I am amazed at how much he understands.  "Henry, will you throw this away for me?" "Can you go get the remote?" And he'll do it too.  Best kid ever.

He's still a world-class sleeper and napper. He's also walking pretty fast. I wouldn't call it a run but chasing Sarah gives him motivation to hustle. He whispers if you whisper to him which is the sweetest thing ever.  He loves any type of ball, car, and anything he can push around. I'm excited for him to open his Christmas presents. Oh, and books. We have yet to reach the end of his book-reading attention span.

I took him to nursery last week and he cried when I had to leave to conduct RS. He doesn't even come up to the other kids' shoulders.  And he can't get up and down out of the little chairs on his own.  I'm going to help in his class until the end of the year so hopefully by then he'll be okay (It took Sarah 6 months to stay without crying). Ordinarily I wouldn't really push nursery that much because, heck, it's just nursery but Justin and I both have Sunday responsibilities that Henry is not helpful with. He hates everything about church except for the drinking fountain.

Halloween 2012

Sarah got a bead set for her birthday and made her dad this necklace Monday night.

Then we carved pumpkins! Sarah wanted nothing to do with cleaning out the pumpkins. But she was all about telling me how to carve it. 

She watched with her hand over her mouth most of the time.

Demon pumpkins.

 Barfing pumpkins.

Sarah got to wear her costume to school the day before Halloween.  Her class then went trick-or-treating to other classrooms in the highschool.  Check out her belt buckle.  It's my favorite part of her costume.  Or the vest I made.

So Henry loves his blanket.  He sleeps with it on his head a lot.  It used to worry me that he couldn't breath but clearly it works for him.  Plus it blocks out light for those long naps. 

Surprise, surprise, Henry wouldn't wear his Halloween costume. So he was just a handsome boy. This is the best picture I got of the two of them before Henry walked away and Sarah pulled her hat over her face.

We went to Mapleton for Justin's parent's ward trunk-or-treat.  I thought this would be best for Henry since he walks slow and not for very long.  He liked getting the candy and eating it but not carrying his bucket.

Then we took the kids to my aunt's house but before we went in, we hit up a few more houses because while trunk-or-treating is good for large amounts of candy in a small amount of time, it doesn't quite feel the same as knocking on doors. And heck, more candy.

 And we ended up carrying Sarah's bucket because it got too heavy.

Sarah used some birthday money to buy this cash register. We play pet store, grocery store, balloon store, bookstore, you name it store nearly every day while Henry naps.  She had me make name tags and we take turns being the cashier and the shopper.  Money well spent.

 The best thing about toys made in China: They come with toy Mike.

And today is my mom's birthday. I'm going to try to get her a new president.