Christmas 2012 Recap in Photos

We're back!  We had a great Christmas--first at our house on Christmas morning, then an impromptu trip to visit my husband's family (it was supposed to be the day after Christmas, but bad weather that day meant that if we wanted to see them, we had to fit it in on Christmas Day), and then several days with my family. 

The girls were thrilled with everything.  And my husband completely surprised me with my big gift--an iPad!  I had been wanting one, but didn't ask for one because I knew I didn't need it, and there were lots of other things I needed more.  But I got the things I needed PLUS an iPad!  I couldn't believe it.  I love it!

So here are pictures from the last few days.  Enjoy!  And Happy New Year!

Rachel's biggest wish was a Merida dress (the princess from Brave).  It was the last gift she opened.  She was so excited.

Daddy got the girls head lamps.  Hilarious!

Rebecca loves Minnie Mouse!

She also loves Doc McStuffins, so my mom made her this doctor's coat that says, "Doc Rebecca."

Not only did Rachel get a Merida dress, Grandma had a whole box of Brave stuff, including another Merida dress (that she made herself!), wig, shoes, crown, necklace, earrings, bow, arrows, and quiver.  This is Rachel opening the box

then expressing her excitement!

And all dressed up.... (isn't the wig hilarious???)

Rebecca had to get in on the Merida excitement, too....

Both girls are excited about my iPad, too!

What fun!

Nutcracker 2012

Today was the day!

Rachel was so excited.

It will never be as exciting as it was the first time we went, but it was a fun afternoon.

And just because Rebecca wanted her picture taken, too, here she is, with Grandma and Rachel:

 

 

And here are a few pictures from yesterday--our first snowfall of the year, and Rebecca's first time playing in the snow.  She mostly just walked around in it, laughing, and watched Rachel and me have a snowball fight (my first snowball fight with my daughter--she thought it was hilarious!).  We tried to make a snowman, without success.  And Rachel made a few snow blocks with this snow block maker, but mostly she just posed with it.

 



another failed attempt

Here's what happened last year we took the girls to see Santa.

I thought this year might be different.  Rebecca's not too shy anymore.  She's excited about Christmas and Santa and was excited about going to see him.

But as soon as I set her down on his lap, this happened:

And this:

After I quickly snapped the pictures I rushed over and rescued her.  She stopped crying right away and talked to him a little bit in the safety of my arms.  She told him she wanted a purple present.

Rachel changed her mind about what she had written in her letter to Santa and told him something completely different that she wanted him to bring.  Uh oh!

He asked her if she'd been a good girl.  She's gotten in some trouble at school lately, so she said, "Well, I've been a little bit good and a little bit bad, but I'm trying to do better."  He thanked her for being an honest girl and told her just to do her best and that no one can be good all the time. 

the best laid plans...

When we won the Nutcracker tickets, my plan was to wait and surprise Rachel the morning of the show with the tickets. 

But then, a week or so ago she came home from school with a birthday party invitation.  And wouldn't you know that it was for the exact day and time as I had already chosen the Nutcracker tickets.  Ugh. 

She was so excited about the birthday party (are all six year olds as into birthday parties as she is?  She talks about them for weeks and weeks!), but once I looked at the invitation, I knew she couldn't go.  But I couldn't tell her that she couldn't go unless I told her about The Nutcracker!  I hated changing the plans to surprise her, but I didn't really have a choice.

So I wrapped up a Nutcracker bookmark I had found and when she opened it I told her about winning the tickets and going to see it.  She was really excited, until she found out it meant that she couldn't go to the birthday party.  I guess I should've anticipated that reaction, but I didn't.  Lots of tears.  Ugh.

But over time, she's forgotten about the birthday party and is really excited to go to the Nutcracker tomorrow.  She's been listening to the music up in her room (two years ago after we saw it for the first time I bought her the CD for Christmas, and she loves it) and dancing to it.

The plan was for Grandma and Grandpa (who are coming with us to the Nutcracker tomorrow) to come down today and go with the girls and me to go visit Santa.  Rachel's been talking about it for a week.  But then winter decided to make an appearance, and it's going to snow all day here.  They said the roads are going to get worse and worse today, so they've decided to wait and come down tomorrow in time for the Nutcracker, and not go with us to see Santa today (tomorrow the weather is supposed to be fine).    So once again, plans change. 

Rachel's not good at changing plans.  Thankfully she took this one in stride.  I'll have to wait and see how the roads are before I decide whether or not to go on with the plan to go see Santa today.  That's a plan I'm afraid she won't be as okay with!  We'll see....

Rebecca's strep throat is the easiest case of strep throat I've ever heard of.  After we went to the doctor she hasn't had a fever at all!  She takes her medicine like a pro.  You can't even tell that she was ever sick.  Still hoping that Rachel doesn't come down with it, though....that would probably change some more plans, and that would make her (and me!) really sad.

medicine

Rebecca loves taking medicine.  This is a complete turnaround from what I'm used to with Rachel, who is terrible about taking medicine.

So it's a good thing that it's Rebecca who's been diagnosed with strep throat, not Rachel!

The last few days she's had a pretty high fever, and I figured it was just a virus, and wasn't planning on taking her to the doctor, but the more I thought about it, the more I thought now would probably be a better time to take her, rather than waiting until later in the week, closer to the holiday, when there would probably be fewer doctors in the office and harder to get an appointment.

I'm SO GLAD I did!  I never expected strep throat.  Neither of them has ever had it.  She wasn't complaining of her throat hurting, and was still eating okay.  Just the fever, really. 

So now she's on the pink stuff, except it's not pink!  It smells like it, is the same consistency, but it's white, not pink!  She likes it.  Oh, it makes it so much easier that way.  Bless you, Rebeeca!!!

Now I am really, really hoping that Rachel doesn't catch it. 

Gotta go wake up my sick girl to go to the bus stop.  In a few minutes it will be Christmas vacation!  Rachel's done with school for a couple of weeks.  YAY!

an eventful weekend

Last week/weekend was the busiest, most exhausting of the month (year??). Whew!  I'm so excited to relax and do nothing today (well, if you count lots of laundry and wrapping Christmas presents nothing....).

This weekend Rachel performed three times in the kids' choir at our church and I performed three times in a choir at a different church across town (I skipped two additional performances in order to see Rachel in hers, or I would've been in five!).  It was BUSY, and I didn't know how we'd make it all work, but we survived, and it all went well.

 

Here are some pictures from Rachel's performance.  She did great and it was so fun watching her up on stage.  I can't really put many because there are other children's faces in them.  Hopefully I cropped these well enough.

Also, this weekend, my parents came (to see us sing) and made gingerbread cookies with the girls.  By this point Rebecca was done with baking and didn't want to pose for pictures, so I only have pictures of Grandma and Rachel.

And not to be outdone, here's Rebecca.  She was a trooper this weekend, putting up with everyone else performing.  She had to do lots of waiting around.  At our church they have this nativity scene set up, and she enjoyed playing in it while she waited for Rachel to finish singing for the last time.

the lucky one

Remember how my dad won us tickets to go see the Nutcracker?

Well, before we found out he won, I had entered another giveaway.  And would you believe that I just found out yesterday that I won that one, too!?!?!? 

I won four more tickets!  Is that crazy or what?  I've never been lucky in this sort of thing before, so I don't know why this sudden stroke of luck, but I'm so thankful to have been blessed by EIGHT tickets to this show!

Last night I called a friend with two little girls who I thought might like them.  She told me, "I think you're about to make my little girl's dream come true!"  Her daughter (a friend of Rachel's) had recently seen the Barbie Nutcracker video, and there was a documentary at the end about the real Nutcracker ballet, which she loved watching.  Then her mom told her that they do the Nutcracker here in town, and she started begging to go see it.  They looked into going, but the only tickets left are the really expensive seats, so they decided not to go.  And then I called her with four extra tickets!  I'm so excited that I could help make her dreams come true.  They're so thrilled.

As fun as it is to know we get to go see it again next weekend (Rachel still doesn't know--please don't tell her if you see her!), I think it's even more fun to get to play Santa and give these away to a little girl and her family who really, really want them. 

fancy

Over Thanksgiving my mom decided she wanted to get Rachel a gingerbread house for us to put together at Christmastime.  While looking at them, I saw this:

If you know Rachel, you know what a perfect find this was.  She's still very princess-obsessed, and loves anything having to do with princesses, castles, fairies, fancy...you get the idea.  So this was perfect. 

She couldn't wait to put it together, but we had to wait until a weekend, when we'd have more time to devote to it.  This past Saturday was finally the day.  Of course, we couldn't wait until a normal hour-- my girls are up at the crack of dawn, so all kinds of things happen around here before 8:00 AM, including making gingerbread castles. 

Mommy had a little trouble getting it put together....

But in the end, it all turned out just fine.

Rachel helped with the decorations while Rebecca played with the Cinderella and coach. 

Later, the girls were dressing up.  Rebecca's not as into playing dress up as Rachel, but sometimes she gets into it.  Here's my fancy girl:

And Rachel wanted her picture taken, too.

Love my fancy girls! (Rebecca was done with looking at the camera.....

another one bites the dust

First Rachel had a cold.  Then I caught it.  I'm still getting over it, but this afternoon I started wondering if Rebecca was sick. I had to wake her up from her nap in order to go get Rachel from the bus stop, and she was really lethargic for the next hour or so.  She finally perked up and acted pretty normal during and after dinner, but about an hour before bed she was on my lap, rubbing her eyes, digging her head into my shoulder, whining that no, she wasn't "sweepy."  She felt a little warm.  She continued to sit quietly with me for a long time, which is very unlike her.  She loves to sit with me, but only for a few minutes at a time, and then she's down running around again. 

Before bed I took her temp.  Slight fever.  I tried to put her right to bed after giving her some medicine, but she said she wanted a story (our usual ritual).  I started the story, but she spent the whole time with her head laying down on my chest, not even looking at the book.  Not normal Rebecca at all.

Hopefully it's quick, but that's not usually the case with my kids.  And this is something different than Rachel and I had (she's not congested, and neither Rachel or I had a fever), so anyone could catch it....  Ugh.  This next week is the busiest of this whole busy month.  This could throw a wrench in things.....

Christmastime

Christmastime at our house has begun.  Rachel was counting down the days until December 1st, when Rudy, our elf on the shelf, would make his appearance (she really thinks he flew here that night from the North Pole--it's going to be one sad day when she finds out that he actually spends the rest of the year packed away in the basement....), and she could start opening the little doors on the Advent Calendar. 

We got out our Christmas stuff and decorated the tree over the weekend.

 

 

Rebecca loves it.  I gave them their new ornaments that day (she got a Mickey Mouse Clubhouse balloon ornament and Rachel got a Merida ornament--the princess in the movie Brave), and made the mistake of wrapping them, so they got to unwrap them (which Rebecca also loved!).  Then my husband put some presents (for me!) under the tree, and she asks every day (several times a day) if she can open them.  She doesn't yet understand that there's a separate day for that--she already got to open a present, so why can't we keep opening the other presents, too? 

I usually love putting up the tree, because I get the chance to relive the memories attached to each ornament, but this year it was rather stressful.  Both girls kept grabbing into the boxes to get another ornament, and, of course, weren't careful.  Three ornaments were broken.  After multiple warnings, I finally had to make them sit down and just watch, which wasn't much fun for any of us, but I couldn't keep letting ornaments get broken.  Finally I started unwrapping them and they were allowed to hang them up (it was the unwrapping that usually caused the breakage, so I just did that part).  That was an okay compromise.

surprise!

Remember how much Rachel wanted to see The Nutcracker last year?

Well, the commercials started on TV and the radio a week or so ago.  As soon as they started she started asking if we could go this year.  I told her we'd only go if we won tickets (there are different places that give away tickets, and I always enter). 

Last year I wanted to win them so badly, but we didn't.  Then my dad saved the day and bought her tickets so we could go see it.

Yesterday on facebook one of the places that gives away tickets (and the same place where I won tickets to go to the water park this summer) started their giveaway.  They had 10 sets of tickets to give away.  I emailed everyone in my family and asked them to enter for us.  They said they'd announce the winners at noon today.

And I just found out that my dad won!!!!

So we'll be going to see The Nutcracker! 

Now I just hope it's a day that we can actually go....they didn't say whether it's a specific day or whether we can use them any day.  Oh, she would be so devastated if we couldn't use them!  I guess we'll have to wait and see.

Hooray!!!

giving thanks

We spent a great few days celebrating Thanksgiving with my family last week.  It was lots of fun with lots of family and lots of food.

Rachel and Rebecca had the best time playing with their cousins and grandparents.

Unfortunately I don't have much in the way of pictures.  We were too busy enjoying ourselves to take them, I guess.  Here we are during Thanksgiving dinner:

My husband and I got to see a movie and do a little Christmas shopping, and I even got to shop with my mom and aunt, something we used to do every year on Black Friday, but hadn't happened in years, so that was fun. 

Rebecca and Grandpa playing dominos:

I can't believe that with Thanksgiving over, we're already in the throes of Christmas preparations.  It seems like it's SO early this year.  I have a huge chunk of my shopping done, which is a good feeling.

Monday night we had our Girl Scout meeting at the community center so that the girls could climb the climbing wall there.  Rachel was pretty afraid, and there were tears involved at first, but I was really proud of her for continuing to try and each time she got a little bit better.  She still couldn't climb up near the top like a few of the other girls (she told me, through tears, that it was because she doesn't eat enough meat, so she's not strong enough!), but she stuck with it, improved, and she ended up having a great time, which is progress for Rachel, who is fearful of new things. 

Here she is:

tidbits

There's not been a lot of exciting news around here, so I feel like the blog has been a little lean lately.  Life is full and busy and good, though...just not that exciting to write about!  But I thought I'd share some little bits and pieces of life around here.

*Rebecca is the little social butterfly of the bus stop.  Every adult knows her, since she engages them all in conversation each morning.  Now the bigger kids know who she is, too, and several of them (mostly girls, but sometimes a couple of boys, too), talk to her.  At the end of the day there aren't many other adults at the bus stop (I guess parents think it's okay to let their elementary students walk home alone?!), but there's always one other mom there waiting, and she and Rebecca carry on conversations each afternoon.  Yesterday the woman's older daughter was there waiting instead (she's college-aged).  Rebecca went right up to her and started talking to her.  What did they talk about?  "This is my foot," Rebecca would tell her.  "Yes, it is!" the girl would respond.  "There's a diaper on my bottom," Rebecca declared.  After laughing the girl said, "Oh, okay!"  And on and on, one statement after another--mostly about body parts.  Oh, that girl....

*Rachel lost another tooth this week--her seventh.  When I was her age I hadn't lost my first tooth yet!  Crazy! 

*We decided not to let Rachel sleep over at the party I wrote about last week.  She's going to the party and staying until close to bedtime.  She is pretty okay with the whole thing, so I'm thankful.  I expected a much bigger reaction when I told her she couldn't stay, but she was pretty nervous about sleeping somewhere else.

*Rachel and Rebecca fight like cats and dogs.   Whatever one has, the other one wants.  Rebecca's in the non-sharing phase of being two years old, so I expect it, but Rachel?  She's supposed to be past that stage.  But she's also in this really frustrating tattle tale stage, though, so even if sharing isn't the issue with her, she's constantly telling on Rebecca who's not sharing.  It's constant, and so annoying to listen to!  They play well together for short periods of time, and those moments are heavenly, but sadly, they don't last very long most of the time.

Tomorrow we head north for Thanksgiving with my family.  Usually we'd be there by now, but because my husband started a new job last spring, he doesn't have much vacation time built up yet, so he has to work today.  Thankfully he was able to take Friday off--we originally thought he was only going to get Thursday off.  So that means we can spend a few days there, which is much better than I was expecting.  But I wish I was there today! 

Happy Thanksgiving!

best night of her life

Rachel declared last night, "The best night of my LIFE!"  In 6.5 years, that means it ranked first out of approximately 2,372 nights.  Wow!

So aren't you dying to know what made it the best night of her life?

We went to the tree lighting ceremony at a local shopping center.

I know, it doesn't sound very exciting, but we had heard from quite a few people that it was really neat, so we decided to give it a try, since it wasn't too terribly cold and it was a weekend, and it started at 6:00, which wasn't too late for our girls.

We had to wait outside for about a half hour to save our space on the parade route (there's a Christmas parade beforehand--Santa comes in at the end of the parade on a horse drawn carriage and goes up to the tree to do the lighting, and then he's there for the rest of the Christmas season to allow thousands of children to sit on his knee and tell him what they want for Christmas.

Here we are waiting for it to get dark and for the parade to start.

I didn't get many pictures of the whole event.  I only took my little camera, and the battery was practically dead, and the pictures were taking VERY slowly.  I was lucky to get anything.

Rebecca watching the parade

One of the characters in the parade

Rachel jumped and squealed with glee.  She LOVED it all.  Rebecca didn't quite know what was going on, but she liked it.

When Santa lit the big tree there were fireworks.  I couldn't get any good pictures of it because of the timing issue with my camera, but here's what I got.  You can kind of see the fireworks on the left, just starting to go up into the sky.

Rachel was squealing with excitement during the fireworks.  It was worth the hassle (and it wasn't a huge hassle, but a little one, fighting traffic, waiting out in the cold, dealing with Rebecca's fussiness because she wanted out of her stroller the whole night....) just to see Rachel so excited.

On the way out to our car she declared it the best night of her life.  Guess we didn't have to take her to Disney World a few years ago and see the fireworks there over Cinderella's castle.  We'll just take her down the street to the shopping center every year from now on!

another look-alike

We've always thought Rachel looked just like me.

But here's proof that Rebecca's definitely mine, too....