Christmas recap and pics

I am finally just now getting around to sharing our Christmas pictures. We had a great Christmas Eve and Christmas day. We are all so blessed. Wow, what a great time. It was exhausting, but so worth it. We are fortunate to be able to celebrate with both families at our home. Christmas Eve morning Presley woke up with a little temp, so we were worried it wouldn't be a good day, but she did really well. We think her teeth were bothering her again. In the afternoon we went to Chad's parents to see aunts, uncles, and cousins. Then we came back home to celebrate with my family. After we ate dinner Papa read a story about the birth of Jesus and we exchanged presents.

Addison was up most of the night Christmas Eve. I think she was waiting to hear Santa and his reindeer. Christmas morning was our own family time for exchanging our presents. When Presley woke up, she saw that Santa had left her a new kitchen and a baby. She went right for her baby and didn't bother with anything else. It was actually kind of hard to get her to open her presents this year. She just wanted to play! She was a very lucky girl who also got another baby similar to this. She sure loves her babies. After we opened our gifts as a family Nana and Papa stopped over to give us our stocking gifts. Chad and I got a new carrom board for our stockings. I was so excited.

Chad's family then came over for brunch. After we ate a yummy brunch we exchanged presents once again. Wow, talk about gift overload! It was great. The girls (and Chad and I too) both got so much great stuff. In fact we all got so much that the problem quickly became apparent.....where do we put it all? In fact, it got us really wondering so guess what Chad is going to work on the rest of this break??? Getting the basement finished up. Well, maybe not completely finished, but at least a little closer.

That night Chad's family and my parents and Hilary came back over for snacks, desserts, carrom, and board games.

I have uploaded a few of our pictures to snapfish for you to see. Hope you enjoy!

another funny

I forgot one more funny thing from yesterday. We were doing laundry and Chad had put a pile on the couch that needed to be folded. We had to run some errands so we just left it on the couch not folded. When we got back we were busy putting things away and didn't realize what Presley was doing. A couple of minutes later we hear her start running toward us squealing...she had gotten a couple of pairs of my underwear from the couch and had put them on over her clothes, or at least had tried to put them on. She had both legs through one opening. It was so funny, and she knew it was too.

funnies

Here are a couple funny things Presley has said these last few days:

"zippitqueenie" (She had heard Chad tell Queenie to zip it earlier in the day.)

"nooooope" (instead of saying no all the time)

"add" (she heard me calling to Chad)

"a'ber" (repeating Chad calling to me)

and here's one we are trying to change

"poopie!" (after she hears Addison have gas. we are trying to get her to say stinky instead)

She is really starting to repeat EVERYTHING we say now. It's so funny. She is talking all the time. In fact even now as she is supposed to be asleep, I can hear her talking away in her crib....

funny tasting apple

Yesterday morning we dropped Pres and Addison off at Grandma B.'s for the morning so we could get a little returning/exchanging/shopping done without the girls. We knew we had to try stuff on so we didn't want them to have to wait with us.

Well, Grandma was feeding Presley lunch, Grandma was eating a tomato and Presley said "Apple? bite?" So Grandma told her it was a tomato, but let her have a bite anyways. Presley promptly took a bite, spit it out and said, "don't like it." :) 3 words in a row!

christmas card

Most of you have should have gotten our Christmas card by now. We are a little late getting them out, but hey, at least we got them out before Christmas, right? We were actually able to get a decent one of both of the girls. We had lots of shots where one would have a huge smile on her face, but the other one wouldn't be looking. Good thing we had this photo shoot at home and didn't have to pay. We took lots of shots! We have some pretty funny ones that I thought I would share. You can see in some Presley was more interested in Addison's shoes than looking at us. She also thought it was pretty funny when Addison fell over. One of the shots is pretty blury, but I loved it. Presley was "loving" Addison, giving her a hug. I wish it would've turned out.

snow crab

This is our leftovers after we had dinner the other night. We are both seafood fans, Chad even more than me, and when we went to the grocery store last weekend we found this crab on a sale, so of course we had to get some. Saturday night Chad made dinner for me. He steamed snow crab. He even had the garlic butter dipping sauce for us. It was delicious, although it was a little hard to crack open. I had the scissors out trying to cut the legs, and it was still hard. Chad ended up opening most of my crab for me, and when we were finished his hands were pretty beat up. Those things have sharp little knobby things, that hurt when you are grabbing on trying to crack open the leg to get the meat out. Beside the crab, we also had mashed potatoes and corn. It was all wonderful. We offered some to Presley, but she was more interested in playing with the claw than actually eating any of the crab. She didn't know what she was missing.

feeling good...lots accomplished

I have been MIA lately from this whole blog thing. I have been forcing myself to stay away because I know I have so much to do and if I get started on the computer I find time flies by and before I know it, I'm too tired to get anything done. So, I am feeling much better now about where we are in terms of getting ready for Christmas. We finished up the gift buying, wrapped all the presents, planned Christmas Eve dinner, planned Christmas morning brunch, took the kids Christmas card picture, got cards made, addressed and sealed the envelopes, mailed cards, got coordinating (couldn't find matching) pajamas for the girls, and gated up the Christmas tree. Yep, you read it right, gated up the Christmas tree. With all the presents under and around the tree, Presley was having a blast. She thought it was fun to pull off all the bows, move the gifts around, try to open them and try to pick them up. Plus, the gifts that were in bags were just waiting for her to peek inside. So, we had to put a baby gate around the tree. When I was wrapping the presents I was putting them in piles of who they belonged to, and we found that Presley's pile was quite a bit larger than Addison's. It seems like it was much easier to shop for Presley this year. Addison doesn't need as much because she has all of Presley's things. But, we didn't want to keep it that way, so we did go out and get a few more things for Addison to even them up. I know she wouldn't realize, but it didn't feel right to me.

Basically all we have left now is to grocery shop and clean the house for our visitors. The girls had their Christmas party today at Day Care. This week is going to be extremely busy. Chad has a game tonight, tomorrow night, and Thursday night. 3 nights in a row! Tonight's is away and the next two are at home. He has now had 1 victory, so at least he isn't going to have a winless season. In fact the game he won he beat the other team by like 20. We have our parties at school on Thursday. Friday both girls have Dr. appointments, and Saturday we have a Christmas party with friends to go to. Sometime in the middle of all of that we will get to the store, clean up the house, and get food ready for company. I'm exited for this weekend! It's coming fast.

say cheese, Santa

Well, what do you know? Santa wasn't so bad....not so good either. Presley let me sit her on his lap and actually STAYED THERE! She didn't even cry. I guess I need to be a bit more optimistic. We couldn't get a smile out of her, but I was just happy she stayed, didn't throw a fit, didn't try to get down, and didn't cry. I'm calling it a success. The picture wasn't the greatest, but it's better than we were expecting. I think Presley was a little scared so she didn't know what to do. Addison did great, although it was during her normal nap time, so we couldn't get a smile out of her either. Oh well. Hey, at least we got a smile out of Santa. After we left Santa, Presley couldn't stop talking about him. She was so excited. Chad and I were able to get a lot of shopping done today. Silly me, I wasn't thinking about the fact that we were power shopping and I decided to wear my boots, my high heeled boots mind you, because I thought they looked better with my outfit, and let me tell you, by about 1:00 this afternoon my feet were KILLING me. I was in pain. And, we were barely started. We went the the mall twice, Kohl's, Old Navy, Dick's, Bed Bath & Beyond, Lowe's, and Target. We were able to get pretty much everyone taken care of. We still need to buy for 2 people and get one more thing for another to be finished with our families. I also need to see what we have gotten for Presley and Addison so far and see if we are done with them or not. I was able to get them their Christmas outfits. I still want to get them a set of matching pajamas for when they open their presents from us. I'm having a hard time finding them in both of their sizes. I did find a cute pair of pajamas today and it was available in both of their sizes, but they were $22 a piece. I couldn't see spending $44 on two pairs of pajamas. It seemed a little ridiculous. I'm hoping I will still be able to find something for them. I originally wanted to get matching pajamas for all of us, but Chad wasn't very interested in that idea. After all our shopping, we picked up the girls, had dinner, played, read books, and put them to bed. Then I got all of our gifts out on our living room floor getting ready to wrap them, but whoops, no tape, not much wrapping paper, and no tissue paper left from last year. I guess I can't wrap. So, back out to the store tomorrow to pick up more supplies. It's ok with me, I wasn't really looking forward to wrapping gifts anyways. That's not my favorite part. Now, i'm off to start planning the menu's. I'm sure this week will be busy.

Happy Day

Happy Birthday Dad & Papa!


I know I already told you on Jen's blog but wanted to wish you a good day here too. Hope you had a great day. We love you and can't wait to see you soon. Just wanted you to know we were thinking of you. You're the best!

decorations

Awhile ago I mentioned that I would try and get some pictures of our Christmas decorations on the blog....and then I realized I didn't take many. I only have a couple and here they are. I figured I better do it soon, seeing as Christmas is only 11 days away! Wow, is that right? Only 11 days? Yikes. I have A LOT to do before I'm ready. We are a little behind, or I probably shouldn't say a little, quite a bit. In fact, we are so behind we (Chad and I) we decided that we better take a personal day and try to get a lot of our shopping done. So tomorrow we are taking the day off. Watch out shoppers, here we come! We actually have a few gifts to the girls and others already, but they still need to be wrapped. We plan on taking Presley and Addison to the mall to visit Santa in the morning. I'm not that optimistic about Presley's visit with Santa, but I guess you never know. Maybe she'll surprise us. I'm sure Addison won't mind. So after Santa, we plan to have lunch together and then Chad and I will drop them off at Day Care just in time for their naps and then we will go back out to do some more of our shopping. Here's hoping we get a lot accomplished!

I still need to get a picture of our lights on our house, but I keep waiting until we get some snow so it looks more like Christmas. But, all we are getting is this rain. I sure hope it snows, at least in time for Christmas. How weird would it be not to have snow on Christmas. There has been so much rain that our lawn is muddy and soft and our poor little snowman falls down everyday. We set him up, he falls down, pick him up, fall down etc.. You get the idea. The ground isn't hard enough for him to stand. I guess I better take a picture soon with or without the snow. I'll post when I get one taken outside.

Besides the shopping part of being behind, I am a little behind on the whole planning of Christmas Eve/Christmas morning thing. We are hosting both here at our house. We will have my (D'Arcy) side over on Christmas Eve for dinner and presents. Growing up we always opened our presents on Christmas Eve so it's nice to continue that tradition with my side. Then on Christmas morning we will have Chad's (Brugh) family over for brunch and more gifts. We haven't decided exactly yet when we will do our own family gifts. I think last year we did it Christmas Eve morning. The only problem with that is this year Christmas Eve is on a Sunday and we have nursery at church that Sunday. So, we'll see. I still need to plan the menus for both the dinner and the brunch. I guess I better start that this weekend. I also need to get ready for Christmas parties at Day Care and school. Aghhh! The longer I sit here and type the more I think of that still needs to be done. I guess I better get off here and start doing something! I think I am getting a little overwhelmed. I have to start sometime....here I GO!!

little elves...

I found this today and have been having a blast, laughing out loud even. Hope you enjoy! After you watch it, you can make your own.

Addy the Elf

Pres the Elf

(I have heard several of you weren't able to watch it. Sorry, it's really cute. I think your computer will need flash player to see it.)

Don't forget about me...

Today I thought I would update you all a little on Addison. It seems like most of my posts have been about Presley lately. I guess it's because she is doing so much now. Addison is getting so big now. She can pretty much sit up by herself now. She will sometimes still fall over to the side, but I am surprised at how well she does and she just turned 4 months on the 9th of December. I don't think Presley was sitting by herself yet at this age. I do kind of think that the Bumbo seat may have helped her a little with this. I actually also got to see her roll over from her back to her front once this weekend. She hasn't done it since, but at least I got to see her do it. She rolled from her front to her back about a month ago. She doesn't do it often, but every once in awhile. She is in love with "singing" now. She will do it all the time. It's the cutest thing. We don't remember Presley doing it, but Addison will just sit or lay and sing. I think it's adorable, Chad does too most of the time. The last couple of days she will wake up at night, not fussy or wanting to eat, just ready to get up, so she will just lay in her bassinet and "sing." Chad doesn't think it's so cute then. :) She is doing great with sleeping. We have been lucky to have two really good sleepers. Addison goes down between 7 and 8 sometime, and then I sometimes feed her when I go to bed, and sometimes I don't. Then she will usually sleep until around 5 or so. Sometimes she gets up around 3:30, but not every night. I am happy with that. She is a really happy baby and will give big smiles to just about anyone who will give her some attention. She loves watching Presley play. She will try and talk to her and give her big smiles. It's hard to believe that 4 months have gone by already. It sure does go fast.

mary and baby jesus

Presley loves playing with her nativity, lil' shephard, and lil' drummer boy little people sets. Chad was playing with her and showing her how angels fly and now she takes all the people (and animals too) and has them flying through the air while she is making the "shhhhewww" (flying) sound. When you ask her where Mary is, she can find her and say her name. She will also find Mary when I ask her who is Baby Jesus' mommy. She also can find Baby Jesus and say his name. It's adorable. In fact last week she took Mary to Day Care for her letter Mm show and tell and she was able to tell them who it was that she brought.

Puppy Sitting

This weekend we were able to puppy sit for our friends, Brian, Roxy, and Grayden's puppy. They have a little shih tzu named Lucy. Presley was in love!!! She followed her all over saying "Oocy". It was adorable. As soon as we got Presley up from her naps or in the morning she would ask "Oocy go?" Sometimes Lucy would walk in with me to get her up and Presley would just squeal with joy. She (Lucy) did a pretty good job at our house. Queenie wasn't all that thrilled to have her here, but she tolerated her ok, as long as she still got some attention.

Saturday night the girls had Grandma and Grandpa Brugh over to babysit while Chad and I went to his staff Christmas party. We had a nice time.

Here are a few pictures of Presley and Lucy, otherwise known as "Oocy."

911

Most of you know how Presley is obsessed with the phone, especially cell phones. She loves to have a phone to "talk" and call people. She will pick up the phone, push the on button and hold it up to her ear and "talk." She will quite often turn it on and then leave it off the hook, and we will find it hours later still off the hook. Well tonight as I was sitting on the couch with Addison and Presley watching JoJo (Presley's favorite show) on TV, the doorbell rang. I got up and answered the door, on my way to the door I looked out the window and saw a sheriff's car out front. It actually kind of scared me. I wondered what in the world they would be at my house for. I opened the door to find the sheriff and another deputy standing outside on the porch. I was holding Addison, Presley was pounding on the door, and Queenie was barking like crazy. Chad was still at practice. They probably thought we were crazy. I asked them to hang on a minute while I put Queenie away. They stood there, and when I got back they said they recieved a 911 call from our home.... I wonder who could've done that???? Presley - that little stinker. Apparantly she had dialed 911 while playing with the phone. They were just checking to make sure everything was ok. I assured them we were all ok, thanked them for coming and apologized for the inconvience. I guess we will have to do a better job at keeping the phones up out of the reach of our little phone operator.

Here Presley just got off the phone with Daddy on his way home from practice, and he had just walked in the door. If you click on the picture, you can see the goldfish crackers in her teeth. She gets so excited when she hears the door open.

coach brugh

i finally ventured out to one of chad's games tonight, although not by myself. both chad's mom and dad went too. it's a good thing they did. presley was all over the place. it wasn't that she wanted to go to chad, it was that she just wanted to run and play. she was not interested in sitting and watching the game at all. i was very thankful that i had help there. i felt bad for them because they took turns taking her for walks, and weren't able to see chad's game much, although they assured me they didn't mind. i have taken presley to chad's practice before and she was able to run and play all she wanted, so i'm sure she couldn't understand why she was supposed to sit now. addison enjoyed the game. she was awake the whole time and was cooing. chad's team should've probably won, but once again it came down to to many missed free-throws and sloppy ball handling. this was their closest game of the season so far. they lost 25-26. they are now 0 and 5. :( looks like this season might be a long one.

rudolph

We got this reindeer last year at Meijer because while we were in the store Presley started squealing with laughter. If you push the hand of the reindeer it will sing a song and jump up and down. It was her first really loud giggle. We thought if that's what it takes to hear her giggle, then we had to have it at home. This year isn't quite the same. She is still in love with it and will talk to him, love and kiss him, but only likes him as long as he stays quiet. She isn't quite sure what to do when his hand accidentally gets pushed and he starts singing. She will usually run to one of us to pick her up and hold her until he is done singing. She likes him better when he doesn't "talk back".

Miss Manners

Tonight while I was sitting at the table while Presley was eating dinner, I sneezed and Presley said " 'Scuse you." How sweet. She will often say it if we have already said it, but I was home with the girls alone and I hadn't even said excuse me yet. She did it all on her own!

Last night while we were eating dinner she said her first sentence too. She said, "I want taco." 3 words in a row! Usually she is still saying one word, sometimes two, but this was 3 by herself. Yippee!

She is getting good at saying names now too. She can recognize most of our families now by looking at her photo album. I will point and she will tell me their name. She is even starting to say her name now, although it sounds more like Prekley. She is really good at Addison too. She has a couple of names for her like baby, peanut (she hears me call her that), and then sonson (her way of saying Addison). She sure is growing up.

Discovering Music

This picture is also from Aunt Cindy on Thanksgiving. Presley discovered Tyler's keyboard. She had a blast with the pre-set music buttons with Gabi. She was bopping her head up and down and squealing. She loved it. The next day at Aunt Jenny's she got to practice her skills some more on their piano. They were watching her for us while we went shopping and when we went to pick her up, she was sitting on the bench with Reagan squealing and banging the keys. Chad thinks we need to buy her a keyboard now. :)

Mini-me

I thought I would share this picture with you. Aunt Cindy took it on Thanksgiving and sent it to us. You can tell that Presley has seen her daddy playing his Play Station game and talking on his headset before. She loves to copy anything he does. She's a pure "Daddy's girl."

Night and Day

Wow, the difference one day can make. It's amazing. Thursday you would've thought Presley was sicker than a dog. Friday I went to wake her up, and she was so happy, she was laughing out loud in her crib. She was in a great mood all day. So, obviously she must be feeling much better. I'm so happy this is over, although Chad woke up Saturday morning not feeling very good. I hope he doesn't get anything now. I know his dad and sister are both sick now and Chad has strep throat going around at his school. Chad, Presley and I have all gotten our flu shots, so hopefully we won't have any trouble with that this year. Addison is still to young to get hers. We will probably get her a shot in February if the Dr.'s still say the flu is going around.

Friday night we went to some friends house and had a game night. We played Taboo and Scene It, the movie version. We played guys against girls, and the girls lost every time. Surprising, I know! I'm not sure what the problem with the girls was. We had a great time. We rarely get out anymore to see friends, especially without kids. Thankfully Hilary was able to babysit again. I know it wasn't much fun for her, since both kids were sleeping when we left and didn't really wake up while we were gone. We sure have a couple of great sleepers.

Looking good?

Today hasn't been the greatest of days for Presley. When I woke her up this morning, she wasn't in the greatest of moods. I thought maybe she got up on the wrong side of the crib. She was really whiny and clingy. It takes her awhile some mornings to wake up, but this was different. We gave her a little tylenol before we left for day care because we thought her teeth may be bothering her. She has been working on getting those eye? teeth (the pointy ones that look like fangs) on the bottom for a couple of weeks. Again at day care she didn't want me to let her go. Apparantly she tugged at her right ear a couple of times today. Enough that it concerened Grandma. So, with her cranky attitude, wanting to be held all day, the ear, and the fact that her cousin, Gabi who we were with on Thanksgiving has strep throat, I decided that I should probably get her in to see the Dr. I called after we got home and was happy to find out that our Dr., Dr. Nordby happened to be the one working the late hours tonight and she had an opening. So, I called trusty Aunt Hildy and asked her to meet us at the office. Chad had an away game tonight, and I knew Presley wouldn't be very cooperative with people trying to check her out so I knew I would need help with Addison. While at home waiting to go to the Dr.'s Presley acted like her normal self, not clingy and happily playing with Addison, talking to her while Addison was in the exersaucer, climbing under the exersaucer, jumping on the exersaucer (you get the idea). I didn't see her tug her ear at all, but felt like I would rather be safe and get her checked just to make sure. Also wanted to make sure her cold was just that, a cold since it's been hanging around for almost 2 weeks now. Well, Dr. said Presley's ears looked good, throat looked good, and her chest sounded good. So, all looks ok. Presley actually did ok while they were looking at her, the hardest part for her was trying to get her weighed. All she had to do was sit on the scale, but she would have nothing to do with it. So, finally they asked if I minded getting weighed myself and then holding her and weighing us together, and subtract my weight. That wasn't what I really wanted, but how could I say no when I had a little girl who was doing the silent cry? I really wished that I had Addison with us, so people would see how little she was and I would have an excuse for my weight seeing she is still so little, but she wasn't with us, so the nurse just saw my numbers for what they were... Yeah. Plus, I was fully dressed and bundled up in my sweater,coat, and shoes still. Oh well. Anyways, we made it home safely and healthy. Hope she gets over this thing soon. I do think she is getting better.

Well, off to bed now. Glad tomorrow is Friday! Sounds like we may have some crazy winter weather tomorrow. I guess I will have to get up early so I have extra time on the roads.

Oh yeah, and thought you'd like to know Chad has now had 2 games since the last time I updated... sorry to say he's lost those two games as well. It looks like it may be a long season. Tonight he was telling me that his team missed 19 free throws and they ended up losing by 17. Like he said before, it's the little things that count in the game. You can't expect to win when you don't do those little things.....

Pesky little bug...

The girls still have that pesky little bug. It doesn't seem to want to leave. I think something must really be going around. We had nursery this week at church, and I had Chad stay home with the girls instead of going with me because I didn't want the girls to get the other kids sick, well, all I did in the nursery was wipe runny noses and listen to awful coughs. They all seemed to have this bug. Actually Addison seems to be doing much better now, but Presley still has a runny nose and a juicy cough. She had a little temp over the weekend, but not to bad. We called the Dr. and one of their suggestions was to give her clear Karo corn syrup to help with the cough. I have never heard of that, but tried it at their suggestion. I thought Presley would love it, because it is basically sugar, but she wasn't a big fan. I think it may have been a little to thick for her. The little bit she got down didn't seem to help much anyways. It does sound like the cold is breaking up, so I think she is getting better. Since she has been sick we have let her have her binky pretty much all day. Normally she can only have her binky in her crib during naptime and at night. Since she can't breath through her nose, and her binky is in her mouth, she is drooling all over trying to breath out of her mouth while keeping the binky in. Silly girl. She has been a little clingy to Mommy and Daddy. In fact at Day Care she has been crying when I drop her off in the morning, not wanting me to let her go. I know she loves being at Grandma's and playing with her and all the kids. So, she must not feel like herself, because normally she doesn't even care about giving me a goodbye kiss when I drop her off, she will just go right to Grandma and start playing with all the cool toys.

So far I have been able to avoid the bug. Chad has a little of the cold. The other night after we put the girls to bed, Chad walked around the house spraying the Lysol behind him. He said he didn't want to "fester" in the sickness anymore. (those were his words)

We were able to get most of our Christmas decorations up over the weekend, and also got a little more shopping done. I will try and post some pictures later of our tree. Chad's next game is tonight at home. Let's hope they have a better ending. I haven't decided if we will go watch him or not. I'm a little concerned that Presley will see her Daddy coaching and will want him to hold her. I don't know if it would work out or not, her sitting with me, seeing her Daddy, but not being able to go to him. Plus, I would have Addison too. We'll see. With two kids, it's usually easier for me to just stay home with them. I haven't even ventured out to the store by myself with the two yet. The idea scares me just a little. :) Even though they are both great kids, having two is hard work, that's for sure. Especially now that Presley is so mobile. She's everywhere! It's a juggle. Good thing Addison is so laid back.

Hearts full of Thanksgiving

Well, I told you things were about to get busier, and they sure have. Sorry it's been awhile since my last post. I have had a couple of sick little girls this past week. Nothing to serious, but enough to keep Daddy home with them on Tuesday so they didn't have to go to Day Care all day. They both have a little cold that thankfully doesn't seem to be bothering them too much. (Daddy took this picture when he stayed home with Presley. Notice the hair?)



Thanksgiving day was spent with both families. We are so thankful that we have family close enough that we can spend part of the day with both sides. I am also thankful for my two little wonderful girls who are already such great friends. I am thankful for my husband, my family, my home, and my job.



We ate lunch at Aunt Cindy's and Uncle Ben's where we spent time with Chad's family. After lunch there was a ping-pong tournament. We had to leave before the tournament was over, but we both won our first round. We then went home to give Presley a little nap before we headed over to Aunt Jenny's and Uncle Matt's later in the afternoon where we spent time with my family and had dessert. I actually made my first pie! I actually had a couple of firsts in the kitchen on Thursday. I made my first mousse, for Cindy's and then pie for Jenny's. I think Chad was impressed. I don't know how good they were, I didn't try either. I hope they were ok. There we had a carrom tournament. We didn't get to stay for the finals here either, but I would guess it would be between Matt and Dad, although Chad was just starting to get in the groove.



Friday we worked on setting up some of our Christmas decorations. We got both of our trees up and mostly decorated. Ben came over to help Chad put the lights up on the second story so now the outside is done. We took the girls to see their great aunts who came from Florida to meet them. They had never met them before. They were able to spend time with their Great Aunts Kathy and Karen. (They are my moms sisters). Great Grandma Pannabecker also came to see the girls. They ended up watching the girls for us for a couple of hours so Chad and I could get a little head start on the Christmas shopping. We were both pleasantly surprised that every place we went wasn't as crowded as we were anticipating. Maybe the crowds were all early birds. We do know of at least two early birds. Chad's mom and sister, were up and shopping while we were still in bed. But, I guess it works out good, because they were done shopping and home by 10:00 a.m. and they found some great deals.



We meant to take a family picture on Thanksgiving, but forgot. This is the only picture I have that turned out from that day with the girls and I couldn't get one where they were both looking. We need to get better at remembering to take pictures. Hope everyone enjoyed their day. We all have so much to be thankful for.

Bath time

Tonight we had pizza for dinner. We forgot to put a bib on Presley... you can see what happened. Remember a couple of days ago I said she was into doing everything herself....she still is. She loves pizza. I guess she's just like her Daddy. I think she had 3 pieces. We got it from Luigi's pizza and they have the small square pieces, so they weren't 3 regular size pieces, but still, she ate more than I did! Oh well, once again tonight was bath night. Both girls took a bath together tonight. Presley was still splashing all over, but would stop when we told her to be careful around the baby. She is so cute when she talks to her. She leans forward and tries to get right in her face and says "Hi Baby" in this really high voice. You can see that Addison's Halloween present, the Bumbo seat is coming in handy for bath time too. She loves it!

Best of Friends

Tonight while I was busy in the kitchen making dinner I turned on Presley's video and sat Addison in her seat so I could work for a couple of minutes without having to entertain them. When I came back out to check on them, I found them like this. I thought it was adorable. Presley was actually holding Addison's hand, but moved it when I took the picture. (How do you like Addison's electricity hair? :)

Aunt Hildy

Tonight Aunt Hildy came over to babysit the girls. Chad had his first game away. His team lost a close game. He was pretty disappointed. He says he felt he had coached a perfect game, but his team made too many little mistakes. Hopefully they were still getting the nerves out of their system with this being the first game of the season.

I had to go to my Family Literacy Night at my school. In my group we read Mmm, Cookies, Thomas' Snowsuit and Andrew's Loose Tooth all by Robert Munsch. He is also the author of Love you Forever, which is a great children's book. You should check them out. Robert Munsch is one of my favorite children's authors. For my group we read the books and our activity was each student was able to decorate their own cookie. We had a great turnout. In my two sessions alone I had close to 130 people.

I know the girls had fun staying at home. Presley got to do her favorite acitivity of the week, COLOR! As soon as she got out her crayons she promptly handed the "ween" to Aunt Hildy so she could color with her. She doesn't like you to just watch, she wants your help too. Thanks so much Aunt Hildy! I'm glad I didn't have to drag them out in the rain.

Busy, busy, busy....and it's about to get even busier

Well, things here are busy as usual, but they are about to get even busier. Last night the girls and I met Chad at McDonald's for dinner. I know, healthy right? It was his only chance to see Presley before she went to bed. He came right from practice. Then from there he had to go back to Beiger for a Family Reading night. So from McDonald's the girls and I headed back home. I gave Presley a bath by herself. She was having a blast, kicking and splashing the water all over. I think I was almost as wet as she was. I guess it was a good thing Addison wasn't in there with her. When Chad is home, I give the girls a bath together so I don't have to do it twice, but when he's not around, I do two seperate baths. I need an extra person to get one of the girls out of the tub and get them dressed again while I am doing the other one. After Presley's bath she had a snack, watched JoJo, brushed her teeth and went to bed. Addison waited until after Presley went to bed to get her bath. By that time Chad was home, so he helped. ( I thought I would add, even though Chad got home late, and was super busy, he still managed to find time to play his Socom game with his buddies... :) He always has time for that, no matter how busy he is.) After Addison's bath she went to sleep and Chad and I picked up the house. I even had time to put dinner for tonight in the crockpot so it can cook all day. We are having beef stew. Yummy! Sounds especially good on a crummy day like today.

Tonight Chad has his first game at Heritage (Middlebury) and I have my Family Literacy Night at school. Good thing we have family close by to help us out. Tonight Aunt Hildy is coming over to watch the girls. It's nice having her come to the house because she can put Presley down for bed and we don't mess up her schedule. Presley does great when we keep her on a schedule. Plus, the girls like playing with her. I'm sure they will have fun.

Irish Twins

Here are my girls in their twin outfits, thanks to Aunt Hildy. She made their shirts. Thanks Aunt Hildy, they are so cute.

I am enjoying dressing them alike when they have the same or similar outfits. If they don't have the same outfit, then I at least try and coordinate their outfits based on color. I figure I might as well do it now while I can and they don't have a say before they get older and don't want to dress alike. (It sure is hard to get them both to look at the camera at the same time. This is the best I could get, and Addison looks a little scared.) Oh well, you get the idea.

Raining?

You know how everything is said as a question at this age, with the voice going up at the end of the word? Well, this morning as we were driving to Day Care and singing songs together Presley asked "Raining?" And sure enough it was raining. I hadn't even said anything about it. This was the first time she had said the weather without repeating someone else who has said it first. She sure is smart. :)

My boyfriends back

A couple of days ago I mentioned that Presley may have a new boyfriend, her friend Graydon. Well, I think she is back to her main boyfriend now, Daddy. She follows him everywhere he goes. All I can think about it the song, Mary had a little lamb...and everywhere that Mary went the lamb was sure to go. That about sums it up with Presley and Daddy. He can't go anywhere without her asking, "Daddy go?" Chad was saying the other day he can't remember the last time he went to the bathroom at home without Presley coming in with him. "Potty?" She is in love. So in love, in fact that she would rather be with Daddy than with Mommy right now, much to Mommy's dismay. She would pick Daddy over Mommy almost everytime, unless Daddy isn't around or if she is around other people. I suppose it's because I am with Addison most of the time and towards the end of my pregnancy with Addison I couldn't hold or carry Presley as much as I used to. Oh well, I know Daddy is enjoying this time being the "favorite".

The FLEA

Chad got an early Christmas present this weekend. He got the new Socom Combined Assult. It just came out this week. He has been busy playing this game all weekend. All of his friends have this.They can play together online and talk to each other through their headsets. His new name is The FLEA. He got that name from a movie that had a sniper guy on it. Friday night he was up until 2 am playing. He knows he is only able to play after the girls are in bed at night. I think he belives he is really a navy seal trying to capture the enemy...maybe in his dreams.

A budding artists

Presley recently has found a new love. She is in love with coloring and crayons. She gets so excited whenever she sees a coloring book or crayon. She could sit and do it for an hour. She gets so focused on her "drawing". She has to get down real close. She likes to have someone color with her. She will give Daddy, Mommy, or even Addison a crayon to have them color with her. Her favorite color right now seems to be "ween", otherwise known as green. Maybe that's because that's the only color she can say. Notice her pinky. :)

I Can Do It Myself

Presley is now into feeding herself all the time, no matter what it is. For the most part she is doing pretty good with it, not getting too messy. Well, today was a different story. She was having cottage cheese, and decided that she didn't need her spoon. She thinks that cottage cheese is a "finger-food." Oh well, at least she is eating it. She is starting to become a pretty picky eater. I hope this is just a stage. Anyways, good thing tonight was bath night.

Play Date

Today we had a playdate with Graydon, my friend Roxy's son. I picked all three (Presley, Addison & Graydon) of them up from DayCare. Actually, before I picked them up I had to switch cars with Chad because I couldn't get 3 carseats into my little truck. They were squished in the back.

Graydon is quite the little talker and talked the whole time on the way home. It was so cute to hear his stories. Graydon was sitting in the middle of the two girls. At one point I looked back and saw Graydon and Presley holding hands! It was the cutest thing. Her first boyfriend (besides Daddy.) She sure knows how to pick a cutie! (When I told Chad, he wasn't to happy about the flirting.)

After we got home, Graydon had a blast playing in Presley's ball tent (thanks Reagan and Reilly for letting us borrow it). Then he found a train in Presley's toy box. He is the biggest fan I know of trains, especially Thomas the Train.

After we played awhile, we loaded back up and headed to Chad's basketball practice. On the way to see Chad, Presley and Graydon got to giggling and couldn't stop. One would try and stop and the other would start giggling again and that got the other one started too. It was so cute. Addison started crying and Graydon helped sing a few songs to get her to stop crying. The kids got to play a little basketball in the gym after practice got out before we had to drop Graydon back off at his home. The kids had a great time. Thanks for playing with us Graydon. We hope you had fun, we sure did.