4th week of January 2016

So January is almost over but in some ways the Christmas Holidays are still going on in my house.  Emmalyn LOVES to sing Jingle Bells and watch Frosty the Snowman.  (Max loves the movie too.)  It's all about the Christmas songs in January!  We listen to Jingle Bells over and over and over in the car.

I was out doing yard work and found this not-so-awesome break in the drip line for my sprinklers.  Some stinking bunny just HAD to see how it tasted.  But huge kudos to Peter who saw it, was immediately confident on how to fix it, and got it handled like it was nothing!

I finally took down the Christmas decorations... sad to put the holidays away but such a relief to have my house all nice and clean again.

When I was putting away the ornaments, I realized that this beautiful ornament my mom made for me and my siblings in 2010 was cracked.  This was the last ornament I got from her before she passed and I was super bummed to see it had cracked (maybe from the heat in the attic where I keep all the decorations?).  :(  I've separated it and will need to figure out how to save it before I use it again.  I'm super sad.

Good bye stocking and animated animals

Goodbye Christmas card door that was a fun reminder of how many great people we have in our lives.

Take 1

I tried to get a cute picture of both of the kids at Home Depot but it's never easy to get them both looking at the same time and smiling and looking cute.  :)

Take 2

Take 3

Take 4 - I give up!

Rockin' her shades

I took Maxwell shopping with me at Gymboree.  For the most part he did great and it wasn't as painful as I was expecting.  He was excited to pick out a shirt for Valentine's Day.

That hair in the morning!

We went shoe shopping as a family and I handed Little Miss my phone and she took a few pictures and a video that I found later.  

Maxwell graduated to the next level at his swimming lessons!  I wanted to get a picture of his card all filled out with his accomplishments but they had already cleaned it off when we got there.  (They were clearly planning on him moving up today.)  Here we come Level 7!

Getting to ring the bell and getting his certificate

Playing on the indoor playground...

(There are two days a week when Max and Landen are both in preschool, Hayden is in elementary school, and it's just Brittany and Emmalyn.)

... and playing outside too.  

It's awesome when days are sunny and warm in winter and you don't need a jacket!

Video - Emmalyn throwing a fit over her food.  Sometimes she isn't cute and fun.

We started Kindermusik again this week.  We are going to a different location with a new teacher, Ms Carolyn.  She's awesome.  In some ways she looks like my mom and she's so fantastic with the kids.  I really, really like her and her style of teaching.  Both Maxwell and Emmalyn are taking classes now.  Max still has his KiddieKeys piano lessons during the week with one of our old Kindermusik teachers, Ms. Leah.

This week, Max had a rare accident at school.  It's been a really long time since he had an accident.  Poor kid.
Max sometime struggles to look through his glasses, he lets them fall down his nose and looks over them since they are blurry to him.
We have added something to my nighttime routine with Maxwell.  I now ask him 3 questions at night.  #1 - What was your favorite part of the day #2 - What was your least favorite part of the day #3 - What is one nice thing you did for someone today.  He rarely comes up with an answer, but I keep asking because I'm trying to build a behavior with him and emphasize the importance of helping others.

I think Emmalyn may be teething again because the drooling is picking back up again.
She will say, "why momma" or "why daddy" when asking why.
She hasn't had much dinner lately.
Emmalyn is tired super early lately.  In face, I put her down at 5 this past weekend thinking that she would take short nap and she never woke up and stayed asleep all night.
Emmalyn is strong at being wiggly when she wants to escape, so strong willed!!!

Christmas is only a few days away...

Had to take a pic - - can't believe we are getting gas this cheap!  It's crazy how much the price of gas has come down...  We need to go on a road trip!

The boys being boys.  Maxwell has tackled Hayden.

My sleeping babies.  How sweet is this?

Max has like 4 different hats on

Emmalyn is doing a great job feeding herself.  I still make her baby foods but we are also giving her more foods to feed herself than we did with Maxwell.

Emmalyn ready to cheer on the local team.  Go cowboys!

Maxwell made this ornament at school with his school pic (we didn't end up buying any of these pictures so this is the only one we'll get)

We celebrated his last day of school for the year with Momma picking him up from school and going out to get ice cream.

Peter and I took both the kids furniture shopping for a new TV console.  It's harder to shop with two kids!  Emmalyn is in the stroller but Maxwell just walks by us which means he's harder to contain and keep his hands off everything.

Emmalyn continues to grow and do new "exciting" things - 

Her tastes are really expanding.  Her favorite thing to chew on lately is shoes...any kind of shoes...it's like she's drawn to them.  I have to be super aware and keep them aware from her.  GROSS!

Her second tooth on her left on top broke through on Dec 20 which is good because she's been fussy and not sleeping well.

She is standing a lot, pulling up and walking along things, and also climbing over things.

Will all that new moving, she's also falling down but that doesn't seem to bother her most of the time.

Sometimes she will give "kisses"  (big open mouth kisses).

Her favorite toy is the activity table.

She loves her binky.  (Max did NOT, so I'm nervous about having to eventually break her from it someday.

She's a momma's girl but certainly lights up for her daddy, Uncle Joe, and Aunt Brittany when she sees them.

When I sing to her she is starting to sing back to me.

She has now learned how to scream.

Can blow raspberries

She makes sounds like "gah gah" and maybe some "buh buh" and "ma"? (at least that's my interpretation.

Emmalyn's Christmas Photo Shoot

I had wanted to get Christmas pictures done of Emmalyn similar to what I had done with Maxwell (click here to see). It's not exactly but it's close enough.  Emmalyn is so easy to get good pictures of...