Christmas Eve's Eve

Here are some pictures from our Christmas Eve's eve party at Gary and Wendy's. We love this party. We had yummy food and good company. Domi and Tyler got Lily a doll the size of her, she was dancing around with it. It was pretty funny. Gary and Wendy got Calvin a Lego truck and Jon and Calvin put it together that night. Then it was off to bed for me and the kids and Jon was off to work. Jon was on the graveyard shift this Christmas.

Christmas cookies

We love to make Christmas cookies as a family. It is a lot of fun rolling out the dough and decorating the cookies. The only problem is that little hands can make big messes!!

Racing

The kids and I love building race tracks with their mega blocks. It is fun to race the little cars down each side to see who will win. This is just one of our creations.

Lily update

Lily bug is potty trained and doing so well! She very rarely has accidents and when she does she says "sorry, I won't do it again." She is now sleeping in a big girl bed and she loves it. We call it her princess bed. It was my bed growing up and she thinks it is such a fun bed. We are getting her room ready for the baby and she is so excited about being a big sister. She loves her baby dolls. She always has one or two with her. She feeds them and wraps them in blankets and changes their diapers and she is so soft with them, it is cute to watch. She loves watching princess movies and playing dress up.

She is one of the most polite two year olds I have ever met. She says please and thank you in the most sincere way whenever you do anything for her. Jon absolutely loves that about her and he is just wrapped around her little finger. I need to get her on video soon because she is just so sweet and her mannerisms are so cute. She is always trying to help out and she is always trying to keep up with Calvin. Those two are best friends. They love playing together and I love watching them interact. They have their little arguments and Lily can hold her own but most of the time they work it out without any big commotion. Lily and I started a mom and tot class at the rec center. She is so excited about it and she loves it. We do little cooking classes, crafts, field trips, and lots of other fun things. It is a 4 month program and I am so glad that we are doing this before the baby is born. It is really fun to get this quality time with my little sweetheart. I just love this age and I don't want her to grow up. She gives so many hugs and kisses and she tells me funny stories. She is just such a joy to be around.

Just a couple of cute pictures of Lily's cute curls.

Legos and Calvin update

Growing up Jon had his own Lego room in his house. He loved building things and he collected tons of Legos over the years. About 6 months ago he decided Calvin was old enough to start playing Legos with him. This has started a frenzy in our home. Everyday Calvin asks Jon to build him a new Lego treasure. They will sit down in our toy room, now Lego room, for hours and build things. Lily has even joined in and both of the kids have really enjoyed this special time with dad.

Lego town, there has been a lot added since I took this picture.

This is the beloved pirate ship. Calvin is really into pirates lately. We rented a Lego movie called Pirate Island and he can't stop talking about it. We have actually rented it several times because he loves it so much. We check out pirate books from the library, Jon and Calvin have been reading a little chapter book together. And Calvin even gets Lily to play pirates with him.

He can't decide if he wants to be a knight, a pirate, an inventor, or an astrounaut when he grows up. He has asked me to send invitations to everyone we know to invite them to be pirates with us and find the treasure. We are leaving right after dad builds the huge, real pirate ship in the backyard. What I love about Calvin is that he has no boundaries on what he dreams up and what he wants to be. He thinks anything and everything is possible and he thinks his Dad can build anything his little heart could ever desire. I wish you could hear some of the requests he throws to Jon. He asked as him to build a pirate swingset, a castle treehouse, a spaceship, a real pirate ship, and the list goes on. He doesn't quite get it when we tell him these things are expensive and we will have to make a plan to build them. He dreams it up and thinks dad will have this done by tomorrow. I love when he comes in my room in the morning and tells me about his dreams. He gets so excited and he has such an amazing little mind.

Just a little side note about Calvin. I have always just loved this boy, he is like a little adult in the way he acts. He is always trying to do his best and be a big helper. He rarely gives me any sort up grieve, he is just such a sweetheart. So to top it off, this is the kind of stuff he prays for at night. Besides asking for help with all of his wildest dreams to come true, he says stuff like: "Please help me to try ingredients and to do all of the things mom and dad ask. And to be a good boy." This just amazes me because a 4 year old usually does not think about stuff like this. And we have never prompted him to pray for stuff like that. He is a really picky eater and he says he does not like "ingredients". But he always tries to taste the food so that he is a good boy. And then he prays for help to like it. And he does everything we ask, pick up toys, room, etc. And he asks for help with these things in his prayers. He is such a good boy. We just love him to pieces.

Cousin sleepovers

Calvin and Lily love playing with their cousins, Ambree, Bailey and Brielle. So Jaime and I decided to do sleepovers for the kids and let the parents have a break for the night. Joe and Jaime had the munchkins the first time and Jon and I had such a fun date night and morning sleeping in. Then a few weeks later we had all of the kids. We rented movies, had treats, played games and had a lot of fun. We set up a big bed in the family room for all of the kids. Getting them to settle into bed was quite funny. Lily and Bailey are little characters, they were running around and laughing in the dark. We finally had to seperate them. The next day we met Joe and Jaime at the mall and took the kids to see "The Princess and the Frog." The kids all liked it, Jon and I were a little wierded out by all the voodoo stuff. But the kids sure were tired by Saturday afternoon. I am so happy we are doing this because the kids love it and it is such a fun break for the parents.

It's a girl !!!

At least that is what the ultrasound tech wrote in the card that we opened Christmas morning. I went in for my ultrasound the week before Christmas and this baby decided to be completely uncooperative. She (?) was tucked as far down into my pelvis as possible in the breech, fetal position with the umbilical cord between her crossed legs. Meaning she was curled up in a little ball hiding her bum where no one could possibly see it. It was kind of funny. She stayed sleeping pretty much the whole time. The ultrasound tech has been doing this for 20 some odd years and he says he has only been wrong a handful of times. So he took a guess by taking into consideration the shape of my belly, the speed of the heartbeat, and by what little bit he could see through the top of the baby's head. He wrote his 70% sure guess in our Christmas card like I had requested and he sealed it up for us to open on Christmas morning.

Christmas morning was very exciting having this fun little surprise waiting for us. Calvin cried when we read that it was a girl. He really wanted a knight brother. But we told him he didn't have to share his room and that he could keep his castle in there and he cheered right up. Not to mention he had presents to open. Lily was very excited. Jon said he knew it was a girl because he had a dream about her and the fact that him and his dad are the only boys in their family made him think we were going to have more girls. I thought it was a boy until the ultrasound and then I thought it was a girl. Even though there are no similarities with this pregnancy and Lily's. This one is a lot more like when I was pregnant with Calvin. It goes to show that you never know, signs, symptoms or whatever don't mean a thing.

And you never really know until the baby is here. And that might just be how this works out, because I went in for my 24 week appointment today and the doctor tried to check what the baby was again and her little bum was still tucked way out of sight. So we may just be surprised, we will have to see. Boy or girl, it is great either way. But as for now we are considering the names Anabelle or Arabelle or Carson (boy), but that is subject to change without notice. The kids love saying baby Anabelle though. We will see.

This is me at 21 weeks pregnant

I am behind

I have so many fun holiday posts to catch up on but I have been so sick this week I haven't done anything. I have a severe sinus infection, fever, body aches, nausea, I have been in bed in 4 days! I will catch up when I am feeling better.And then I can get started on my blog book.