February 17, 2013

Last Sunday night we made and frosted cookies for Lily's teachers and some church friends.  Since the girls are not to be trusted with frosting, I let them do the sprinkles.  Apparently they cannot be trusted with sprinkles either.  I was cleaning sugar out of the grooves in our table for two days!  They were so proud of their creations.  I suppose a little mess every now and then is a good thing.  And the sprinkles did look good on the cookies - just not on the walls, my table, the floor, and their clothes.

As the baby's due date draws nearer I am realizing how quickly Lily and Annie are growing up.  The other morning Annie was sitting on my lap and holding her blanket over her index finger - the same way she has since she was a tiny baby.  I had to snap a photo to capture this moment before she outgrows this habit.

Now that Lily is four she insists on not taking a nap.  I think she likes the time alone with Mommy while Annie rests.  But some days a girl just needs her sleep.  On Tuesday Lily passed out around 4:00 in the afternoon and  nothing we could do would wake her up.  We put her to bed a 7:00 p.m. and she finally woke up at 1:00 a.m. to go to the bathroom.  By then she had been sleeping for nine hours and she wanted to have a snack and play.  Mommy agreed to stay up with her if she would color quietly.  The coloring lasted two hours - while Mommy was asleep on the couch.  What a relief when Lily woke me to say she was ready to go back to bed. 

 Annie was happy to enjoy a night alone with Mommy and Daddy while Lily slept.  We played games, read stories, and let her "fly" on Daddy's legs.  It was nice to focus so much on one child and we could tell it meant a lot to Annie to have us all to herself.

 We had a great Valentine's Day.  Lily helped Mommy decorate, set the table, and make a pie for Daddy's gift.

 Daddy brought home balloons and a box of chocolates for each girl.  Our favorite babysitter Cassandra came over to watch the girls so we could go to see "McManus In Love" in Blackfoot.  The show was funny, but the seats were not very comfortable for a Mommy six weeks away from giving birth. 

 Lily had dance class on Valentine's Day and earned this purple jewel ring for doing her dance without any mistakes.  She is so proud of it and has a special box to keep it in when she doesn't want to wear it.  She also is going through a Jessie (from Toy Story) phase.  She wants to be a cowgirl all the time.  Kind of a nice change from all the princess stuff.

 Here's Lily and Annie at our Valentine Dinner.  Lily was so excited to get a gift from Daddy and to eat breakfast for dinner.  We had cream cheese stuffed french toast with raspberry sauce, strawberries, and whipped cream, sausage, and orange juice.  Plus a neighbor brought over red snickerdoodles and we had chocolate.  Love is sweet in the Hall house!

 I "mustache" (must ask) you to be my Valentine!  Our babysitter Cassandra brought these over for the girls.  They originally had a sucker poked through the middle so that when you suck on the sucker it looks like you have a mustache.  The girls were so excited to show us their mustaches Friday morning.  I love that Annie's is upside down.  They've been wearing their mustaches - "like Papa" - all weekend.

 We got another surprise Friday morning - a Valentine gift box from Puna and Papa.  Annie loved the cards and stickers.  Lily was excited about the watercolor paints and a new movie "Rio".  We saved the movie until night time so Daddy could watch it too.

 Friday night we built a tent fort in the living room and snuggled down for "Rio".  The girls loved the music and all the colorful birds.  Mommy and Daddy enjoyed it too.  Thanks for the fun gifts Puna!

Saturday morning a friend from church brought by a shoebox full of headbands, bows, clips, and flowers her daughters have outgrown.  Annie was so happy she dumped everything out to take inventory and play.  It kept her entertained for almost an hour.

Behold the fierce icicle of terror!  This thing has been growing on our house for weeks and finally achieved a length of over four feet.  Jeremy snapped a photo of it Saturday morning and sometime during the day it broke and fell.

Annie was trying to put snow gloves on her feet Sunday after church.  Mommy was tending Lily and didn't notice that Annie fell asleep - on her face while wearing a raincoat!  Once Mommy realized the house was way too quiet she went looking for Annie and found her right behind the living room couch like this.  We promptly got her to bed, after taking a picture first.

Saturday morning Lily woke up with a cough and slight fever.  She continued to get worse through the day so we took her to the doctor.  She was tested for influenza but came back negative.  She has been coughing and struggling with the fever.  But she's in good spirits.  We're just trying to help her rest and stay hydrated.  Hopefully she'll kick it without spreading it to the rest of us.  Daddy stayed home from church with her because Mommy needed to accompany the choir and play the piano in Primary.  Thanks for taking good care of Lily Daddy!

Valentine Social

Our church held a Valentine Social for the adults.  All the food was provided for us and Jeremy was in charge of the entertainment.  We decided on two games.  The first was a wedding photo guess who.  Everyone brought a wedding or engagement photo and we all tried to guess who was in each picture.  It was a big hit.  The second game was a Valentine themed white elephant gift exchange.  We read a funny left and right passing story and then everyone opened, swapped and stole gifts.  It was a blast.

 The table settings

 The buffet table.  We had brisket, potatoes, corn and squash, rolls, and caesar salad.

 Playing the guess who wedding photo game.

 Delicious frosty pineapple punch

 Hors d'oeuvres: chocolate covered strawberries, shrimp cocktail, and empanadas

 Playing Left and Right

 Dessert table

The most popular gift was a bottle of red soda I had relabeled "Love Potion No.9"  with a warning on the label that consumption could lead to hot and passionate romance.  We all had some good laughs over the fights that bottle brought out.  This was the best church social we have ever been to.  Thanks to everyone who helped pull it all together.

February 10, 2013

 No new snow this week, but it was warm enough to get out and enjoy what we already have.  Lily loves pulling Annie around in our little sled.  The girls thought it would be fun to pretend they were jumping on the trampoline so they played in the empty frame for a long time.  Silly kids.

 The roads cleared off so we could finally take our Christmas bikes out for a ride.  Lily did awesome with her bicycle's maiden voyage.  Annie surprised all of us with her ability to reach the pedals and get herself going.  She is highly motivated to keep up with Lily.  The only problem we had on our ride was a tiny neighborhood dog that came out to greet Lily. She had quite a scare and started pedaling like a bat out of "you know where".  We had to cut the ride short because Lily was crying so hard.

 Annie gets some great bedhead, but this one was so funny I had to get a photo.

 Here's Lily in dance class.  She is really coming along.  It is great to see some progress.  She is also excelling with gymnastics.  Her coach wants to move her up to the next class, but Mommy is not sure about that yet since Lily will only be four and all the other girls will be five or six.

 In January Mommy started a cleaning rotation for the house.  Bedrooms on Mondays, Kitchen on Tuesdays, Living Room and Basement on Wednesdays, Bathrooms on Thursdays, Errands on Fridays, Laundry on Saturdays.  It has worked very well and keeps us all from running around on Saturdays trying to clean the house.  Lily likes to help Mommy.  Her favorite jobs are: making her bed every morning all by herself, and helping Mommy with the bathrooms. 

 Annie has a new favorite television show.  It is called "Bo on the Go!".  Mommy loves how active the show is.  The girls watch the whole thing standing up so they'll be ready for the next action Bo asks them to do.  If you have a toddler at home, we recommend trying out this show.

 We made valentines for the grandparents this week.  I won't show the final product since they are in the mail, but the process involved finger painting with our feet.  Thank goodness we have an unfinished basement because it was a messy project!  We have lots of little red footprints on the floor.

 Our silly girls!

 Saturday morning Annie woke up with a stuffy nose.  She didn't like that it was running so much so she found a toy stethoscope and used it to plug her nose.  I thought it was so funny.  She liked getting a laugh out of us.

Daddy took Lily on a daddy-daughter-date Saturday.  Lily was so excited.  She picked out a special outfit and headband and spent a lot of time on her hair.  It is such a blessing to have a Daddy who will spend time with his girls.  Thanks for loving all of us Daddy!

February 03, 2013

 Our big story of the week was SNOW!  Temperatures have warmed up a bit and early this week we got a lot of snow.  Jeremy had to dig himself out to get the car out of the garage for work.  A neighbor came over and plowed our driveway for us and two other neighbors came and secretly shoveled our walks.  Roads were slick.  Christine slid off the road trying to turn into our street after choir practice last week.  Luckily she and the car were ok. 

 Lily is still loving gymnastics.  Her new favorite thing is to hang on a rope over a foam pit, then let go and fall in.  Her teacher makes class so much fun.  I know she plays hard in there because she falls asleep after lunch every time we have gymnastics.

 Mommy was sick this week with a serious sore throat.  So hard to be pregnant and not be able to take much more than Tylenol.  But after six days, the pain and chills are gone.  Lily wanted to play nurse this week after all the sickness we've had.  She tucked Ariel into her closet with a blanket, a cup of ice, and a small bowl "just in case Ariel gets tummy yuckies and needs to throw up".  She kept a washcloth handy to wipe Ariel's forehead "so she won't feel too hot."  It was sweet to see how diligently Lily cared for her dolly.

 Lily and Daddy enjoyed some play time in our front yard.  We have a large enough pile of snow that the kids can sort of sled down it.  Mommy wanted to play outside too but she needed to stay inside and get well.

 Annie wants to be Mommy's helper (when the mood suits her).  She offered to mop the kitchen on Friday night.  So we gave her the Swiffer and let her have at it.  She was done after about 1/3 of the floor, but at least she was willing to try.

Christine has been having a hard pregnancy week.  The baby is healthy, but Christine's anxiety has been tough.  Two childhood friends had babies in NICU for different reasons.  Every night has been filled with worry and tears.  One friend was able to take his baby home and the other friend's baby was taken home to our Father in Heaven.  It's been a rough emotional ride so close to delivery. 

Lily and Annie have been waking a lot during the night.  Each one gets up one to two times a night.  Lily to go potty and Annie for various reasons.  Annie has also decided she doesn't like to eat anything.  She refuses pretty much every meal - even foods she used to love.  It has been a frustrating week with interrupted sleep and a hungry two year old who won't eat.  We're hoping to catch up on rest very soon.