Spoiled Girls

Ahh, winter is so long this time it seems.  We try to keep busy, but some days we just have to leave the house to keep from causing each other bodily harm.  Where do we go?  Target.  It's 1 mile away.  And guess what?  January is a HUGE clearance month at Target (I've heard July is too).  We went there a LOT that month, but recently too.  Back to my post title.  I love to spoil my kids.  It's so bad because I know they just don't need these things, but I want to buy them for them anyway!  Target has graciously offerred to help me out in this situation and provide cheap cheap toys for me to buy my kiddos.  Like this beauty.

Seriously?  Who doesn't love a blow up car that doubles as a ball pit?  With the extra balls it was $9.  Sydney rolls it across the house like a hamster ball scattering small plastic balls everywhere.  Priceless.

Next we scored a Lightning McQueen sleeping bag for $5.  So we had to put up the tent.  She was very excited about her new "bed."

 Next was a perfect toy for me.  I love the Mr. Potato Head toys as a kid and even had baby potato heads that my kids now play with.  We got them Mr. & Mrs. Potato Head for Christmas and then I saw this:

I so wanted it.  But not for $17 when I had just bought the Mr. & Mrs. ones.  So I didn't get it.  But then good old Target marked it down again and again.  And I happened to be in the store when it was $4.24.  SCORE!!!!  My kids are going nuts over these guys. (And let's just be honest, I am too).

I think one of the favorites though has been this:

I can remember countless hours spent playing on hoppity horses as a kid.  Ours were actually horses too with a horse head on it.  This one just has Dora.  :(  Oh well.  It was also only $2.50.  We had one already but it is slightly large for Sydney.  This one is toddler size and she is thrilled with the bouncing capabilities.  Mady is just thrilled that the ball has a handle on it so she toddles around the house dragging it behind her repeating, "bah bah bah" (ball ball ball) over and over again.  Also Priceless. 

Thank you Target for allowing me to indulge my kids for cheap.  We'll definitely be coming back.

Him Have Purple Toes!

A couple posts ago I mentioned that Aaron had sprained his ankle really badly.  He was playing basketball at our church with a bunch of guys on Saturday morning (you can all see how this is going right?) and right at the end he rolled his ankle and went down hard.  He came home and iced it for awhile but it was hurting pretty badly.  He had already broken that ankle 10 years ago, so he was concerned that it might have broken again.  Off we went to Urgent Care (thanks to my neighbor who took my kids!) and got an X-ray.  No breaks, but we did discover that the original break had never healed 100% together, so the new bone that grew in formed a bridge in the fracture.  Coupled with the extra bone around the outside that grew in, and his fibula is almost twice the size it normally would be.  Possibly the only reason he didn't break it this time.  Yay for past injuries?
Anyway, he was on crutches for a few days and now is just hobbling around.  But the best part is, his foot is mighty pretty.  Sydney comments on it daily.  And seriously, wouldn't you too?

Don't you love that the bruising goes halfway up his calf?

As Sydney says (repeatedly), "Him have purple toes!"

Gymnastics

We've been sick lately.  First icky sick, then colds, then other.  As in, Aaron severly sprained his ankle on Saturday at church basketball and is now on crutches and Sydney dislocated the ligament in her arm on Sunday and had to go to the doctor to get it popped back into place.  Oh the joys.  She's all better now and Aaron is on the mend, so here I am.  Finally.
Before all that fun stuff happened though, a friend of Sydney's invited her to attend her weekly gymnastics class.  We left Mady to scream at a friend for a couple hours (thank you Karen for dealing with the separation anxiety!) and went to hang out with Kenzie.  At first all the new kids really freaked Sydney out, but eventually the teacher got her warmed up and participating.  That's when she started having fun!

The teacher made up all sorts of fun obstacle courses for the kids to do and they had a blast.  Swinging, jumping, crawling, running, somersaulting, etc.!

The trampolines really scared Sydney at first but Miss Stephanie came through again and got Sydney to jump in.  Sydney wouldn't let me help her though.  It had to be Miss Stephanie.

Then we got to go to "The Pit."  They had a slide next to it so the kids could go in.  They loved it of course.

Then Sydney saw the rope swing.  She wanted to try it.  I was sure she'd fall right off, but look!

She went out and came back 3 times without even a hint of falling off once!  I was so impressed and it was by far her favorite part of the whole day!  Look at that grin!

She keeps asking to go "swing like Tarzan" with Kenzie again!  Thanks Casey & Kenzie!  We had so much fun!

Snowy Project Week

I have this sort of quirky thing about me.  Whenever it snows, I have a crazy urge to do some crafty projects.  When we woke up to snow last Monday, I knew it was going to be a good run because I hadn't crafted for quite a while.  Turns out I was right!  As Sydney says (often), "Look at me!" 

I first did this star.  I had gotten it for Christmas (thanks Mom!) and had been planning to mod podge some scrapbook paper on it, but had never done it.  So I went for it.  Having never used mod podge before (shocking since I come from a seriously crafting family), I was thrilled with how it turned out.  The fumes gave me some temporary clairvoyance and I saw a lot of mod podge in my future!

See...  Told you.  I saw the idea for these blocks here and had to make them.  I LOVE them and just used scraps from the star paper so they all match.  sigh.  Be sure to check out 10 steps to perfect mod podging and her ABC blocks if you like this project.  I'm in love with this site too!

I was thoroughly enjoying my mod podge at this point so I looked around for things to do.  This used to be painted plain brown and I'd been bored with it for awhile.  Not anymore!  Aaron started laughing at this point because I was going nuts with the mod podge!

I was in full project mode by then so I started in on stuff I'd been meaning to do.  A pillowcase for Sydney:

A tutu for Sydney (tutorial found here).  So adorable.

Back to the mod podge for a bow holder.  Something we've been desperately needing but that I was struggling to figure out.  I ended up mod podging a scrap of wood , hot gluing some flowers and ribbons on it and putting some sticky wall velcro on the back.  Presto Chango!  Our bows are all clean and organized!  Yay!

Finished this one this morning (a day late, but we had the V-day from you know where, so...)

And last but not least, I grabbed another of those spare cabinet doors (remember our toy box?) and mod podged a new way to show off my kids.  So darn cute.

Birthday Girl!

Videos Now Included!

Wow! The last year has flown by! Already our little Mady cakes (who was never very little) is a 1 year old! On Tuesday we took her to the doctor. She weighed in at a very healthy 26 lbs and 33 inches. Wowee baby girl! We cheated (despite my being a serious stickler on this rule) and turned Mady's car seat around a week early. She giggled pretty much the whole car ride that day. On Thursday when Aaron got home from work he had a surprise - my sister Jessica came to town to visit! I think this is the only picture we have to document her being here, but she came, we played, and Sydney has asked almost every day since where Auntie Jessa went! She got to come to book club with me which was so fun since Aaron even made sure she knew which book we were reading! Way to go babe! Thanks to both of you for the great surprise! There are 3 little girls out here that were all born within days of each other. We all got together to have a fun little party for the girls. We lined them up and gave them each a little cake and a party hat. Brooklyn and Brynne both hated their hats and cried. They weren't super excited about their cakes either. Mady wasn't thrilled about the hat but she tolerated it. She wasn't interested in the cake at all, until I finally shoved some in her mouth and got her to taste it. Then she went hog wild!
Everyone had a blast watching Mady go to town on that cake. We had stripped her down, so we just let her go at it. Then Paul & Janell were kind enough to let her bathe in their sink so she could be all squeaky clean for bed that night!

The next night (on Mady's actual birthday), we gave her her presents. She struggled opening them but had fun playing with them all! She especially loves that dolly and yells Bah-bee! a lot. It's hysterical.
Brilliant Auntie Jessica even thought to include Sydney in the presents and brought her an adorable little bag with a baby penguin in it. When Sydney opened it she exclaimed, "My handbag!" Thank you granny from Madagascar 2!
Also on her birthday Mady finally let us record some big stuff - she's walking now! She's actually walking a lot and being oh so big! I now have 2 toddlers!

She's walking much better now, although she still has the Frankenstein stance (which I adore). She's walking more than she's crawling now, so I guess she's all grown up! sniff sniff

I Know, I Know...

I stink at this. But my baby had a birthday, almost a week ago, and I'm determined to get caught up. Because she keeps doing funny things. So here we go. January in review...

On New Year's Day we went to the Museum of Nature & Science with our good friends Martin, Casey, & Kenzie. I love this picture of Syd & Aaron in the Expedition Health exhibit learning all sorts of cool stuff.

Kenzie & Sydney had a great time together riding Guanacos
Can't you see them being best friends forever? I can see the sleep overs now...

I decided to get out and go on a walk. I asked Sydney if she wanted to go to the park and she said no. I spent the next few minutes convincing her that she likes the park. After we discussed slides & swings she agreed to go give it a try.

We shopped lots of Target clearance (yay!). And we wore our new boots a lot. Aren't they just stinkin' cute?
On the 16th we went to a local candy shop that still makes all their candy by hand just like they did in 1930. Sydney's favorite part was the candy samples and the brochure rack like they have in hotels.Then over to the zoo. Take advantage of that decent weather when we can get it!
Next we built a fort. This is only blog worthy because it is the first fort my kids have cared about and played in. I'm pretty sure it was because I bribed them with popcorn.
A few days before Mady's birthday we went to the Children's Museum. Had to take advantage of her still being free! Sydney caught on to the role of a fireman real quick. While Mady and her friend just gabbed over some shopping. Ah, such fun.

Equally Cool

Today a friend was visiting me. Sydney happens to really like this friend and shows her all her toys each time she comes. Sydney really loves small animal figurines. She plays for ages with them, lining them up, arranging them into families, etc. Those little guys were the only way we got through church for a few months. Today she brought them out for my friend's viewing pleasure. Robin picked up a particularly strange one (shown here on the right) and asked Sydney, "Who is that?"

Sydney glanced up and nonchalantly answered, "That Toth"

After noticing the blank look on my friend's face, I helpfully informed her that Toth was an Egyptian God.

"Of course your child knows this," she responded.

Sydney proceeded to tell her who all the rest of them were including King Tut, the mummy, Anubis, Isis, and Nefertiti. Then she schooled her in a few other things including what a Tapir is and one of her favorite Disney characters.

Apparently Dopey and Toth are equally cool. Or equally uncool. Not quite sure which.

Deep Thoughts and Dilemas

We're going to Target today to pick up some more chicken nuggets (among other things). This morning while Sydney devoured one for breakfast (it wasn't worth arguing about) I realized I have a big dilema though. We usually buy the dinosaur shaped ones, which Sydney really likes, but she doesn't eat the whole thing. She bites of the dino's head, arms, legs, and tail, and leaves the rest to be thrown away. EVERY time. So here's my dilema: Do I continue to let her waste half of her food simply because she prefers appendages? or do I buy the "nugget shaped" (what does that mean anyway? What shape is a nugget?) ones and make her eat the whole thing? The nuggets would severely limit my artistic abilities. What's a mom to do?

P.S. This is not Sydney's plate although it gives me great ideas!

Potty Training

I hate it more than anything else right now.

Who You Gonna Call?

Yesterday Sydney was sitting on the potty when she suddenly starting seriously crying. I finally managed to convince her that I couldn't understand what she was saying while she caterwauling like that and got her to spit out, "A dragon getting my toes!"

Well, that was my first guess.

We proceeded to kick dragons out of the house for another 15 minutes. Apparently we had a very serious infestation. Here's Sydney showing off the dragon she caught. And here she is drop kicking him out the backdoor into our subzero wilderness.
After bruising their backsides she'd yell, "No come this house naughty dragons!" We're a dragon free home now. But she caught another one in Walmart last night. Be careful if you shop there.

Christmas 2009

Well, Christmas is over. My tree and all other holiday decorations are finally put back in the basement and my house looks, as Aaron noted today, "Bare." Which I think might be another word for clean that we are unaccustomed to using. Here's our farewell to 2009.

Sydney's first year leaving out treats for Santa. We had no cookies, but Sydney generously ate some of the treats before going to bed and included treats for the reindeer. She was very disturbed to discover that Santa had actually eaten "her" treats the next morning. Go figure, but I think it says on the plate that they are his.

Christmas morning. Oh the joys of the candy cane. Seriously, the kid had fruit snacks (from her stocking) for breakfast. But we had sticky buns, which aren't much better!

Mady with an awesome toy that makes all sorts of cool noises from Nana. Each girl opened 1-2 presents and then wanted to quit because they wanted to play with them. This is why we didn't go overboard this year.
This pretty much sums up our Christmas dress photo shoot. Seriously. These were taken Jan 4 because it was basically the first time Mady had been to church in forever because she has been sick. Despite my cajoling, they did not want their pictures taken. I have a great one of Mady in a headlock (courtesy of Sydney) on the floor crying. We love Christmas.

Hooray! A happy face! My mom got these great Christmas dresses for the girls and Aaron finally got a good picture of them. Happy day.
2009 was fun, now on to 2010!
Soon to come - this little girl is starting to walk!

Catch Up...Again

Ahhhh! I hate having to do catch up posts, but poor Mady has been sick for awhile. She got a cough the week before Thanksgiving and 3 sicknesses and 1 round of antibiotics later, she still has it. And it sounds worse now than ever. In fact I think it caused her to do a little baby barfing twice today. I might rip my hair out. I love winter and snow and Christmas and last year I was dying for it to be cold because that meant I would no longer be hugely pregnant, but this year I'm done. I love it still, but I want my baby to be not sick now! We were spoiled with Sydney's superman immune system and now we are paying for it. Grr. Anyway, here is my recap of the past month. I know I blogged, but these are some things I missed and want to record. Feel free to skip, but my little journaling self wants these preserved. Maybe now we can get back to that "More frequent shorter posts" mantra we were going for a long time ago...

Look at those sisters

I know this one isn't of family members and I'm not generally a fan of pictures of animals or things with no people in them (unless you're a pro-type), but I finally got to see the baby red pandas at the zoo. FINALLY. They're like a year old now. I want to eat them up and take them home. Don't they look cuddly? We went to the zoo. I think 3 times this month. So fun. We took lots of silly baths together We went to an ugly sweater party. Also so much fun. Oh yeah Tom, I posted it. Mwuahahaha. We went to Aaron's work Christmas party. Also so much fun. They always do a kids party instead of the more traditional adult-only drinking ones, so they have Santa, balloons, breakfast, face painting, carnival games, and a REALLY great present for each kid. Ooh, I love that party. I look forward to it all year. And I do mean ALL year.Next, a Christmas post and then on to 2010!