Sunday, December 26, 2010

My home is about to puke red

We've been "elm.o-fied" since yesterday. B got so many El.mo things it is ridiculous! E.lmo books, El.mo camera, El.mo sing along machine, Tic.kle-me-E.lmo, Elm.o jammies, it's a little insane.
What's even more fun is all the noise they make. I think in a couple months, I may have to be admitted to a looney bin. It's only been one day of all things E.lmo and I already was dreaming of Elm.o songs last night. YIKES!!

It was a super fun day though. Brynna really made out like a bandit with new toys and books and clothes... mostly from grandparents too, which means Batman and I didn't go overboard or broke ;-)

We were only able to get one picture of the 3 of us:


Too bad her eyes are closed or it would have been a really good picture!

And here's a couple of B with her new loot:



Saturday, December 25, 2010

Merry Christmas!

Wishing you and yours a very Merry Christmas on this day!


Batman, T and Beamer

Thursday, December 23, 2010

Crafts... with Pictures!

Well, in my usual slacker style, I didn't get everything documented in pictures before I sent them off to my family. But since we did pretty much the same presents for Batman's family, these will have to suffice:

For the grandparents:
The ornaments have B's handprint painted on them with glitter inside and a "dangling" picture of her royal cuteness. The plaque, I made with my new Sil.houette machine (have I mentioned I LOVE it?! 'Cause I am kind of infatuated). Obviously the one I made for my parents has their last name and not my IL...

(In retrospect I would have measured and centered their name instead of just winging it...)

For the Aunties and Uncles (and cousins!):
Each one has their first initial on it- also made with my lovely new machine-

Since I drew my little bro, I made him this:

It's a "prayer board" where he can put pictures and little notes of who and what he's praying for (He asked for it, if you can believe it. The punk wants to be a pastor... go figure)
(again in retrospect- I should have measured the ribbon spacing instead of just winging it...so much for that now thought)

Batman technically drew my sister's name, but since he's not all that crafty, I whipped up her gift... and since I'm a slacker I forgot to take a picture of it before I sent it off, but here is where I "copied" it from. Also made with my new machine ;-)


For the cousins:

We got a stuffed animal thingy for my youngest nephew... it's called a hug (B has one too- hers is purple). We got it at a local craft fair in November (handmade but not by me) and I thought it was fun:


And my other neice and nephew got these books (the first and second).

I'm {fairly} happy with how things turned out. And did I mention I'm loving working with my new Silh.ouette machine? Thanks again Batman!!
So there you have it folks: Our handmade Christmas!

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

13/14 months!

Epic Fail. That's how I would describe my getting up a 13 mo post before the 14 mo one. Ha! So instead I've chosen to combine them... hopefully, this won't be a pattern ;-)

So Brynna has gone from being my "baby" to an active toddler! Oh my! The last couple months have been crazy for her!

Between 12 mo and 14mo she popped out 6 new teeth! She now has the 4 front on both top and bottom and all 4 of her molars. It's been quite an ordeal though. There weren't too many sleepless nights, but the few we had were doozies I tell ya! Hopefully, she's got a reprieve for a while?

She is walking EVERYWHERE. No more crawling in this house. And she seems to be figuring out "running" as well. Although that usually ends with either running into a wall (she takes after her mother) or tripping over her own feet (also like her mom).

She's still not saying many intelligible words. She still says mamma and dadda and duck (du) and dog (do) but not much more than that. It seems that du and do have various meanings though. She will point out a duck and say "du" but then she will do the same thing with Elmo or the Christmas tree ornament or the food on her plate, so who knows? Batman is a little worried that she doesn't say too many words yet, so I think we will bring it up at our next dr appt. I'm not overly concerned, but we will see next month :)

She "seems" to be growing however, she still fits into a lot of her 9 month clothes. Most of her 12 month stuff still looks a bit big, but since they are most of her warmer clothes, that's what she wears ;-)

Her feet seem to finally be growing a bit. She now wears a size 4!

We are still in size 3 disposables and her BG CD still fit nicely... I'm not sure they will last until she's potty trained though. They are let out to the biggest size and if she gets too much bigger, I don't think they will last. Anyone else thinking they may have this issue? We have plenty of "bigger" homemade CD so I'm not worried, just curious if they BG will really last.

We still CD most of the time. When we travel of course we switch to disposies (since I can't exactly do laundry on the road), but when we are home and around town, it's cloth all the way. And now it's been made easier as Batman and I purchased THIS (and the dryer too) on Sunday- and they were delivered Monday- and I LOVE them!

Brynna is eating all table food now- which at times can be a challenge since we like her to eat what we eat... and we've been eating a lot of salad lately. Haha! Thankfully, most of the salad toppings are things she will eat, like beans, softer veggies, couscous, quinoa, tofu, rice, "meat" crumbles, etc.

We had our first big snow storm just after Thanksgiving here and Brynna LOVED playing in the snow! Here's a look:




Eating it was fun too:



She LOVES reading books and even "reads" to Kino sometimes:


She discovered some of the fun things about Christmas these last couple months too like trees and ornaments:




The Wiggles (yes, I know she's not supposed to watch ANY TV until she's 2, but sometimes we just need a break from our normal routine... please don't judge):


Christmas crafts:


Macy's (Day After) Thanksgiving Day Parade (in Seattle):




It's fun seeing her figure out things. You can almost see the wheels turning in her head as she figures out how to reach something, or open a drawer, play in the dogs water, open doors, push buttons (the dishwasher especially), figure out the shape finder, make elmo "talk," etc.

She gets more and more personality by the day and one of her favorite games lately is "hide-and-seek" She loves to "hide" and wait for you to find her and she really loves finding Batman or me. It's the cutest. thing. ever!

And that's all I can think of... I really am going to try and be a better blogger- up tomorrow (hopefully) are all the Christmas gifts/ crafts we made!

Wednesday, December 15, 2010

Work in progress

I have Brynna's 13 mo post brewing...

In the meantime I'm getting all our Christmas gifts together. We are doing a "handmade" Christmas again this year. First, because, well, we are poor. And second, because I'm in a crafty mood. And third, it's fun! Haha!

I'll take some pics when I get things done.

Happy Hump Day everyone!

Monday, December 13, 2010

My neglected blog

I think I should just change the name to that officially. It seems like I never have time to get on the computer, much less update you all...

I think I just need better time management.

So here's the last couple weeks in bullets:

  • Cheer has been crazy busy- we had 4 games last week, plus an extra practice- which turned out to be for naught since the routine we were going to perform didn't happen
  • I've had 3 girls quit the team in the last 3 days and I kicked one of the guys off
  • Said boy was kicked off for being an idiot- misses practice to get a tattoo? Give me a break!
  • I think we all need Christmas break
  • Brynna has been thriving! Such a busy girl I have!
  • Batman started back out at the base f/t until the 22nd
  • The inside of our house is finally decorated for Christmas, but I think we are forgoing the outside this year. Everytime Batman was available to put up the lights, it was either raining or snowing like crazy
  • My sister was in a car accident- she was rearended by a guy with no insurance- lovely- and now her car is totalled
  • My older brother is going in for back surgery tomorrow morning
  • My dad has a colonoscopy tomorrow and a cystoscopy on Thursday
  • My parents car broke down last week- it's "fixed" now
  • My mom is stressed out like you wouldn't believe so I've been a bit of a sounding board lately
  • With all the rain the PNW has been having, my parents basement started flooding
  • Brynna turns 14 months old next week and I still haven't posted about her 13mo update... slacker mom
  • I got one of these babies from Batman- a belated birthday/ early Christmas present- and an attachment has formed... LOVE
  • With all this cheer stuff going on, I haven't been able to use said machine much... but soon my pet... very soon
  • I have one of our biggest fundraisers coming up on Saturday and somehow I've convinced Batman to MC...
  • Kino killed our resident squirrel today and ate most of it... I found the head and torso laying in front of the back door earlier this evening as I was cleaning up dinner... thankfully outside, not in
  • I'm afraid Kino is going to be sick in the middle of the night. All over my newly cleaned kitchen floor... or worse... the carpet
  • I'm trying to come up with Christmas gifts for my sis and little bro (Batman drew Ash and I drew Zac)... I really want to get Zac this, but they are sold out... and I can't knit or crochet to save my life- plus I'm poor and $50 for a hat is not in my budget... time for plan B?
  • I've decided to go on the "no food" diet... seriously
  • Not seriously, but I have to do SOMETHING... need to lose weight

I think that's all for now... I really will try to get a post up for B's 13 mo update... sometime BEFORE she turns 14 mos!

*promise*

Thursday, December 2, 2010

Happy Thanksgiving

Huh? What's that you say?



Thanksgiving was a week ago??



Oh, right!



Well, Happy {Belated} Thanksgiving then ;-)



(Ack! My face looks like it's painted white! YIKES!! I promise I wasn't dressed up as a mime!)



Life has been super busy for us lately... what else is newMi? I feel like I never have a moment just to sit down and do anything for myself (aka blog) and when I do, I have been choosing to read (this series) again (I'm hoping Batman gets the hint and buys me the 7th/ newest book in the series) and to craft. I ended up making some super cute things for my sis, my mom and my alder brother for their birthdays. Well, mom's and ash's were cute...

Here's our life in bullets then, since I seem to be epically failing at this blogging thing:

  • Miss Brynna turned 13 months... YIKES! That's an upcoming update [**promise**]
  • Cheer season has begun- meaning lots of games, activities and the like
  • My cheer assistant was in Austria for 3 weeks- meaning I had to be at EVERY event instead of just 3/4 of them
  • We are cohosting a cheer competition in Dec, which has kept me hopping even more than normal
  • Batman did some odd jobs with his dad and his old work
  • Batman started back out at the base f/t for until the end of the year
  • We spent a weekend in Twin with Batman's brother and family
  • We spent Thanksgiving in Seattle with my family
  • We had a crazy snow storm on our way home from Twin, Seattle had one the day we were suposed to fly out (we ended up changing our flight for the next morning as our scheduled flight at 7:40 pm didn't leave until 12:15am- on top of that it took my parent's 6 hours to get home from the airport area! ), and then another one yesterday that dropped 8 inches at our doorstep. It was a little insane, but thankfully B and I didn't have to go anywhere. We just kicked it around the house
  • My team lost {devastation ensued} to Nevada... I still love our kicker though... he's from our town (and Batman's HS) so how could we not show the love?
  • Kino got to spend a week at our friends house, causing all sorts of ruckus with their 2 dogs, and even got to sleep on their bed... he lived like a king for 6 days straight
  • We watched the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade from the comfort (warmth) of my parents family room... then the next day froze our *you-know-whats* off the next day at the Macy's Day After Thanksgiving Day Parade in Sea-town
  • Brynna got to spend some time out in the snow, first with cousins, then with aunties and uncles, then with just me
  • I made my sister a cute shirt for her birhtday using a tutorial I found online. Then saw a shirt almost identical in Ol.d Na.vy on black friday... mine was, like so much cuter though
  • I made my mom a cute scarf using another tutorial I found online.
  • One of these times I might actually link to the craft tutorials I find, so you can actually see what I'm talking about

And I think that's it in a nut shell... or at least what I can remember (other than the updates on B that will be in another post- think teeth... and lots of them)

Hope all is well with your families and that you had a great Thanksgiving!