Santa was here

Somehow Santa knew where to find us and left some fun toys for the kids. Thankfully they don't quite understand the excitement yet and slept in until almost 8am! Once Madeline saw her presents though, she was all about it. Her first present was a new camera. She loves it and took pictures all weekend!! I'll be posting some of the pictures she's taken later. Some of them actually aren't bad.

She helped her sister open her presents too.

She got a glow-worm that lights up and sings lullabies.

Santa also brought her some of the snacks she loves. How does he know this stuff?

Fia also got a new bath toy and jammies. Madeline got a Cookie Monster Wii game, Elmo's Potty Time DVD, slippers, coloring book and new hair barrettes. Santa was very good to them.

As for Andy and I, we both did a good job for each other. I got him a nice OSU frame for his MBA diploma. I thought it would look great in his new office at work.

Madeline helped me open my gift from Andy.

It's a beautiful new Eco-Drive watch. I love it but I haven't been able to wear it yet. I need to get the band adjusted to fit me.

Christmas 2010, Part 1

We had a wonderful trip back home for Christmas. Lots of travelling but it was so nice to see everyone again. With all those stops meant lots and lots of pictures. So I hope you all like pictures and lots of them. Our first stop was at my parent's house on Christmas Eve. As you can see, she is wearing some of her new gear.....a dress set with earrings (which she absolutely LOVED) and a kitchen apron. She was opening a new Mickey and Minnie Mouse Christmas ornament.

Then she helped her cousin Alexis open some of her presents.

The last gift from my parents was a stroller and doll for each of them. They must have done 50 laps around the house pushing their new babies. It was so cute!

Then we were off to Grandma Cipollone's house.

Madeline and Alexis loved playing together. It will be so much fun once we live closer and they can play all the time.

Then it was time to go home and get in bed. Santa was on his way afterall.

Merry Christmas!

This was Madeline's first homework assignment. We were supposed to decorate this tree with whatever we wanted. Family pictures were a given. Then we filled it in with "ornaments" colored by her and some of her favorite characters.

- The characters are from Yo Gabba Gabba, her new favorite show.

- Woody from Toy Story was a given too, she loves that movie.

- The glitter was not a good idea in hindsight.

- I wanted to do some sort of stickers since she loves those. I found candy cane stickers when I was out and thought they were perfect for this.

- She is obsessed with tracing her hand and had me do that while we were making her other ornaments, so on the tree it went.

"Painting" Snowmen

Sophia paints a lot at school and typically ends up eating it.

I thought, why not use edible paint? So I came up with an art project painting a snowman using whipped cream and M&M's. What kid wouldn't like that? I showed them my example (don't laugh, I was never known for my creative abilities) and set them free.

Sophia enjoyed ripping her paper.

Madeline was painting something, it just wasn't a snowman.

In the end, they both had a great time. Anything that is messy is always fun, right?

Wildlights 2010

It has been terribly cold this year, so it was tough finding a decent night to go to the Wildlights at the Zoo. But we made it the last semi-warm night there was right before a storm rolled through. The lights were beautiful, the kids had a great time and we left right when it started to rain. It makes me sad to think it might be our last trip to the Columbus Zoo in a long time. I love this place!

Christmas Tree 2010

Madeline is really understanding Christmas trees and Santa this year, so I couldn't wait to get our tree up. Here is the requisite forced-smile picture.

She loved looking at all the different ornaments.

Fia had some fun playing with the lights.

Fia snapped a good picture with her Momma.

Madeline tried her best not to smile.

With this being Fia's first Christmas, I got them both new stockings. Madeline never had a decent one to begin with anyway. I just need to get their names embroidered on them. It's looking very festive around here.

After all of that, I decided I was still in the Christmas spirit and wanted to make Christmas cookies. At 7 o'clock at night. And not just any cookies. The famous Lair Christmas Cookies.

Umm, not the brightest idea I've had in awhile. But we had fun! Madeline was a great helper as always.

Of course the decorating was her favorite part.

I'd say they turned out pretty good. They even tasted great too!

Random Photos

Every kid has a photo of themselves with Daddy's shoes on, right? Madeline added in the hat and gloves as well. Silly girl!

This picture of Sophia cracks me up! She had so much fun putting these ears on.

This photo melts my heart. My two beautiful baby girls.

Update on Madeline

I've been doing the monthly updates on Sophia, but I haven't had an update on Madeline in awhile. When I was taking Fia's pictures, Madeline wanted a turn. So here are her shots. hehe

- Her vocabulary has taken off and she speaks in full sentences. A funny story....Andy likes to joke and says to her all the time, "That's not appropriate." Well, she said it one day in context and Andy and I busted out laughing. It was hilarious! It still surprises me when she says something and I can actually understand every word.

- She has regressed with her potty training. :( She was all the way in underwear all day long and staying dry and now we are all the way back to pull-ups all day long. It has been so frustrating. Part of me wonders if Andy's back issues were throwing her off. She is very sensitive to things going on around her, especially when it comes to her Daddy. She is moving up to the pre-school room at daycare in January. So we are hoping this change will make her want to be a big girl and not have diapers anymore.

- She is really in touch with her emotions now and says what she is feeling. "I am very happy to see you" and "I'm sad" said with a long face.

- She loves to help with Fia. She will bring her a toy or console her when she is crying. It is so cute. She has also started hugging her a little too much. She basically tackles her. I can't leave them alone together anymore because I'm afraid of what she'll do. Like the other day when Sophia was happily laying on the floor playing and Madeline walked up and jumped over her! Yes, she leaped over her sister and didn't quite make the landing. Sophia wasn't too happy but she was okay.

- She is definitely two. The power struggles are exhausting. She will purposely not do something just because we asked her to. Like when she had been telling us she was hungry for a half hour and then when we said it was time for dinner, she refused to come to the table. After we had sat down and begun eating did she come to the table.

I didn't realize a two-year-old could get so far under your skin. She was doing something bad and I asked if she wanted to go to timeout and she said yes. OMG! My blood was boiling.

- I am reminded all the time how much her personality is like me. It's kinda scary.

- This isn't new, but she is most definitely a daddy's girl. Even her teachers comment how she acts differently with him than me.

- She has started picking out her own daily outfits, much to our dismay. The combination of clothes are sometimes quite interesting. But she insists on wearing what she picks out and I don't want to squash her independence. Yesterday she picked hot pink pants, a bright orange shirt and purple socks. I guess she wanted lots of color that day.

10 months old!

Where has the time gone?! My baby girl is already 10 months old. And with Christmas coming, this next month is going to fly by. Before I know it, I'll be planning her 1 year birthday party. She has a little cold but I hope you can't tell in the pictures.

She's had some fun developments this month!

- She started clapping her hands together. It isn't hard enough to actually make a clapping sound, but she looks so cute doing it.

- Even though she isn't crawling, she can get around. She rolls and scoots all over the place. She isn't army crawling, but she can really scoot around on her butt when sitting up. You can tell she really wants to get moving so I think we'll have a crawler in the next month.

- She can roll back and forth like a champ during the day, but at night she forgets how to roll back. She wakes up at night crying all the time now because she's rolled on her tummy and can't get back. I'll be glad when this phase ends.

- She's eating more table food now and seems to like it. It's hard to get her to eat a whole meal of table food though. The little stinker gets tired of chewing and just wants to eat her baby food.

- Right on her 10 month birthday, she started babbling da-da-da-da. I gotta get her to work on ma-ma now.

Ashley Rose is here!

My newest niece arrived into the world yesterday. She looks just like her sister. And is cute as a button! Look at that hair.