What a little smarty pants!

Well, here is an update on little miss Manda...She has taught herself to write the alphabet, much to our surprise. The other day she was playing with her chalkboard and she wrote out the whole alphabet with just a few errors. I figured she had been working on it at preschool. Then, last week I volunteered in her class. While talking to the teachers aide, I learned that they haven't been working on it at all. They do that in the 4 year old class. The 3 year old's concentrate on following instructions, taking turns, and basically getting used to not being at home all the time. I was so surprised, because we don't really work with Amanda on her letters or her numbers for that matter. I was certainly not that self motivated to learn things. In fact, when I was in the 1st grade I didn't learn to read until half way thru. I went to one of those "alternative" schools that let the child decide what they want to learn. What a bunch of bunk...I wanted to play in the homemaking center all the time. I didn't want to learn how to read or write. My mom finally pulled me out and put me in reg. public school and I was reading in less than a week.

Cute story: Amanda's preschool is offering a "class" on parenting your preschooler. So, Dave and I went to check it out and see if we were doing things "right" and to pick up any pointers. The preschool provided care for all the kids. Amanda was so excited to show Sarah where she went to school and show her off to her teacher. Well, skip ahead to last night....Dave was doing something that didn't agree with Amanda, (we're not even sure what he was doing) Amanda says, "Dad, you took classes on how to be a good parent and you didn't pay attention!" That just had us cracking up.

Stop Growing So Fast!

There's my sweet baby girl. I can't believe how fast she is growing and changing. We just had her 18 mos. check up. (Even though she just turned 17 mos.) She is 33 1/4 in. long (95 %), and weighs 24 lbs 10 oz. (50-75 %). She's still allergic to milk, which is a huge bummer because when she does get a hold of milk or yogurt, she just loves it.

I was counting how many words she has and it's well over 30 now and I'm sure there is more that I just haven't thought of.

The other day we were all in the hot tub. Dave, Amanda and I were singing Ring Around the Rosie, and when it was time to "all fall down" we would all go under water. Well, skip ahead to later that night, after we got all cleaned up, I catch Sarah doing circles in the kitchen saying "Asses, asses, asses" then she would sit down. Then it dawned on me, she was singing the "Ashes, Ashes" part and then "falling down." So, I started singing the song. She looked up at me, smiled and started walking in a circle. When I got to the "all fall down" part, she sat down. Then I sang the second part of the song, which I never heard before until we got a cd with the song on it, and when I got to the part where it says "they all stand up", she stood up. It was so cute and she just loved that I understood her game and could play with her.

Today she said her first 2 word sentence. She said, "Mommy up." Ahhh, they grow up so fast.

Well, that's all for now. I'll give an update on Amanda later. Today is Sarah's day. Love you baby.

The Night Before Christmas

Christmas eve we got all dressed up and headed over to my Aunt's house. We were celebrating my Mom's bday. It was a hard day. Her father was born Christmas eve and she was born Christmas day. So, we have almost always (when we were in the same state) celebrated their bdays together on Christmas eve. So, this year was the first without Grandpa. It was just hard to not grieve a bit for him. Mom, Aunt Sue, and Grandma each had moments that were too hard to bare, but we all were there for each other and made it thru.

Part way thru the evening, Dave, Amanda, Sarah, Mom and I went to Services. It was a full house. The girls did pretty well. The funny thing was the last time we went to that particular church (ours is on the other side of the river) it was ash Wed. When it was time for communion, Dave was going to take to girls with him. Amanda looked up at me with her hand covering her forehead..."I don't want the black stuff, Mommy!" So, cute.

After church and dinner at my Aunt's, we got home and put Sarah to bed. While Dave was reading to Sarah, Amanda decorated a couple cookies for Santa and got some carrots for the reindeer. I took some pic's of that and posted them for you to see.

A Couple Days Before Christmas

Just a few days before Christmas..."Santa" came to visit us at home. I told Amanda that he had called on his lunch break from the mall to let us know that he wanted to come visit us. When he came he had some early presents that he couldn't fit in the sleigh. It was two giant boxes of fireworks. He wanted to make sure we rang in the new year with a huge BANG! And, boy did we! They were great! We even got some that fired up into the sky. So, pretty! Sarah did pretty good with them, but Amanda had trouble. She is just so sensitive to loud noises and doesn't like things that startle her. She stayed out for about half of them, and then went inside to play with her friend.

Naughty, naughty!

Remember the day you brought home your sweet little baby, with that fresh baby scent? That innocent little delicate creature that made your heart swell to over flowing and caused tears to stream down your cheeks every time you thought of them? I remember the first time I held her and I thought to myself how sweet and innocent she was...I just couldn't imagine that I would some day want to spank the tar out of her little hiney....Well, those sweet little things grow up to be, back talking, don't listen when you say no, artists of floors and walls. Yes, my sweet little darling is shown below partaking in the creation of her first crayon master piece...on my kitchen floor! Ahh, to see the look of utter concentration in the moments before I started screaming...:0) Just kidding, I wasn't that upset. It's a good thing we are planning to tear up our kitchen in the next few weeks or months. Other wise I might have been a bit more upset. So, I repeated to myself when I saw this art work...."Take a pic before you get mad. Take a pic. before you get mad." So, here's the pic.'s. Hope you all are having a great weekend. Enjoy!

Our Little Helper

Are we glad we got this shovel or what? We only wish we had gotten two...because now that Sarah has to do everything Amanda does, they both want to shovel at the same time. We've had a couple of nice winter snow falls in the past couple of weeks and the girls have had a lot of fun shoveling snow, building a snow fire man, and sledding. (I'll post those pics later) Thought you all might enjoy these pic's. We better enjoy these fleeting moments of them wanting to help us out, while we can. :0)

Our Little Star

Below is a slide show of Amanda's school program. I was a little nervous for her when she first got on stage. She looked like she was about to throw up from nerves. But, as the show went on, she loosened up and looked to be having a good time. I thought the kids were just too cute. I can't wait for next years program. Amanda thought she was so special because she had so many there to watch her perform. Dave, Sarah, myself, my Mom and Dad and my friend from San Fran, Lori were all there to cheer her on. She even got a flower from Grandma to show her how well she had done. At the end of the program the principle of the high school came out as Santa to give the kids a candy cane. Amanda actually said thank you with out being prompted. Yay! Then we had cookies and punch. We all had a really good time.

Check out my Slide Show!