No more paci!

Before  we ring in 2013 I thought  I better document  a huge 2012 accomplishment that happened over  a week ago and I forgot to mention ---- Brielle doesn't use a paci at all anymore!!!

A few days before Christmas Brielle was driving me crazy with her paci...wanting to go  sit in her bed a lot to get sucking time in, constantly asking about it, etc. So I just took a scissors and cut the end off. Brielle kept telling me it was broken and that Daddy would fix it when he got home lol. Daddy got  home and told her  he couldn't fix it (broke her little heart) and that was the end of paci.

The first night she kept waking up crying, and I had  to keep going in to lay with her. But after that first night she's slept just  fine, and really doesn't even talk about paci anymore! The only thing that had changed from before is that she used to just lay down without any problems at night at go to sleep, but without the paci to entertain herself while she waits to fall asleep she  now tends to fuss more and she likes Lee or I to lay with her in bed. I always swore I wouldn't be a parent who did that, but I'd say about 50% of the time now we have been laying with her for about 15 minutes. Hopefully we can stop that  soon, but  it's a lot better than the  constant paci obsession!

So yay Brielle, you're a big girl now---no more paci!!! :-)

Here are a few photos as we say  goodbye, forever, to paci!  (She  still has  the  little stuffed animal puppy/monkey/lion from them, but the paci parts are at the landfill!)

Happy New  Year's Eve everyone! I will be back to normal blogging soon. If you haven't gotten all caught up on my *many* Christmas posts and my 2012 recap then be sure  to look back at my last few updates! :-)

2012--Our Year in Review

Since  the girls are still  gone at Lee's parents' house I thought I'd get our 2012 year  in recap done today! I like to do these at the end of the year--- check out our  year  in review from *last year* right HERE

And now for this year---it's been  great  year!

(You can click on all  these photos to enlarge them)

We celebrated Brielle's  first birthday!

Brielle got her special sock monkey blanket, I threw a Valentine's Day party for the kiddos, and Brielle's beloved monkey paci officially broke!

Unseasonably warm March weather  got us out to the park, the girls went to Chuck E Cheese for the first time with my mom, and I got my DSLR camera and did lots of photoshoots!

Lots of Easter festivities and Sawyer turned 4!

Raya's 3rd birthday, Preschool orientation, and  Mother's Day....also park visits were in full swing

We took a vacation to St. Louis with Raya's BFF Brynley...hit a Cardinals game, the zoo, and many other  things!

Raya started swimming lessons, we attended parades, and celebrated the 4th of July

First trip to Adventureland, Iowa  State Fair, and we celebrated Daddy's birthday!

Raya started 3 year old preschool two mornings a week, she started ballet class, and we started to enjoy fall sweater hat weather!

Lots of fall fun---pumpking farms, hayrack rides, Halloween parties, and trick-or-treating!

Weather turned cold, celebrated Thanksgiving, and Brielle moved to a big girl bed and started sharing a room with Raya!

Visit to Raya's friend  Bryn, playing in the snow, picking out a Christmas tree, and celebrated Christmas!

Can't  wait to see what the year 2013 has in store for us---hopefully lots more fun! :-)

Sleepover!

So Raya  was sick on Christmas day, but  on the 26th she woke up feeling great again! And can you believe it--no one else in our family has gotten sick so far?! Whew...fingers crossed we continue the good luck.

So last night since everyone was feeling good again we decided to have  cousin Sawyer over for a slumber party! They played, ate mac n cheese, played in the bath, had a movie/popcorn/pop party, and slumbered on the floor of Raya's room (because she is *insistant* that a slumber party is only a slumber party if it involves sleeping on the floor lol).

She was in seventh heaven spending all this time with her favorite person in the whole world!

 

 

Pictures like this will most certainly be brought out for high school graduation parties ;-)

No sleepover is complete without mac n cheese!

Then today Lee watched all the kids and kept the sleepover party going strong while my mom and I went shopping! Check  out the goodies my mom got me for my birthday :-)

Bras (because  I hate spending my  own money  on those lol), a couple yellow placemats for the girls' playroom table, new boots (can you believe I don't own any fashion boots like this?! I'm very picky about shoes with my arthritis, but both these pairs are super comfy), then of course some skinny jeans to wear with the boots haha....and lastly, funny story about the vests. I really did want another vest because I own one and it's nice when I don't want to wear a coat (which when I'm with the girls I hate carrying a coat at the mall and stuff because I'm carrying so much of their crap already!) ....but  anyways, for xmas my mom had gotten me a Scentsy warmer---not knowing Emily also got me one---so I was able  to exchange that Scentsy warmer for *3* vests because they were on sale so insanely cheap!

Thanks mom!

And now tonight Lee left  with the girls for his parents' house---and I am sitting here shocked that I have 3 days to myself! I am meeting someone tomorrow morning to sell  my double stroller, and then I have an appt. to get a long overdue hair cut! Maybe some Starbucks after that :-)  Love my girls, but already enjoying my break!

Here they were before Lee loaded them in the car tonight

Probably  won't  update  the blog for  a couple days, because I'm not sure what I'd blog about with the girls gone! haha....maybe I'll do a post later about everything I (hopefully) accomplish while they are gone :-) 

Christmas Day

So, as I hinted in yesterday's post, Christmas Day Santa brought not only  presents but puke as well! I  went to bed around  midnight, after carefully preparing everything for the next morning....and at 1am I woke up to blood curdling screams from the girls' room---and when I opened the door I saw Raya, covered in puke and screaming. I called out to Lee  "get in here! We have a freaking Christmas nightmare!"  ....and so began a good 30 minutes of washing sheets, remaking beds, finding a puke bucket, etc. etc. Merry Christmas to us LOL.

Thankfully we made it through the night and Raya got a little sleep. We work up at 7am and Raya said she felt good enough to go see if Santa had come, so I got my camera ready and Lee sent the girls out to see their big gift---the long awaited pink kitchen.

Let's just say there reactions were not what I expected:

So much for the matching  Christmas morning pjs....Raya's had puke on them :-P

Have you ever seen two little girls more excited?! LOL ...I think Brielle was just completely  confused, and poor  Raya couldn't muster up the strength to say anything more than "look, my pink  kitchen"  ---I know she was super excited on the inside ;-)

Santa even put some fun new  wooden food inside! I looooove all the Kidkraft wooden food sets....and the little  bottles on the 2nd shelf there are Melissa and Doug. I'm trying to slowly switch out all  their kitchen stuff to wood only and get rid of the plastic cheapy stuff.

Poor Raya  wanted to play so bad, but  you could  tell she still felt sick :-(

While we got ready to head  downstairs (to see if Santa ate the cookies and milk, see the stockings, etc.) Raya waited in the bucket we were keeping nearby---just in case of more puke! Luckily she  never did puke again after the episode at night.

Downstairs  the girls found their stockings, some more presents  from Santa (unwrapped) and a few from Lee  and I (wrapped). I really did cut back big time on the number of gifts this year, and I'm glad considering poor Raya didn't have the stamina this  year to open much more anyways! They each got a Barbie and some Dora chapsticks in their stockings, and then they got legos and a learning pie sorter game from Santa....and then from Lee and I they each got two games. Raya was so sweet---when I told her that Mommy and Daddy had gotten her a few presents too, in addition to Santa, she immediately gave me a big hug and said "thanks mommy!" awww :-) We kind of messed up a little though, because Lee and I didn't buy gifts for eachother---instead  we went shopping together and sort of bought  eachother gifts while we were out together that way---then everyone gets exactly what they want! Plus we buy ourselves stuff all the time lol. But anyways, Raya was quite upset that "Santa" hadn't  left Lee or I anything in our stockings! Oops. Note to self---next year we need to buy eachother stuff for stockings :-P

Checking out the downstairs loot!

Putting on the Dora chapsticks! (this is why Brielle's  hair is always in a little ponytail!)

No matter how many times I tell her, she insists on wiping chapstick all over her entire face LOL

Raya's lips are fruitylicious!

A princess cupcake game

A minnie bingo game

Thankfully this was the last present---you can tell Raya is ready to lay down again! (The 4th game they got from us---not pictured---was a Melissa and Doug sandwich stacking game)

 

So after presents the girls got dressed and we all  rested for awhile until my parents showed up! My dad was helping Lee build furniture for the new playroom and my mom wanted to see the girls' new toys and play---so they stayed for the day and hung out.

She looked so pitiful  on the couch rubbing Dora chapstick on her lips---the only  new gift she had the energy to "play" with LOL

Brielle had fun playing with their kitchen though!

Checking out the Minnie  Mouse bingo game

Grandma's here!

Raya would  get occassional  bursts of energy---here they are playing with Brielle's new  legos!

For furniture Lee got me 3 big bookcases to store toys...and my parents had gotten the girls a table and chairs and a toybox/bench....so that's what Lee and my dad were working on putting together :-P

And yesterday some neighbors delivered a huge plate of homemade goodies!

By the end of the day the boys had all the furniture built, and my mom helped me put all the toys away---now we have some good lookinng rooms for the girls! hehe

Here is the kitchen in it's new spot in the girls' bedroom...the colors match so perfectly!

I still need to do some more organizing on the shelves...
I'm going to have all the cute wooden food sets displayed and then all the mismatched kitchen stuff inside the kitchen
---with overflow in a tote that we can pull out as needed

And now the playroom! The nursery furniture is gone and we have an awesome play space now!
It's only been less than a day, but  already I'm so glad we moved the playroom upstairs. Now there is no more dragging toys up and down the stairs...and the new space is much brighter too.  (I still have tons of accessorizing to do, but here's how  we set it up! I need to get curtains, cushions and/or pillows for the "window seat" toy box, some sort of wall display above the *short* bookcase (which I will paint---it's an old handmedown and needs repainted), and I also want a couple cute placemats for the table to help protect it from wear and tear. We actually still have empty shelves and  empty totes to fill up, so there is more space in here than I expected!

Woodland play land! :-)  The new toybox stores all the stuffed animals/dolls...I want to make it more of a window seat with a cushion or pillow or something

This is that rug I mentioned buying awhile back---I love it!

So glad I sold a bunch of baby toys---they still have too much crap! lol :-)

Behind Brielle is that short bbookshelf I want to paint (hoping to paint it a red color to match the new chairs) ...and above the bookshelf I want to do a bunch of frames in all different colors to match the rug :-)

And this  closet is the next to -do project---it's going to be a big  dress up closet! We got tons of hooks to hang all over in there right at the girls' level...so they can hang up all their own dress up clothes...and we'll have a little drawer unit for all their dress up jewelry and various accessories :-)

The new table is so cute. It's by Kidkraft and really sturdy...my mom and I can sit at it no problem. It should last the girls a really long time!

So there you have it---our Christmas Day! Thankfully today Raya woke up feeling just fine and no one else is sick....so Sawyer is actually coming over for a sleepover tonight and Raya is out of her mind excited haha. Then tomorrow Lee is watching all the kids while I go shopping with my mom for the day! She's taking me out for the rest of my Christmas present/Birthday present (my birthday is in January). Then Thursday night Lee plans to take both girls with him to his parents' for the weekend (first  time Brielle has gone without me!) so I get an entire quiet weekend just for Mama! :-)