Anything She Wanted

Seriously, this kid marches to the beat of her own little drum.  On Saturday Addison went to a princess party.  She had been talking about it for days (ever since she received the invitation).  

Thursday night we went through our closets and chose a princess dress for Addison to wear to the party...along with a bow and shoes (yes, she is very much a girly girl).  Of course she had to try everything on to make sure it was perfect, which meant Hannah also needed a dress to try on.  And for the rest of the week the girls were running around in their princess dresses talking about the party.

This actually made me a little nervous.  Hannah wasn't invited to the party, but she was just as excited as Addison.  I finally decided I would take her out on a little Hannah mommy date after I dropped off Addison.

So, the morning of the party, I dressed the two girls in their princess dresses and explained to Hannah that she hadn't been invited to the party, but we were going to drop Addison off, and then mommy would take her somewhere to get a special treat.  I had a friend watch the twins (Bart was out of town at the NAEA conference) and headed off to the party.  We dropped Addison off and I took Hannah to Macey's.

For those of you not from Utah, Macey's is a local grocery store.  Our Macey's just happens to have a little soft serve ice cream counter, and a bulk candy section.  As we were walking in from the parking lot I told Hannah she could have anything she wanted in the store, ice cream, candy...whatever she wanted, she could get.  I imagined this would be any two-year-old's dream, and her reaction confirmed my thoughts.  Her eyes lit up as she said, "Okay!" and quickened her step.

She walked in the door and right up to one of the giant car shopping carts...you know, the ones EVERYONE dreads.  Parents hate them because their kids are always asking for them and they're insanely hard to maneuver.  And everyone else in the store hates them because people using them are either blocking the way or bumping into other people because they're so dang hard to maneuver!

I told Hannah we didn't need a shopping cart.  We were just going to go in and get her a little treat.  She insisted on getting one, and after some arguing, I finally told her she couldn't have a treat if she didn't leave the shopping cart.  (Yeah, I really won't be winning mom of the year any time soon).  She sadly left the cart behind and I led her to the bulk candy isle.

I knelt down so I was eye to eye will my melancholy little two-year-old and explained to her that she could have anything she wanted, any of this candy, or ice cream at the ice cream counter (that we could see from the candy isle)...anything in the whole store.  Her eyes lit up and she asked, "Anything?!?!"  This was more like how I envisioned our little outing.  I smiled and said, "Yes, anything."  She took off running back toward the grocery carts.  I ran after her.  She reached her beloved car cart and said, "I want this."

Seriously, I just laughed.  I picked her up, put her in the driver seat, and pushed her around the store.  And you know what, she was as happy as could be.

My silly little Hannah. Not a day goes by that you don't make me laugh.

Sweetness & Love

As I mentioned last month. I've joined 11 other photographers and committed to take a picture each month depicting a theme.  February's theme was "sweetness & love".

Having twins is very tricky...in a lot of ways really, but lately I've felt concerned about making sure I get enough one on one time with each of them.  Maya actually makes it pretty easy for me to get alone time with her.  She wakes up from naps nearly forty-five minutes before Lilly almost every day.  Most of the time we head downstairs and start getting lunch or dinner ready, but one time this month I decided to just play with her on our bed.

We were interrupted briefly by a phone call, after which Maya demanded the phone.  When my attempts to distract her with something else failed, I finally just gave up and gave her the phone.  Then I just sat back and watched her discover, what to her, was this amazing new thing.  The buttons, the beeping, the lines and dots, the funny noise it made after a while until mom pushed one of the big buttons.  There's something so endearing about watching a baby explore something you take for granted every day. 

Having little ones can definitely be challenging at times, but I have to admit, I'm going to be very sad when there are no more babies in our house.

Now head on over to Kelly's blog to see her interpretation of the theme.

Other Random December Pictures

My mom and dad are now empty nesters, so they thought it would be fun to wait to decorate the tree with the grand kids.  The only problem is, three of their five grand kids are one.  And there were just so many other things to do that the tree never ended up getting decorated.

In all honesty, it was a pre-lit tree and had some cool little frosty branches and berries on it already, so you didn't really notice.  Although I have to admit I found it rather ironic.  My mom usually makes her trees absolutely gorgeous.  In fact, I remember a year in high school when Dad and us kids wanted all our little "made these at school" ornaments and she wanted a fancy tree so we had two Christmas trees...te he he.  This year I was really excited to photograph all her beautiful ornaments.  Of course, the year I'm excited about photographing the fancy tree, we don't have a fancy tree.  Oh well.

There actually was one ornament on the tree this year:


My mom's friend gave it to her for Christmas, so she put it up.  Isn't it AWESOME!  I've got to get me one of these for my tree.  Thanks Gwen!  At least I got to photograph one ornament!

My mom also got some adorable little outfits for all her grand kids.  She wanted a picture of them all together in front of the Christmas tree.  This was the closest we got.



Anyone have any tips on how to get three one-year-olds to sit still, look at the camera and smile?

At least I was able to get some cute pictures of the kids individually.


The outfits were adorable, but I think the babies preferred these outfits.


And as is every trip to my parents house, this one was filled with games after the kiddies went to bed


I suppose the good thing about posting this late is that now there's only 11 months left until Christmas.  The countdown is on. :)

Christmas Day!

Addison and Hannah were very excited to find a Bike and a Trike under the tree for them. The twins were excited about the cereal. By the way, putting cereal out in front of the tree is a tradition that started with my dad's family. My Grandma told me one year was an especially tight year with respect to finances and Christmas Eve they were looking at the tree and feeling kind of down about how little there was under it. Then they got an idea. They went to the pantry and brought out stuff they had in food storage and put it under the tree. The next morning the kids each got to pick some of their favorite foods from under the tree. It's since evolved into cereal, but I love the little story behind it.

Opening Stockings. Waking up my sister was kind of a big deal this year. I took pictures of her coming out of her room. See that random cardboard thing on the right of the picture. That's what caused this reaction. What is it you wonder? It's a life size cardboard cut out of her boyfriend who left to serve a mission in Argentina just before Christmas. Now, lest you think we're REALLY weird and disturbing, we kind of have an ongoing joke with her. When High School musical came out, my parents found a cardboard cutout of Justin Bieber and got it for her. We found it incredibly entertaining to put it in random places like her shower or closet to creep her out. The tradition continued with Robert Pattinson when Twilight came out. We put him right in front of her door Christmas morning...like the open-her-bedroom-door-and-he's-right-in-her-face kind of "in front of her door". That year it scared her to death her when she opened her door, her blood curdling scream could be heard throughout the house. It was AWESOME.

So this year, as Bart and I were talking about how Ron (her boyfriend) was leaving, Bart commented, "Hey, we should get a cardboard cutout of him for her for Christmas!" After some web searches and the go ahead from my parents, Ronnie boy was on his way. She thought it was pretty funny, and her roommates were pretty bummed she didn't bring it back up to school with her.

There, now hopefully you only think we're mildly weird and disturbing. ;)

Moving on...

We mistakenly had Hannah open her Polly Pocket as one of her first presents.  It was like pulling teeth to get her to open the other ones.
But this was her reaction to a robe my parents got her. Who knew a two year old would be so excited about a robe? I think she was just excited to give Grandpa a hug.

And this is my adorable niece wearing the hair clips I made her.


And more of the day's festivities.  That pan Bart is so excitedly holding up in the air...comic muffin tins.  He LOVES them.  Now he always wants to make muffins.  I have to admit, they are pretty freaking amazing. Sigh, Christmas always seems to go by so fast. 

Catching Up - December

Okay, in an attempt to get caught up on my blog I'm going to just post mostly pictures from December.

Christmas Cookies (I had a lot of fun with these)...thank you Bakerella

  The kids had fun making theirs too Christmas PJs Our own little Christmas before we left Naps at Grandma's House Snuggling with Grandma's toys...This morning Addison said, "Mom, I just can't get Grandma's house out of my head. She has so many toys!" LOL! The twins were pretty excited about all the presents. Christmas Eve. Bart & I were in charge of Christmas Eve dinner (my family has a big Christmas eve dinner instead of a big Christmas dinner). We made prime rib. It was delicious! Christmas stories (that's the book I made my dad last year for Christmas...and got to him around Valentine's day...It would have been done in time if the twins hadn't come early!  I'm glad we got to use it this year though) and opening Christmas PJ's...Maya apparently would rather crawl on presents than open them.