December and 22 month update, finally

            I am pretty sure I say this almost every month, but December truly was the epitome of busy! We accepted an offer on our house, celebrated the advent season, celebrated Christmas, moved into a townhome and closed on our home as well as many other small things all in one month.  It was a month full of blessings for sure.

            We were able to spend a lot of time together as a family this month which was wonderful.  As part of our celebration of advent we place a focus on time spent together and had a countdown of activities for each day that we would do together.  These included things like, going out to our favorite places for dinner, seeing Christmas lights, making cookies together, family movie nights, reading the Christmas story, and more.  We thoroughly enjoyed spending the time together and getting ourselves ready to celebrate our Savior’s birth.

Out to dinner...

....with the fam

Family self portrait as part of our calendar

            At the beginning of the month we went to Columbia for Ben’s class for that last time every (hopefully) and celebrated by going out to his favorite restaurant, Red Robin.   Alethea and I had fun shopping for maternity clothes and Christmas presents during his class too!  We enjoy our time in Columbia, but the idea of not having to drive 3hrs round trip one Saturday a month is very inviting.

            I updated in a separate update, but we did sell our home and move into a townhome we are leasing for the next 7 months until after Baby 2.0 arrives and Ben is done in Charleston.  It is perfect for the time being but nothing fancy.

Alethea's favorite part about the moving process

Yay for boxes!

            My parents came into town a few days before Christmas and we had a lot of fun going out to eat, cooking, seeing Christmas lights, celebrating Christmas and simply enjoying one another’s company.  For Christmas this year we had several people mail presents/send presents with my parents for Alethea in addition to what we had and my parents bought for her.  We weren’t sure what her stamina would be like so we opted to have her open a few gifts each day leading up to Christmas.  She thoroughly enjoyed this, though I think she could have opened everything on Christmas since she opened all of her gifts and helped with everyone else’s too, lol. She got some bows and a baby from her Aunt Justine and Uncle Cody, some play cupcakes from my parents that have shape matching incorporated into them, and more play food from my grandparents and Uncle Camden.  She loved having new toys even if it wasn’t Christmas yet. J

Not so sure about this hair stuff

Matching the shapes on her cupcakes

Showing off the bed she made fore her new baby

            We went to church on the 23^rd and I had her wear her Christmas dress that I bought her.  I just loved it and one of the bows from her aunt and uncle matched perfectly.  Then Christmas Eve we went to the candle light service at our church (for the first time since we have been here since we are always out of town over the holiday).  It was a great celebration of our Savior!  And Alethea even did great sitting in the service the whole time.  After church we started our tradition of watching cartoon version of How the Grinch Stole Christmas on Christmas Eve.  Alethea loved it just like her mommy.  Such a great story of how Christmas isn’t all about the presents!  Then after she went to bed we watched The Grinch (non cartoon version) which I have watched for years wrapping presents because I love the story and the music.

Not feeling the bow

Mamaw and Papaw

Family photo 

Posing and being a goof with Mamaw

The whole ensemble

Watching How The Grinch Stole Christmas

            Christmas morning Alethea woke up at her normal time and we did life as usual for her so she wouldn’t be hungry during present time.  It helped that the presents and tree had to be in the office for house showings so she didn’t even realize they were all there in the morning. J  After breakfast we finished off her little people nativity and explained that we were celebrating Jesus birthday today (even though we know she doesn’t get it yet).  Then it was time for digging in to presents.

Finishing off her Little People Advent Calendar

The finished product.

            This year we decided we wanted to start the tradition of giving each other 3 presents, one for each of the gifts that was brought to Jesus by the wise men.  Even though I know these weren’t brought at his birth, it is still great symbolism and a way to open up discussion about how the story doesn’t end with Jesus’ birth.  The gold present is represented something really treasured/desired, frankincense is represented by something for spiritual growth, and myrrh is represented by something for the body.  I love the symbolism and it helps us remember that it’s not all about the presents themselves but the savior we are celebrating through the giving of gifts.  Plus we also plan to do stockings, though with the move I didn’t get to make them so we did a stocking box for Alethea only this year.

            Our present rundown for the year for Alethea was gold – art easel with accompanying paint holders, scrapers, and paper, frankincense – a toddler Bible with stories short enough for her attention span and lots of inviting pictures, myrrh – new underwear in preparation for potty training in January, and stocking – magnetic puzzles and a few books.  Ben’s presents were gold – a case for the tablet he had already purchased, frankincense – a devotional about leadership, and myrrh - a new pair of jeans he desperately needed since he has lost all his weight this year.  For me Ben got gold – a cookbook called Weelicious that has a ton of family friendly recipes and tips for getting the whole family to eat healthy, frankincense – a devotional for pregnant women, and myrrh – a new key holder for my running shoes. Everyone really enjoyed their presents.

Opening up her easel

her new Bible

Putting her easel supplies away

playing with her new puzzles

off to the races with her new shopping cart

            Alethea got a lot more goodies from my parents and her Grandma and Boppa.  She got lots of new play food, a shopping card, some new pjs, several books, a doll, a blanket, and probably more that I forgot.  Ben and I got some money and snack food and cookbooks as well.  To avoid a marathon post the last thing I am going to mention about our Christmas is that we read the Christmas story out of Alethea’s new Bible as a family and then my mom and I made a yummy breakfast consisting of cinnamon bun pancakes with a delicious sauce, cheese eggs, sausage, and bacon.  Lots of great memories and yummy food this Christmas!

Reading the Christmas story

Testing out her new easel

cuddling with her presents from Grandma and Boppa

She decided she needed a bath after painting, lol

            We also had a crazy last day few days of 2012 involving one of our dogs Basil.  She had a confirmed UTI that we were already treating, but then on December 30^th, she started peeing blood.  So we took her to the emergency vet that evening and eventually discovered that the reason she had a UTI and was peeing blood was because she had 50+ bladder stones.  Crazy!  Her bladder is supposed to be the size of a half dollar and was the size of a medium potato instead!  She had surgery New Years Eve to the tune of way too much money, but we just couldn’t justify not helping her and now she doesn’t have to be tortured anymore.

            I am already getting way long winded so I am going to be quick with the update about Ben and I.  We really didn’t have much exciting happen with us.  Ben had 2 weeks off for stand-down at base which was wonderful.  We really enjoyed having him home for that time.  I am just trucking along with the pregnancy (more on that soon in a separate post).  I have been spending a ton of time reading my new cookbooks I got for Christmas, cooking yummy food, running, and chasing after a toddler.  Good times. J

            Alethea’s update is probably going to be pretty short too because I didn’t do a great job of keeping track of milestones this month and my pregnant brain just can’t seem to remember things that well.  We did our in home measurements again this month and she is 36inches tall (3 feet already!) and 26lbs 9.6oz.  As usual, she is continuing to grow like a weed and has us wondering if she we ever slow down, lol.

            A big development this month has been her interest in potty training.  If it weren’t for the fact that we knew we were going to be flying to NY in January, she would already be diaper free, I think.  But I just didn’t want to deal with a newly potty trained kiddo on a plane, so we are just taking it easy.  She very frequently asks to pee on the potty, and has only finished a poop on the potty when we caught her mid poop one time, lol.  She has shown great interest and I know she is ready so mission potty training will commence in late January. J

            She hasn’t gained any new teeth this month, but her canines are still working their way in.  Her total is still at 16 teeth and I think the 2yr molars are in the works, but no break throughs yet.

 Her appetite seems to be back to normal this month, thankfully.  She still is not a veggie fan and is very hit and miss with every veggie we offer.  Some days she will gobble up peas and other days they are just toys.  We have had a break through with discovering her loved for dips though.  I have been able to get her to eat almost any meat as long as she is able to dip in into ketchup and she loves to dip her pancakes into maple syrup for breakfast.  Next on my list is to try finely chopped raw veggies with dip to see if we can eek those into her diet.  Other than those developments, her diet is pretty much as usual.  Breakfast is usually pancakes (sometimes as many as 5) with syrup, a banana, and eggs or cheese.  Lunch is usually either, leftovers, ravioli, grilled cheese, or whatever I can pull together with some sort of fruit. Then dinner is whatever we are serving as well as one thing I know for sure she will eat.  One cute thing is that she loves to pray at the beginning of meals (and sometimes in the middle, lol).  She asks to “pay” and has to hold both of our hands to pray.  Love it!

Tried to teach her she could drink her yogurt, but she enjoyed that way to much, lol

working on learning to eat yogurt by herself and not make a mess

            One big milestone, I almost forgot to mention is that she is now sleeping in a toddler bed and loving it.  We converted her crib to a toddler bed when we moved so that she could start getting used to not having the rails.  It was a great choice and she loves her new little freedom.  She has even stayed in bed with the exception of one time during nap that she got out.  She is getting so big!

Her new bed

testing it out

her clementine had to test it out too, lol

            She has also continued to develop into such a musical little girl.  She has always loved to dance and still continually dances and points to the stereo requesting for “dence” music.  A new development has been her love for singing.  When we are driving in the car it isn’t unusual for her to break out into song to entertain herself in the back seat.  It is still “la la la” over and over in different pitches, but it is adorable.  Often times she will even sing on cue.  So fun!  She definitely comes by that honest because I am always singing and have since I was little.

            Sadly, I think I am forgetting a bunch of cuteness, but my brain just can’t seem to remember anything else. Plus this is getting way to long so that is probably a good thing anyway, lol.  2012 was an awesome year and we are excited to see what 2013 has in store.

She has discovered a love for mirrors

snuggling with Daddy

diapering all her babies and stuffed animals

tuckered out on a run

Sticker face :-)