Merry Christmas to All!

Countdown to Christmas

It's been a crazy, busy week, and I'm still catching up on my blogging.  I told you all about my Baby Brother! in a post yesterday, and I told you all about my crafty skills in a post before that.  But I haven't told you about the rest of my weekend!

On Thursday night, I bundled up with Mommy and Grandma and met Daddy at his work.  I like going to work.  The office atmosphere is very conducive to productivity.  There was a party going on to celebrate everyone's hard work all year, and I jumped right in.  My main man, Santa even made an appearance.  I walked right over to him, climbed on his lap (after cutting the line), and told him all about the cake pop I was eating (pictured here):

Hi Santa! I lick my pop. No bite. I lick.

Santa had to get back to his elves at the North Pole, so I organized some box races to keep us kids occupied.  I'm not sure why moms, dads and grandparents spend so much money on toys, when copy paper boxes are where it's at!  We zoomed in our boxes (with a few pushes from the dads) all around the office!

After a few laps (the Baby 500), we decided to make a train!  Whoo! Whoo!  This was extra fun, but the engine (Daddy) was a little low on fuel.  This is why electric engines are so much better than diesel.  I digress.

There was a package waiting for little ol' me on Friday night.  Inside was my very own nativity set!  I have had so much fun playing with Baby Jesus, Mary, "Toseph," the cow, sheep, donkey, and Wise Men.  I love my "tibi" set!  Grandma added batteries to it just last night (12/22), and now my tibi set sings "Away in a Manger" and "Silent Night" whenever I put Baby Jesus in the manger!  It's really sweet and lovely.  Big thanks to my Godcousin, Chris, for thinking of me!!

 After much discussion of teacher gifts, I decided the best way to thank all my wonderful teachers at school would be to bake cookies (and get them a Dunkin' gift card)!  So I rolled up my sleeves Saturday morning and dragged Mommy into the kitchen to bake.  We decided on Peppermint Blossom cookies, since we had the Hershey Peppermint Kisses on hand.  And because they are pretty and tasty. 

I let Mommy do the easy part of mixing and rolling the dough.  I took on the hardest step - placing the kisses in the middles of all the cookies!  I found this difficult task was easier to complete with a cookie of my own in hand (and mouth).  The cookies came out beautifully!

Look how well-centered those kisses are!

I'm sure I'll have much to blog about in the next few days.  I hear the Big Man from up North is planning one last visit for 2011 tomorrow night!  Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

My Baby Brother!

My mom tells me that I'm going to be the big sister to a baby brother!  This is very exciting news, people! 

I finally know which color scheme to use to decorate my doll cradle!  Blue!

Now, could someone please tell me the difference between brothers and sisters

(or boys and girls for that matter)? 

And why does the baby get to wear an antler headband?  Where is my antler headband?

HANDiwork

My mom and I have been making a lot of handprint crafts the past week or so, and I thought I'd show some of them off here.  Get it?  HANDiwork?  That's what they call a pun.

Anyway, I had a bunch of friends over on Saturday to take part in this workshop of handcrafts (another pun!).  Mom covered the dining room table with a disposable tablecloth and cups of scissors, ribbons, googly eyes, and pom-poms.  Everything was ready for my friends and I to get our craft on!  We toddlers are pretty smart: we let the grown-ups do the hard parts while we played!

L&J working with the salt dough

Three of our creations ready for the oven

Watching a little Elmo while the 'rents did the hard parts

Snack with BFF A and her mom

 We five toddlers (18 months to 2 years) had over two hours of play and snack time!  It was pretty fun.  And here's how our crafts turned out!

Handprint reindeer ornament (or gift tag)!

Salt dough handprint ornament (or wall decor)!

My mom found both handprint craft ideas on some website called Pinterest that she's way into.  She reposted the salt dough recipe here: http://hoardingrecipes.blogspot.com/2011/12/salt-dough.html

The handprint reindeer were really fun to make too!  Here's what we did:
1. We traced and cut out our hands on shimmery brown cardstock, with our fingers as reindeer feet and our thumbs as reindeer heads.
2. We hot-glued pom-pom noses, googly eyes, ribbon collars, and pipe cleaner antlers.
3. We colored hooves onto the feet using magic marker.
4. We punched a hole in the top for to add a ribbon hanger.
Voila!  I really liked having my hand traced on the paper.  Some of my friends were not such fans of this process.  But all of our reindeer turned out really cute!  Happy crafting!

Oh What Fun!

Dear Blog Readers,

What a weekend I just had!  My Grammy blew in from the North Wednesday night, with all the rain and wind.  She said it was a nasty flight, with life jackets falling out from the seats with all the bumping.  But any flight is worth it to see ME!  I made up for the bad flight with all the fun things I had planned.

Grammy and I played together all day on Thursday (and ate chocolate pudding for lunch!), while Mommy and Daddy were at work.  When Mom got home, we piled into the car and drove to Merriweather Post Pavilion for the "Blinkin' Binkies" event at Symphony of Lights.  Normally, the light display is open to cars driving through.  On Blinkin' Binkies night, strollers and wagons are the #1 mode of transportation.  I hopped in my BFF Audrey's sweet ride for the mile and a half walk.  I'm not sure how much Audrey and I noticed the lights, but we were laughing the whole time!

After a day of playing with Grammy on Friday, I loaded everyone (Daddy too!) up into the car to drive to North Baltimore.  After a quick dinner at the Papermoon Diner, we drove to 34th Street in Hampden to see the famous decorations.  They sure lived up to the reputation!  This one block is absolutely amazing.  Every square inch of housing is covered in lights and decorations!  The families on "Christmas Street" have been decorating for 64 years, which I think is a lot of years.

 We had a lot of fun walking up and down the street.  I even got to pet a few puppies!

 Just as we were heading back to our car, we saw Santa!!  I really like the idea of Santa, but wasn't so sure about actually sitting on his knee.  The guy is a bit overwhelming, although the candy canes sure help.

Mom, Dad and Grammy were all a-flutter on Saturday, getting the house tidy and decorated for BadBash 2011, the annual holiday party.  I made myself busy until it was time to get dressed!  I got to wear the prettiest party dress and party shoes!  Mommy even let me wear my special occasion pearl necklace, which feels so funny on my tongue!  We are a pretty good looking family, so I made sure someone got our picture in front of the tree before things got too crazy.

Speaking of crazy though, imagine my surprise when SANTA came to our party!  I mean, who doesn't invite Santa to their holiday party?  He's the most popular guy around this time of year!  I just couldn't believe he took time out of his crazy Christmas schedule to come to Baltimore!  WOW!

I coralled most of my friends for a group shot on Santa's lap.  Missing from the picture are Danny and Jackson-from-school.

 Later on, I got a great picture with my friends Jackson, Julia, Danny and our moms.  We are a really fun group of kids!

 The other surprise guest of the evening was my mom and dad's great friend, Greg.  Greg flew all the way up from Florida to surprise us at the party!  He and Santa must have been in cahoots - the surprises were flying like reindeer on Christmas Eve!

 The party was a great success, with lots of fun and laughter.  Not to end the weekend in an anti-climatic fashion, I grabbed Mom and Grammy Sunday afternoon for a trip to the Arbutus Volunteer Fire Department to see their annual train garden.  It was spectacular!  I loved watching all the trains whiz by on the fun tracks.  If you are in the area, it's worth a stop!

 Happy Holidays, friends!  We're off to a fantastically fun start!

Oh Christmas Tree

I thought my parents were pretty crazy last year, when we went to a parking lot full of trees, took one home and set it up in the house.  Now I know my parents are crazy.  This year, we went to a whole farm of trees, grabbed a saw, and cut one down to put in the house!  Mom and Dad say, "oh what fun! oh how fresh!"  I say, "oh what insanity!"  But... I love how the pine needles feel in my fingers.  And I really, really love putting the ornaments on next to the tree!

For comparison, here is a picture of me with the tree last year:

Christmas 2010

 Here is a picture of me with the tree this year.  Look how much I've grown!


Christmas 2011

  Here is a picture of my superb tree decorating skills.  I should be a professional tree decorator.

And as much as I love to question my parent's rationale, going to the tree farm was a lot of fun.  It was a bright, sunny day, and my best bud Jackson was there with his parents. 

I had a lot of fun wandering throughout all the trees.  Some were so tiny, they were shorter than me!  Mom said I couldn't touch those trees, because they were just babies.  They didn't look like babies to me... just really short trees. Silly Mommy.

Mom and Dad say our tree this year is the tallest yet.  From the looks of how it filled Grandma's car, I'd say they're right.  It sure does smell good!  Happy December, everyone! 



November Recap

Laura's vocabularly took off this month.  She is getting really conversational, with actual sentences thrown around.  I am terrible and couldn't tell you her "first" sentence, but it was probably something to do with ownership (hers, daddy's or mommy's).  Here are some of the funnier things Laura has said and done this month:

Foop poops - fruit loops

Cancays (or sometimes pinkies) - pancakes

My fend ah-dee - my friend Audrey

Keem up! Body keem up! - clean up (this one is sung)

Futterfly - butterfly

Thank yoo you welcome! - Instead of just saying "you're welcome"

Achoo! (after coughing or when reading the Mitten)

Backie - blankie

The end! at end of books (or when she's bored and is ready for the end!)
Again! at the end of books (or puzzles) (or any other activity she'd like to continue doing)

Touchdown!

Go stee'ers! (all football is stee'ers)

Okay! Yeah!

I dunno?! (with hand motions)

Likes to play "uppy down" where she bounces on outstretched legs

Oh! Wow!

Oh god & oh geez (trying to limit how often she says these!)

Super affectionate with Ries (who is getting much more patient with the hugs)

With hand out, "siper! No siping!" to stop Swiper the Fox, from Dora the Explorer

My cousin! Bit! - my cousin, Elizabeth

Row row row, genty down steam! (singing!)

Supoopsial -marsupial

Sisolisee - mythology (Nate and I are having fun getting her to mimic big words!)
I lub you! - I never get tired of hearing it!

Laura also sings versions of the Alphabet, Row Row Row Your Boat, Wheels on the Bus, Patty Cake, Rock-a-bye baby, and the Clean Up song.  Her favorite song to dance to is Bingo (but I haven't heard her sing this one yet).  Laura wakes up singing little songs of her own. 

Laura had a blast playing with Uncle Taylor and his Brio Trains.  She handed Taylor a piece of track and he asked what he should do with it.  Laura shrugged and said, "I dunno!"  We were all cracking up at her earnestness. 

At a friend's house, Laura moved all four children-sized chairs to the center of the room and lined them up with a stuffed friend in each.  We weren't sure what she was doing till she sat in a chair herself and said, "Choo! Choo!"  What amazing abstract play!

Laura wiped her teary face with Catty's tail the other day, which had Nate and me cracking up.  She is also my best helper for putting on make-up, as I described in a separate post.  I can't get over what a big girl she is becoming.  Her personality is just wonderful.  She is happy, smart and caring, with a fun sense of humor.  Laura is always ready for a laugh (preferably along with some tickles)!

It Begins

Laura sits on the toilet lid while I finish my hair. She rummages through my make-up bag till she finds the compact I use for foundation.

Hee-ya, Mommy! she pipes up.  I take the compact from her and find the round pad in its hidden compartment.  I swipe the powder across my cheeks, nose, chin, forehead.

Waura’s turn! calls the voice next to me.  I gently dab the pad twice on each cheery cheek.  Laura rummages some more.  Out comes my favorite brown eyeliner. 

Waura’s eyes, Mommy!  I hold the pencil near Laura’s face as she squeezes her eyes impossibly shut.  Two quick swishing sound effects later, Mommy’s turn! pipes up from the voice beside me.  Before I can finish lining my own eyes (for real), a small hand holds out the mascara.

Ok, Laura! Your turn! I quickly swoop the wand in front of Laura’s wide-open, beautiful blue eyes. Her lashes are so long without mascara. It’s funny to think someday she’ll insist on wearing it for real.  I quickly finish my eyes and put the powder, eyeliner and mascara back in my make-up bag.

And so it begins, I hear from a bemused fatherly voice in the bathroom doorframe.  I look up to find Nate has watched this whole morning ritual unfold.  Indeed. So it begins.

Gobble! Gobble!

All week, my mom has been asking me what the turkey says.  Sometimes I said "Cock-do-doo!" to see if she was paying attention.  I'm not sure why the sudden obsession with turkeys.  I kept hearing about some big dinner, but apparently I slept through it!  At any rate, I had a great week.  Here are some pictorial highlights:

Meeting my cousin, Elizabeth.  I call her "Bit."

With my mom

The only turkey I saw all day...

The popcorn was tasty!

I had lots of fun filling everyone's popcorn bowls!

Trains with Uncle Taylor

The tree my mom decorated for the Concord Museum is named after me!  The Laura tree!

Happy Thanksgiving, friends!  I am thankful for a great mom, dad and doggy, as well as my two backies (blankies), foop poops (fruit loops), Baa (my sheep), and a loyal group of blog readers!

Philadelphia Marathon!

Time flies around here... almost as fast as my uncles, Taylor and Vin, run!  Taylor ran the Philadelphia Marathon on Sunday, November 20th, while Vin ran the Half Marathon.  Both had really great times!

Uncle Vin finished the half in 1:57:22

Uncle Taylor finished the full in 2:42:57

I had lots of fun riding on the shoulders of my mom, dad and Bimpy while we moved all over the city to watch the runners. 

 I even got to meet my friend, Keira, for the first time!  She's a little younger than me, but very sweet.  I wanted to push the stroller for her, since she was so bundled up inside!

I am really proud of the running Taylor and Vinny did.  They were both so fast!  Maybe someday I'll run somewhere other than in circles around the house.

Tis the season!

I am almost too excited to contain myself over some of the Christmas presents I already have ready... So I made this little poster.  It doesn't even begin to suffice!!!

October Recap

I am clearly a little behind on my monthly recap for October.  What can I say about Laura?  She has us cracking up all the time.  Her funny personality is greatly enhanced by her growing vocabulary. 

Even Laura cracks herself up.  She'll be babbling to her toys (I wish we knew what she was saying) and then will just burst out laughing.  Then she shakes her head and says, "Siddy Wara."  Daddy, Mommy and Ries are also "siddy" quite often.

In October, Laura started singing songs.  Some of them are clearly her version of actual songs, like "Rock-a-bye Baby" and "ABC's."  Others are completely made-up and totally hilarious.  These songs are usually about something happy.  "Happy Colors" was her break-out hit, and was followed a few weeks later with "Happy Tractor."

The song "Happy Tractor" was initially inspired by a fear of tractors, thanks to a ride on the back of "Poppa's" ride-on mower.  Tractors were evil scary things, till a ride on a happy tractor at the pumpkin patch.

Laura is getting much better at interacting with characters on TV shows.  Instead of just watching, she'll repeat the phrases the characters prompt.  In particular, she'll yell for "pack pack" and "map" during Dora.

Whenever someone is drinking a mug of something hot, Laura blows and says, "coppee!  hot coppee!"  I think she learned this one from Mam-ma.

Laura took a stuffed tiger from Uncle Andy's childhood room.  Laura just wouldn't leave without "Catty," who is now one of her best friends.  Every now and then, Laura will be holding Catty and we'll hear her mutter "Not An-ny's Catty.  Wara's Catty."

Laura was able to visit with her Brammy and Bimpy (and the beloved Pippi) for a weekend.  She loves seeing all four of her grandparents, and we get a kick out of the names she has come up with for them!

Laura loves talking on the phone - real or pretend.  She'll walk around with the pretend phone up to one ear, and a finger in the other ear to help her hear the pretend conversation.  She mostly calls Audrey, Poppa, Brammy and Pippi.  The conversations are hilarious!  "Hi! Hi! Hi! ahsdkhfakhdgkah hakghdkjdfhakl askdjhf!  BYE!" 

We have been trying to Skype with Brammy and Bimpy when we can.  Laura thinks it's pretty neat technology.  Sometimes when we're simply talking to someone on the regular phone, Laura will stare at the screen trying to see the person at the other end of the line!

Laura asks for help by saying "My hep!"  This translates to help me or I need help.  Instead of longer phrases, Laura usually just says "My ___" to get what she's after.  It gets the job done.

We had a lot of fun dressing Laura up for Halloween.  She went to school as a big, pink poodle, and refused to take her costume off after their parade.  At home, she dressed up as Boots the Monkey from Dora the Explorer.  She loved going house to house with her pumpkin basket, filling it with "pops" and "can-ee."

The Big Announcement!

Candy Corn!

I have a lot of fun at school.  We play with toys, sing songs, and do really fun art projects!  Here is one of my most recent works:

We made these to decorate our classroom for Halloween.  The teachers painted our feet orange, yellow and white (it tickled!) so our footprints would look like candy corn on the black construction paper.  My Grammy is really into hand- and footprint crafts lately, so I thought she'd get a kick out of this masterpiece!  I have a feeling I'll be bringing home a pretty sweet handprint turkey in the next few weeks.

Happy Hall-weeeee!

Hi guys!  I had a fabulous Halloween today!  At school, I dressed up in my poodle outfit.  I absolutely did not want to take it off.  I wasn't sure I could be much cuter.  And then my parents put me in the Boots costume!  CUTER!

After I checked out my awesome pumpkin, I decided to take a few rides down my slide.

Finally, the clock struck six and it was time to go Trick or Treating!  I really enjoy activities that involve gently placing objects in baskets, so Halloween is right up my alley.

I went up and down the street with Daddy for an hour and a half, then came home to show Mommy my loot.  My basket was completely full and I needed help carrying it!  Look at all the great treats I got!  I got to pick out one treat from the pile, and I went for a "pop."  It was delish.

After enjoying my first Halloween treat, I joined Daddy on the porch to hand out candy to some other Trick or Treaters.  What a great night!

Tick teet!  Happy Hall-ween!  Thanks!  Bye bye!