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Kids/Parenting

Christmas jammies

I can’t remember how long we’ve had this tradition, but every year, my mom would let us open one gift on Christmas Eve—and it was always pajamas (and virtually always flannel pajamas).

This year, Hayden and Rebecca got pajamas that match all their cousins’ (thanks Aunt Toria!). You can see Hayden’s beloved monkey pajamas with his bike on Christmas morning.

Keeping with the animal theme, my mom got us reindeer pajamas!

Here’s our happy family in front of my in-laws’ Christmas tree:
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Rebecca seemed to like them very much:
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Categories
Kids/Parenting

Christmas festivities

As promised, more photos from our Christmas celebrations!

Hayden and his gift from Santa: a bike!
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Baby’s first Christmas (with Aunt Jess):
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Hayden the reindeer:
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Kids/Parenting

Santa Baby!

Yes, we did celebrate Christmas—but with all the traveling and then the recovery, I haven’t had a chance to get around to posting any pictures from a very fun Christmas with my in-laws. But that’s changing today!

These are from our ward Christmas party:

Hayden and Santa
Hayden saw that Santa was giving other children small bags of candy. So while we were in line, I asked Hayden what he was going to ask Santa for and he wisely chose “Nanee!”

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Rebecca wasn’t too impressed with Santa.

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But she’s Santa Baby!

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Random

The making of Rebecca’s room

Considering what kind of shape our house was in when we bought it (fashion-wise, that is), you’d think we would have done more in the first three and a half years living here. Not so. We’ve painted two rooms, replaced several light fixtures—but that’s about it.

Other than the kids’ rooms. Three years ago, we took down vile wallpaper in Hayden’s room, put in new chair rail and baseboards, painted, and I even made new Roman shades for Hayden’s room. It’s still not totally done (a few finishing touches on the shades, and we have to hang a lot of the little accessories and decorations I made), but it’s a world of improvement over its previous state.

Rebecca’s room was an even more extensive project. Here’s what we did for her:

  • Took down the hunting duck wallpaper and border—thanks to my BIL Sean for helping with that one (seriously, it looked like this: )
  • Repair holes from a few dozen twenty-penny nails and retexture walls, with help from my dad
  • Install and caulk crown molding and casing around closet, again with help from Dad
  • My mom made a valance, curtains and ties, with almost no help from me (I picked the fabric 😀 )
  • Prime and paint ceiling and walls, with help from my FIL
  • Tear out ugly old green office carpet, remove nails, staples and tack strips from original hardwood floors, with help from my FIL
  • Sand floor, with help from my BIL Kevan
  • Fill nail holes in floor
  • Stain floor
  • Polyurethane floor (3 coats)
  • Stain and polyurethane closet doors
  • Stain and polyurethane carpet-to-hardwood threshold thing
  • Paint baseboards, install, caulk and repaint.
  • Paint accent wall and alcove stripes pink.
  • Replace alcove shelves
  • Hang curtains and closet doors

Load in the furniture and voila. A short (NOT!) seven months after we started, it’s now my favorite room in the house.

And since you asked, here’s a close up of the floor (alcove stripes reflected in it, and quite unswept):

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Random

A room with perspective

This weekend was a momentous one for us: Rebecca moved into her own room!

Rebecca's room

Rebecca's room

am I to stay here?
“Am I to stay here?”

And Hayden got a big boy bed!
Big boy bed!
He actually asked for quiet time on his first day with the big boy bed—and he stayed in bed the whole time! (Last night, however, was the first time he fell out of bed 🙁 .)

But I think the people who are most excited are me and Ryan—after four and a half months, we finally have our room to ourselves! All of our toiletries have been migrating to the guest bathroom so that we didn’t wake Rebecca as we got ready for bed—and once we were ready, actually going in our room sometimes required nerves of steel and holding our breath.

Strange how having free reign of one’s own room can feel so . . . freeing!

What little changes in your life have brought big changes in your attitude?

Categories
Kids/Parenting

Got toes?

I’ve been making soup a lot lately: salsa soup, white bean soup, and coming up this weekend, turkey noodle soup, of course.

Hayden has also been making soup: mostly alphabet.
hayden made alphabet soup
Yeah, that’s a deep fryer.

In other activities, Hayden has begun singing various and sundry songs, with a little help from us:

He’ll be ready for Don’t Forget the Lyrics any day now.

Not to be forgotten, Rebecca has made her own strides this week. On Monday, she discovered her toes!
got toes?
Got toes?