A Day in the Life » Life

Bet you can’t shake your booty like this

Andrea — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 03:43:34 +0000

Addie loves to dance. There is a restaurant called Babe’s that we go to sometimes, where the waiters and waitresses do the Hokey Pokey. The last few times we’ve gone there, Addie has asked the waitress if they can do the Hokey Pokey so she can dance with them. I am SO glad I got a video of this, it is priceless!

Look-a-likes

Andrea — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 21:31:56 +0000

I have gotten a lot of comments lately on how much Nolan looks like Addie when she was a baby. So I put together some comparison shots of the two of them at around 7 or 8 months. They’re not identical, but you can definitely see the similarities.

Deer in the Headlights

Tongue Out

Cheesy Grin

New Entertainment Center

Andrea — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 02:45:34 +0000

We have this alcove in our family room that houses our TV, along with movies, components, wires, Wii stuff, remotes, etc. It is a nice space, and we’ve always wanted to do something more with it. So a few weeks ago we talked to Zac’s cousin Ryan, who can build just about anything, about doing a built-in entertainment center. He said he could do it, and with a little bit of Zac’s help, one week later he was at our door ready to install it! We were not quite prepared for how fast he got it done, so I didn’t get to take a “before” picture, but if you can look past the child in the foreground, here is a picture I found of what our alcove looked like before:

Before

Just a TV and and IKEA entertainment center (which I sort of broke). And now:

After

We love it! I have some storage space for movies, toys, DVD player, plus some! And I don’t know what to do in those pretty shelves above, but I’m sure they’ll get filled up. Thanks Ryan!

BONUS! There was an estate sale on our street last week, which means TONS of cars were coming up our street for 3 days straight. So we put the old entertainment center out on the sidewalk with a sign that said “FREE” on it, and it was gone within 10 minutes. Saved me a trip to CCA!

While Addie was “napping”

Andrea — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 21:45:56 +0000

Addie is in the process of trying to drop her nap. Some days she will sleep, some days she will not. It has moved steadily back from starting at 12:30 and going until about 2 or 2:15, to starting at 1:30 and going until 3:30ish. When she actually falls asleep. On the days she does not sleep, I ask her to read or play quietly, or rest in her bed, and she has “rest time” for about an hour. She still comes out of her room a couple of times during the hour, but I just remind her that it is resting time, and she will continue to lay down and rest, or play quietly. Quietly is a loose term, since most of the time she is singing while she is playing, which I am fine with.

Today while she was “napping”, she made a royal mess of her room. She pulled out toys I didn’t even remember we had. And to top it off, she found a pack of stickers and tore them all off and put them on the floor!

I was about to be seriously ticked when I looked a little closer, and saw this:

She had split up the stickers and placed them into groups! What an organizer! Maybe I should enlist her help organizing the rest of my house.

Cherish

Andrea — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 20:40:57 +0000

Someone I know or knew chose one word each year to focus on all year long. She made it sort of a mantra that was meant to inspire and motivate her to be better. I can’t remember who you are, but if you are reading this, feel free to take the credit for this idea. I want to do that this year. I have been reflecting on how things are going (which is pretty smoothly) and I want to remember these years as a time I cherished, instead of just endured. Because I think many of us can agree that sometimes it seems like there is no end in sight of nighttime feelings, teething troubles, eating battles, toddler tantrums, potty training, etc. I know I sometimes get bogged down in this kind of stuff. But why not focus on the precious hugs and slobbery kisses, bedtime snuggles, joyful smiles, ticklish tummies, first milestones, and kid-like excitement that comes with every holiday where candy is involved? Almost every time I am in public and someone whose kids are grown sees me struggling with my kids, they always smile knowingly and just say, “Cherish these days. They go by way too fast.”

That is why this year I have chosen to focus on the word Cherish. I will cherish my sweet baby and my fiery yet totally fun preschooler. I will cherish my thoughtful husband. I will cherish my caring parents, siblings and in-laws. I will cherish my friends. I will cherish memories we make, and hopefully I will write more of them down so they don’t slip away. That is my goal this year.

I am so far from perfect and am working on being a better sister, daughter, mother, wife and friend. But I am hoping that as I find joy in this little life of mine, that I will be able to improve on my flaws and just be a better, happier person.

Donut making

Andrea — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 21:32:50 +0000

We made donuts! Addie found some video of a kid making donuts on youtube, and asked if we could make our own donuts. I had never done it before, but Zac had, so while he was home we decided to give it a shot. I was surprised they turned out so tasty! They don’t look great, but we learned a few things for next time. Like, don’t make them so huge! If they were smaller we could have browned them slightly on the outside and they would be done on the inside. Addie is a great helper and helped me cut out the shapes of donuts she wanted (heart, pumpkin, circle). It took about 3 hours, and Nolan was a dear and slept almost the entire time!

Step 1. Mix the dough and let it rise for about an hour. Then roll out the dough and cut into shapes!

Cutting them out

Cookie cutters work

Step 2. Let the dough rise another 30 minutes to an hour.

Getting a little messy!

Step 3. Heat up the oil, but use a thermometer to check if it is hot, NOT your fingers. Addie missed the memo on that one, and burned her finger. She spent the next 10 minutes soaking her fingers in cold water. It was sad, but funny because Zac had told her 3 seconds before she did it “Don’t put your fingers in the oil, it is HOT.” Then she promptly put her fingers in the oil. Ouch!

Soaking her finger

Step 4. Toss the donuts in the oil, and flip them with chopsticks when they are brown.

Guess I should have dressed up for this photo shoot

Almost done...

Step 5. Take them out when both sides are browned, and glaze them!

Before the glaze

Step 6. Eat! Addie loved eating her donuts!

All glazed and ready to be eaten

She liked the donut holes...just her size!

Trampoline Family

Zac — Sun, 08 Jan 2012 22:45:33 +0000

These last two weeks we have had lots of fun being home together as a family. We have been going places like the mall playground, the museum, Grandma and Grandpa’s, the bowling ally, and the park. However, the best part was just spending time together as a family.

Trampoline Family

P.S. Doesn’t my new fence in the background look great…

Fort Worth Museum Day

Andrea — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 16:35:32 +0000

We went to the Fort Worth Museum of Science and History this week, and took advantage of the HUGE children’s section, filled with all sorts of things to explore and play with. Addie loved the grocery store section. She probably spent 30 minutes just filling her cart with food, checking out, putting all the food back, and filling her cart again. She also enjoyed the hospital section, where you could drive an ambulance, check some x-rays, and care for the babies in the nursery. She was excited to wear the white doctor’s coat, and I must say, this girl is a natural at this stuff. It wouldn’t surprise me if she ended up as a nurse or doctor someday. Or at least wanting to be one. Who knows if our genes combine to make a smart enough person to be a doctor.

Dr. Addie Inspecting Her Patients

A Proud Doctor

Nolan and mom

Nolan was a champ! He was so good the entire time, and even fell asleep in his stroller for about 40 minutes (which was good because we were bad parents and kept him there WAY past nap time, we just wanted to see everything!)

Playing at the water station

There is an outdoor water station, where you could make awesome water fountains from PVC pipes, make boats float, spray water guns, etc. It would be really fun in the summer. The Dino Dig was closed, so we didn’t get to dig in the sand for fossils, which is okay since you tend to get a little messy there.

Other exhibits we liked were the George Washington exhibit and Energy Blast, which is an exhibit all about alternative energy resources. Sounds boring, but it was seriously cool. It has a ride, movie, experiments, and tons of information which is meant to get you thinking about alternative energy sources. Addie was impatient during this part, so I didn’t get to spend a ton of time in there, but I would like to go back sometime. In fact, we ended up buying annual passes so we COULD go back a few times this year. We went out to lunch on our way home, and Addie asked, “Can we go back to the museum now?” after we ate. Haha! I guess that annual pass was a good idea.

Box fort

Andrea — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 04:16:26 +0000

How many boxes did you throw out this week? We had a huge tower of boxes that probably could have cleared 30 feet. So we decided to make a fort. As soon as I mentioned this to Zac, I could see the wheels turning in his mind. He is a hands on kind of learner, so I knew he would take this and run with it. He got to work and made this awesome fort/castle that Addie loved playing in.

Flower box window

Putting the flowers in order for the flower box

Shutting the drawbridge

Out the round window

Showing her kitchen table

It might not look like much, but it included a few windows with shutters, a drawbridge door that actually works, a look out telescope, a flower box with flowers, a flag pole, some furniture inside (table and couches), a chimney, and a milk jug bugle (you know, for announcing visitors). Zac did the whole thing, and I’m seriously impressed it has stayed together so well! Maybe he should have been an engineer…

Other Christmas happenings

Andrea — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 04:00:41 +0000

Since I have been so lame at posting this last month, here are some other things we have done, some Christmasy and some not. The first was Addie’s dance recital. She looked precious in her costume, I love it! It was really more of a normal dance class with a few run-throughs of their big dance at the end. They got to hold teddy bears and dance with them. It was seriously cute! Although it was good they did it a few times, because the girls got a little distracted by all the parents taking pictures and videos of them. It was awesome.

Ballerina Pose

She just can't hide that personality:)

Addie and Savannah

Addie and her cousins Austin and Caleb attended Grandma Taylor’s First Annual Grandma’s Christmas party too. They made a craft, decorated cookies, watched a Christmas movie, and open a couple of presents. They had a blast, and when I came to pick up Addie, she hid in the bathroom and yelled, “NO, I want to stay and play with my cousins more!” Man she loves those boys.

Addie, Austin and Caleb

We made a few of our own crafts at home too. Thanks to Pillsbury, we made a few successful batches of gingerbread men, decorated them with frosting and M&Ms (mint, mmmm), took pictures of them, and then promptly ate them. Yumm. We also made some snowmen out of toilet paper tubes. It was something we found on a blog and Addie though they were worth trying. I think they turned out cute, but then again, I had to make most of them because her attention span for crafts is about 4.2 seconds.

Christmas cookies and snowmen

We saw the Coppell santa again this year. Addie did much better, although the conversation went sort of like this:

Santa: What do you want for Christmas this year?

Addie: I want a Belle phone (she has been asking for this phone for weeks. It is just something she saw in the Target checkout line, and really really wanted it. Enough so that it was the only thing she wanted to ask Santa for)

Santa: ooh a Belle phone. I’ll see if my elves can get one of those for you. What else would you like?

Addie: (silence…..she had only rehearsed one thing to ask for, Mom and Dad didn’t tell her she could ask for more than one thing…)

Santa: Do you like princesses?

Addie: (continues to stare at Santa in silence)

Santa: Would you like a candy cane?

Addie: Yes! (Addie is loving all the treats I am letting her have this month. This will cease soon, after I eat it all up)

So, we got a picture and left. I think it was a successful visit, even if she totally clammed up.

Addie and Santa