Valentine's Day 2013

A Very L.A. Day

Eating In N Out and watching airplanes at LAX while wearing short sleeves in January. Could we be any more L.A.? I'll upload a video from home, the app isn't letting me.

Jump, jump, jump around!

Happy New Year, Daphne can jump! She's been working on this for a looong time now. It's so cute to watch a toddler trying and trying to jump, and it's so cute to watch her accomplish her goal. Here are some stills from a video I took on New Year's Day, proving that Daphne can get air, or whatever the young folks are saying these days. 

Also, Daphne can confidently recognize a circle. She found a sprinkle on the floor (uh, yuck!) not quite a week ago. She looked up at me and said, "Spernkle!" I glanced at her and confirmed, "Yes Daphne. You found a sprinkle; it's a blue heart." (Those were the sprinkles we had spilled the day before, so I assumed it was one we missed.) She looked at me and said, "Circle." 

"No, Daphne, that is a blue heart."

"No. Circle. Mommy, circle."
Well, I went to check it out, and sure enough, she had a blue hole punch that was lost when we punched some flash cards the day before. Clever girl, not only did she know that she was holding a circle, she was so confident that she told me so! Of course, she thought she had a sprinkle... but she figured out that it wasn't when she tried to eat it. She's only 21 months, after all. 

Watching airplanes

Spur of the moment, the girls and I are having a lunch picnic by LAX. We found a great place to park and watch airplanes land... Right over our heads! Amazing- this will be a regulate event for us since we're so close now and it's pretty easy. Btw, it's bright out here and I can't really see the pictures I posted. Hope they're decent!

See the airplane? Top center of the picture:

Coming in for a landing:

SO close! An airplane blocking the sun for us:

Sunny but cold:

December 23rd

Today's Christmas break day started off with a little vacation just for mommy... meaning that I went to Trader Joe's all by myself! It was wonderful. I got a teeny little cup of coffee all to myself and nobody spilled it. I came home to little girls all dressed (mostly) and ready to go to Denny's for some hobbit pancakes! We had fun with some family activities, and delivered our Christmas cards to a few neighbors.

Violet was as decorated as our cookies:

I'm not sure her cookie-decorating vision was realized:

So many cookies! One of my very favorite Xmas activities. I love decorating them, I love eating them! (And can you see our pink gingerbread houses? Top left?)

We all got some running in playing bad guys and super heroes. I'll let you provide your own narrative for this picture:

We (er, Erik!) built our fire pit! (And can you see how clean the garage is? Gooooooo Erik!)

That, friends, is a packet of chestnuts, wait for it, roasting on an open fire! I will not stop in my quest for the perfect Christmas break! Very fun, and it turns out... I like roasted chestnuts!

SAN-sa! And a great day all around

I think I've finally done it- I may have figured out how to do Christmas! I'm only making a very few gifts, and those are for or with my girls. I have majorly minimized baking and candy-making, except what I can share making with the girls. We are staying home for Christmas, and while we will miss all of our family, we really needed to eliminate the stress of packing the car with presents and little girls. Santa is grateful, too. He's tired of reading the redirect notes to come find us somewhere else.
So that leaves us HOME this weekend with NOTHING that we have to do. Shopping is done, we aren't going anywhere and no-one's coming here! (Though like I said, we will miss our family! And we always welcome visitors!) And today was worth it. It was worth all of the "no"s, it was worth buying gifts instead of staying up nights to make them. This is exactly what I want to be doing... this year :)
Just because I want to remember today forever... I woke up an hour before anyone else, and read with a cup of coffee. Then Violet woke up, and we read for half an hour. Then Daphne woke up, and the three of us read for another half an hour. Yes, that's right, my day started with two hours of reading, half of that snuggling under a blanket and chit-chatting over stories with my favorite ladies. Then we woke Daddy, who took the girls out to play bubbles in the backyard while I made pumpkin pancakes. After breakfast, we cleaned out the garage, and sold our bunch of cardboard moving boxes for $20- they were gone within 90 minutes of being posted on Craigslist! Erik took a load to the Goodwill and picked up burritos for lunch, then cleaned the garage a little more while Violet and I went to get our hair cut. (Violet took it upon herself to cut her hair *for the very first time* last weekend, so we had to get it evened out). We came home, I made some popcorn mix for neighbor gifts, then we all got cleaned up and bundled up to go to dinner. We tried a Brazilian BBQ buffet which was fun, then we headed to Starbucks to get some hot chocolate to drink while we drove around looking for Xmas lights. And it was amazing! The girls BOTH loved it! Daphne kept saying "Moe, moe (more)!" I asked her what she wanted more of and she replied, "SAN-sa, peeese (Santa please)!" It was so cute- any time we were on a main road with no houses, she kept pleading for "Moe Sansa peeese!" And Violet decided that she wanted to see as many snowmen as possible, so they both had a favorite character to spot. It was just magical how they both ooohed and ahhhhhed at every light display, joyfully clapping and calling out, "Frosty! Sansa!" So magical that Daphne, who didn't nap today, stayed awake for the ENTIRE trip looking at lights. Amazing.

Anyway, today was exactly what I was hoping for this weekend. Extended pj time, fun with the family, traditions, memories. I have had overwhelming patience with my girls since the horrible tragedy at Sandy Hook last week. Something changed, and I just haven't really lost my temper or patience since. I assume this surge in patience is somewhat temporary and circumstantial, but here has been a change in me that will remain, even when the season is over and the headlines change. I am overwhelmingly grateful tonight for a perfect day with my little family.

Craft Round-Up

A few crafts we've been working on--

Crafters-in-training making salt dough ornaments. 

I recovered our chairs, which had been badly abused by children at mealtime!

Yuck!

Much better!

Keyfobs for Violet's teachers' Xmas gifts:

Picture coming of Violet and Daphne's stockings!