Note to Self

Note to self: While sponge curlers are intended for overnight use, its probably not a good idea to leave them in overnight on fine baby hair. Haha.

Be My Valentine

Will anyone else have a Valentine as sweet as mine? I think not. :)

I know its a little early, but the outfit was too cute to wait! :)

Family Fun

Last night, we went over to Darren's parents' house, where Lizzy let us play Rock Band!



Even Grampster got into the action and sang a few songs for us!


And then Savannah wanted to try out the drums. These are for you, Uncle Ben!

And then she got in some play time with Aunt Lizzy... "I see you!"

And then she needed to snuggle with Momma on the couch and eat "puppy chow."

And Auntie Em is always teaching Savannah new tricks!

And Aunt Lizzy is always a lot of fun too.

We sure had a great time!!! We are so thankful to live so near to family!

Busy Little Bee!

I've recently decided that couples without a toddler or small child must have TONS of free time. Savannah is really busy nowadays, and she keeps me really busy as well. She is a great kid, and behaves well for the most part, but she never stops moving as long as she is awake!

She got this little kitchen from Mimi and Grandad for Christmas, and it does a great job of keeping her occupied for a good part of the day. I'd highly recommend it!

This is her newest trick... she puts her hands on her "hips" and says "cheese!" I was working with her a little bit on posing since she will be competing in Tiny Miss America next month, but I'm not sure this facial expression is going to be all that impressive. However, I find it quite charming!



But its not to be confused with this facial expression, which is entirely different. You see, when she points to her belly, wrinkles up her nose, and says "shhhew", it means she is telling you she has a dirty diaper. She is very good about letting us know when she has used the potty. I thought she might be ready to potty train early, so we bought her a potty, and brought it in the house, and I sat her on it (sans the diaper) and she screamed bloody murder. Thinking something was hurting, I quickly jerked her off and checked to make sure everything was ok. It seemed fine, so I sat her back on the potty, at which time she screamed and cried again. It took me a few tries to figure it out, but she's pretty much terrified of the potty. So we decided just to keep the potty nearby and look at it every once in a while, at least for the next few months.



Feel free to stop by and let her cook you up something!



One of Savannah's favorite things in the world is not actually a toy... its our dog, Sasha. She LOVES to play with her "doe-g" (long o, not short). As soon as I get her up in the morning, she greets me, and then looks right to the floor and yells "Sasha! Dog!" Haha. She also has a new habit of going to the dog food bowl, getting a piece of dog food out, and following Sasha throughout the whole house saying "bite, ahhh! bite, dog!!!" until Sasha finally eats it, and then she makes her way back to the dog bowl to repeat the process. My poor sweet dog participates in this each day until I save her by setting the dog food bowl on the counter. But yesterday topped it all. Yesterday, I gave Savannah a couple Vanilla Wafers to eat. She took one, put it in her mouth, and then started to laugh, at which time the cookie got ejected into the floor. Sasha, being a dog, ate it. Savannah thought it was absolutely hilarious, so she proceeded to put the next cookie into her mouth, bend over and spit it on the floor, and then laugh hysterically when Sasha gobbled it up. Gross, I know. But it was pretty funny. If only you had heard the giggles of delight, you would have let it slide too.

Do you see Sasha in this picture? She must not mind Savannah too much. :)

Another facinating toy are these stackable boxes (thanks, Aunt Kathy!!!). She spends quite some time each day trying to figure out how to take them all apart, and then put them all back together.

She is so busy, but such a delight. I wouldn't have it any other way!

Blessed

Well, the Christmas decorations have finally been packed away again, and I was a bit sad to take down one of my favorites, the Christmas Card Tree. If you know me well, you know I love to get the mail. I don't really know why, but I love it when the mail comes and I get to see what has arrived. Maybe its from shopping too much on ebay, or because we get movies from Netflix, or because I think old fashioned cards are way better than e-cards, I don't know. But I especially love to check the mail in December. We get tons of Christmas cards and I get so excited to see new pictures and read letters from our friends, both near and far away. This year, we got more Christmas cards than we ever have before, mostly because all of our friends are starting families now. I thoroughly enjoyed checking the mail and then posting new cards on the Christmas Card Tree. When I took it down this year to pack it away, I was struck by how blessed we are... we have so many special people in our lives... we hardly had any room on our tree left!!! (This picture was taken the week before Christmas... we got even more than the ones shown!) And I sure like it that way. :)

Drew and Kari's Wedding

Yesterday, we got to witness our friends Drew and Kari get married!!! Drew played basketball with Darren for several years, and I've known Kari since she was two! :) I only got a few shots of the stunning couple because they were surrounded by tons of people, and because I was chasing Savannah most of the time. :)

Mr. and Mrs. Andrew Hunsley

Getting the garter...

I did get lots of pictures of friends that we saw. Here is my brother, Ben, with Uncle Warren.

Zach, Ben, and Betsy...

Ben and Melisa...

Mom and Carrie...

My little family...

Ben, Zach, and Sarah...

Ben and Bethany...

Zach and Sarah...

Mary and me...

Ben and Tana...

Renee (mother of the bride... isn't she beautiful?!) and Mom... they had a hard time keeping their eyes open for this pic.

Me and Katie and our babies... backwards. :) I never thought I'd see this day... but I love it!

ALL of the kids - minus Kari- who was on her way to Mexico for her honeymoon!

Back row - Wil, Patrick, Emily, Melisa, Thomas, Zach, Ben, Mary

Middle row - Brittany, Katie (Audrey), Lauren (Savannah)

Front row - Sarah, Bethany, Carrie

We had enough pictures, so we turned around on the paparrazi.

The dashing Dads... Michael, Dan, Willie, Warren, and Chet.

And at 10:30, we finally arrived home, and Savannah passed out in her bed for the night after being a very good girl all evening!!!

Congrats, Drew and Kari! We love you!

New Year, New Words

Savannah is now trying to say everything that we say. On this video (ignore the dirty face - she just had a doughnut!) I caught her saying peekaboo, mimi, grandad, pawpaw, touchdown, please (5 times), thank you, Sasha, dad, and all gone. They might not sound like much to you, but a parent gets really excited about these things. :)