Dress Up!

This morning after breakfast, Isabella asked me to help her put her "princess" outfit on. She then gave me Dorothy's outfit and said "her wants to be Dorothy" -- so it was the first time my girls played dress up together. :) Then Isabella was so kind to say "baby sister is Dorothy, I'm the princess and you be the bad lady" (Maybe I should worry about how she views me as her mother. :) And then we went on to act out part of the Wizard of Oz. Although I will admit, "Dorothy" didn't hold up her end of the show, we got very few responses from her, none of which were her lines. It was fun for me to see a little glimpse of what the future may hold -- hopefully we will have many more dress up days!! Now if we could just get Daddy to project his head onto the wall so he could be the wizard........

What Jesus gave Isabella

Yet another funny "Jesus" story from Isabella. I hope I don't gross you out, but this morning, Isabella had a booger hanging from her nose, so I told her to "come here and let me get it." After I did, she said "Ouch Mommy, you hurt my nose" Me: "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to hurt your nose" Her: "JESUS gave me my nose!" I guess it was worse that I hurt her nose since Jesus gave it to her. After stifling a giggle, I was impressed that my child was actually listening to me in Sunday School yesterday because we were talking about things that God gives us and what we can give to Him. I said "Yes, Jesus did give you your nose,...and your pretty hair,.... and your little lips..... what else did Jesus give you?" To which she responded "Boogers!" I couldn't stop laughing and she said "Silly Jesus." Her "honesty" made me think of the joy I get from my children and even from the silly things Isabella says. And just the way her little mind is thinking made me think of the joy God is getting from her as well because He is the author of all joy.

Kind of a rough night

My poor Amelia is sick -- or at least I think she is. Yesterday she laid down for a late nap. She always takes 2 naps, but every now and again she will want a third. So I laid her down before Kenny got home. Then he got home, we ate dinner and she was still sleeping, let her sleep a little longer and then thought if I didn't wake her up she would go to bed late. So I went in and got her up and she was burning up. And she has pretty much had a fever since then, its been from 100 to 102, but only once do I think its gone less than that and that was at 5 am. She doesn't have any other "symptoms" so it kind of worried me last night and I had her sleep with me. I can't say I totally mind that because once again, I like getting me some baby love! But I didn't sleep much at all. Honestly I don't think she slept as well either because she loves her crib, but I was so worried that her fever would spike really high in the middle of the night and if she was in her crib I wouldn't know it. So I got to sleep with a little radiator on top of me last night. This morning around 5, Isabella came in our room -- which she does alot of mornings. She will come in normally around the time Kenny gets up for work and she will get in bed with me. And say what you will, but I love it. We don't let her sleep with us at night other than every now and then we make it something special, like her birthday, Christmas Eve, etc. -- trust me she asks every single night though. But in the mornings I love it, Isabella will come in and put her little arms around me and be just about nose to nose with me and say "cuddle, cuddle, cuddle" -- I know this won't last long so I'm enjoying it while I can. Anyway, she came in this morning and thankfully it was early enough that Daddy was still in bed so she was able to cuddle with him. As much as she loves her Daddy, morning cuddle time is for mommy, she was a little upset when I told her to cuddle with Daddy because baby sister was in bed, but she was ok when I told her it was because baby sister was sick. Well, Amelia being the light sleeper that she is, popped up and started saying "Be be" or "Bu bu" she varies between the eh and uh sound which I think is what she has started calling Isabella because we keep trying to get her to "say" something for Bella -- I think it worked, I think she at least recognizes the B sound for her. Its so cute! I kind of laughed seeing both girls in bed with us -- I don't think Amelia will be asking for it like Isabella does, but maybe that will change. Amelia then got kind of squirmy like she wasn't getting comfortable and it felt like finally her fever had broke so I put her in her crib and she went right to sleep. A few hours later when she woke up -- back to having a fever. I now have an e-mail into the nurse at her pediatrician. I know its a low grade fever, but with the weekend coming and the fact that she doesn't have any other symptoms of a cold or anything, I'm a little concerned about it being some other kind of infection. And fevers can be kind of scary. I know my mom said when I was little that I ended up having convulsions due to my fever spiking so quickly so its scary just to think about.

On a lighter note -- so I don't leave you all just worried about my poor Amelia -- Isabella said something yesterday that I thought I would share. We try to teach her that when she disobeys that she is making Jesus sad as well because she is supposed to obey Him and He tells her to "obey your parents". Of course when she does things that she thinks are good, like giving the cats water (or just deciding not to be mean to them for one day) she will say "I made JESUS HAPPY!" Well, yesterday I said something to her that was funny (at least to her) and she said "Silly mommy, that made Jesus laugh!" :) Too cute!

Birthday Party

I'm finally getting around to sharing pictures from Isabella's birthday and birthday party. Its probably a good thing that I've been busy this past week because if not I definitely would have had all those emotional posts I was talking about. Obviously, I had her birthday, then the 19th was the actual day we found out about Isabella and got pictures e-mailed to us, then their was the 22nd when we got out to California and held her for the first time..... I laugh that Isabella's going to dread it as she gets older having to say all week "Yes, Mom, I know what today is" :)

Last Thursday, on her birthday we took the girls to Sesame Street Live, even Amelia enjoyed it. I wish we were allowed to videotape in there because Amelia was dancing like crazy sitting on my mom's lap -- I was laughing so hard. Then afterwards we went out to eat and she got a birthday present. You can probably tell in the pictures that she loves it. It is a Wizard of Oz collectible that actually moves around, the witch will come out and start the scene from the movie, the legs with the slippers on it shrink under the house and then Dorothy's shoes light up red..... its really cute and she loves to watch it. All day Friday I kept hearing it and I was wondering how much of "I'll get you my pretty" I could take. Then the next pictures start with her birthday invitation -- since it was a princess party, I found little "glass"(like) slippers and I made little pillows and sent them out as the invitations (only had 2 to do, so it wasn't much work :) Then you can see the decorations, cake, etc. It was fun doing a girly party. I think it looked cute and Isabella loved having a princess party and getting to dress up in a princess dress and crown. She actually loved being the center of attention. When I asked her if she wanted to go blow out her candles she said "Yes - and everyone sing Happy Birthday to me!" Although I didn't take a picture of it, we played "kiss" the frog prince (like pin the tail on the donkey, but with lips for a frog) and we also made a little craft -- which Isabella is holding hers up in one picture. The kids all had fun playing in the castle. Of course, I had somehow imagined that the girls would come in and put their little princess dress up stuff on that we got them, but no such luck they just wanted to play. My nephew Garrett did enjoy his "knights sword" though so I guess he kind of dressed up. Isabella also got a little dress up set from my parents that was Dorothy and Glenda the good witch. She had to put them on that night and in the one picture of her as "Glenda", she's saying "There's no place like home". The last few pictures are of Isabella in some new PJs that she got from a friend of my mom's. They're her "princess" pajamas. I asked her to stand by the castle and let me take a picture of her in them and she said she wanted to be the "bad lady" so that's what the ferocious pictures are from. :) Then she and I had some girly time together and painted each others nails -- -yes she painted mine, with me just steadying her hand or it would have been all over my hands. And of course I had to throw in a picture of Amelia, she likes to climb in the castle as well, she just tries to climb out of the windows. Isabella is now wondering when her birthday is again.... it's going to be a long year! :)

Happy 3rd Birthday Isabella

Isabella is 3 years old today (considering it is after midnight as I'm writing this.) I can't believe it - I know it is so cliche to say "Time flies", but really it does. On this date, 3 years ago at 3 in the morning our precious Isabella was born. It was a Sunday and we knew nothing of her or her birthmother. Right now her birthmother was probably in labor, I was probably getting ready for bed. Right now, I was totally clueless to the fact that I was going to be a mommy the next day. I can't even express to you how much I wish I was there, not the one giving birth to her because then she wouldn't be who she is, but just there to hold her the very first moments of her life. You all will have to be patient with me because I promise you that the next few days I might be doing the emotional posts-- its one of those 3 years ago today..... type of things that you will be hearing a good bit of. As I was thinking of Isabella's birthday and as I've been planning her birthday party (side note here, today when I showed Isabella the little dress that she is going to wear to her party she said in a cute little whispery voice "Wow, Is Garrett going to dance with me?" :) Anyway, as I was doing all of this, I came across some letters I had written to Isabella, and I thought I would copy and paste one here. This was the first letter I had written to her and she was almost 4 months old. I don't know, maybe this is too personal, but seeing that I don't have a large blog following, I'm assuming Isabella won't mind.

Wednesday, May 12,2004
5:00pm
Dear Isabella,
I just checked on you as you were taking a nap and I couldn't help but stare at you in disbelief. Each day I am still amazed that you are here and I thank God for you. You are so sweetly laying in your crib with your arms above your head and still "sucking" your passy even though it is laying next to you. You are not quite 4 months old and yet I can't believe how quickly the time has flown by. So many things have passed that we will never get back again. Even though I lacked alot of sleep, I loved getting up and feeding you throughout the night, just you and me in the quietness of the night. You would finish your bottle and then I would cuddle you up against my chest and you would fall back asleep. I do love the stage you are in now - you're smiling all the time, making all kinds of new sounds, "talking" (especially to daddy), rolling over, but I just wish for one more day or even just a couple hours where I could hold you again when you were not even 5 pounds. We have done so much and you have changed so much in 4 months and yet I still remember the feeling I had the first time I held you. All of a sudden, I'm a mommy and I have this tiny little girl that I love instantly and unconditionally. As the quote goes "When they placed you in my arms, you slipped into my heart." Actually, I think you were growing there all along and I just didn't know it until I held you. I hope you always know just how much I love you! I wish I could bottle up exactly how I feel and give it to you when you're older so you could feel it too - because I'll never be able to put it into words. I hope that you know the amazing grace and goodness of God like mommy and daddy have learned. You are our special gift! We prayed for you for so long not knowing that all along God already had you picked out for us. So many tears we shed in hopes of a baby and now we shed them because He has given us more than we could have ever imagined. You have given me something that no other child could give - you made me a mommy and you have shown me that God's way is perfect! So little, and yet somehow through you I have learned so much already. If the Lord tarries, we have just begun this journey with you sweet girl and I'm so excited for what the Lord has in store for you. As a mother, I wish that somehow the tears I shed in hopes of you will be more than the tears you will have to shed in your lifetime. Most importantly though, my hope for you is that you accept Christ at an early age, that you love God with all your heart, and that you learn early that His way is Perfect.
I love you!
Mommy

Gymnastics!

Today Isabella had her first gymnastics class and she loved it. Sorry, I didn't take any pictures. For one, I knew that my hands would be full with Amelia, plus I didn't want to be this crazy mom taking her child to class for the first time and then constantly taking pictures. :) Since she is turning 3 this week, I knew that more things were available for her age. So we decided on gymnastics -- it seems like the best thing for her, she needs to burn some energy off, loves being around other kids, plus after watching them today this really will teach her some discipline needed especially for when she goes to school (Yes, I know its still 2 1/2 years away) -- she has to line up, follow instructions, not cut in line, etc. Plus its great for exercise and coordination and she looked like she was having a blast. I had thought about ballet but this seems to fit Isabella better -- even if I would love to see her in a little tu-tu. :) After she was all done she had to call Daddy and tell him all about it. I think she will probably take a good nap today. They really kept the kids busy doing things today and I love the way they had things set up. Plus, anyone that wants to work with a bunch of 3 year olds and can keep their sanity and the kids attention is good to me!! The only problem,.... she's already asking if she can do it again.

New setting

Just thought I would mention that I have changed my settings when it comes to comments. I didn't do this because I've had any bad comments or anything, a few people have asked me if I would think about changing things so they could leave a comment even though they don't have an account so I am allowing anonymous comments, but I am now doing comment "moderation" where I view everything before it is posted. That way I can still "protect" things, but more people can comment if they want. Hopefully this all works. Thanks!!!

Book Meme

I've been tagged actually by two people, Shawnda and Michelle for the same thing. It is a book Meme.

So here is how it works:

1)Grab the book closest to you
2) open to page 123, and go down to the fourth sentence
3) post the text of the following 3 sentences on your blog
4) Name the author and book title
5) Tag 3 people to do the same

Honestly, we don't have any books on our desk, except a dictionary -- so if you want to consider that the closest book to me the 4th word down on page 123 is Beef. (I don't think I really need to type the definition out :) So I cheated, first I decided to go to books I was reading last night. These are "Romancing Your Child's Heart" by Monte Swan, and the other is "Shepherding A Child's Heart" by Tedd Tripp (I guess you can see how my heart has been burdened lately) First I chose "Shepherding A Child's Heart" -- Page 123: "What happened? Charlie's conscience was smitten by the gospel! Something in what I said struck a chord that resonated with his young, larcenous heart." Not a great 3 sentences to write since you'd have to read the whole story. Then I went to "Romancing Your Child's Heart" -- Page 123: "The childlike nature may become adultish, defensive and cynical. Children hurried in this way lose their fluidity of mind, and their spirits shrink, pull inside and close. For example, children forced to read before they are developmentally ready commonly have lifelong reading problems." Although this did make me think I should stop worrying about Isabella not knowing the sounds of all the letters...... Page 123 just had to be on child development rather than anything inspiring. So I thought I would go ahead and grab another book that, although I haven't read in a while, always has encouragment when I read it. This is E.M. Bounds On Prayer - This is a compilation of 7 books he had written. So -- Page 123, "The eye and presence of God give active life to trust just like the eye and presence of the sun make fruit and flowers grow and all things glad and bright with fuller life. Faith and ttrust in the Lord form the keynote foundation of prayer. Primarily, it is not trust in the Word of God, but rather trust in the person of God."
So there, it is, I cheated -- but once again I was encouraged and convicted about my trust in God and Who He is!

NOW...... who to tag....... I am going to tag Becky (partly because I'm just tired of seeing the same picture on her blog for the past 3 weeks! :) and partly because I'm sure she will either give me great encouragment or a good laugh in her book selection), Kris (you're lucky you updated your blog lately or you'd be in the same boat as your sister) and Stephanie (because I can feel her heart in her writings on her blog, and I'm hoping she's got a great book suggestion for me. :)

Worse than the DMV!!!

So today Kenny and I decided we need to go by the Social Security office to file for Amelia's SSN/card. Lets just say it was HORRIBLE!!!! I'm not sure how Isabella's went by so quick, but not this time around. We've tried to go before and it was the same way, but we really wanted to get it done before taxes so we went ahead and waited...... and waited...... and waited...... 2 1/2 hours to be exact!!!!! You know how the DMV always seems to hire the grumpiest people to wait on you -- well they weren't grumpy here, but unbelievably disorganized and most of the time had 2 out of 5 windows open. They give you different letters for what you are waiting for and then your number. So, one lady would call out E35 and then a couple minutes later another guy would call out E31 -- ITS ALREADY BEEN CALLED! But no matter how much people complained, a couple of them refused to be swayed into doing things correctly, which meant we had to wait longer because they would call 2 E numbers, then 2 F numbers, 2 H numbers so when they called the wrong 2 E numbers, ones that had already been waited on, it obviously made the wait time longer. Irritating!!!
Then after that I ran to a store, a store where when Amelia was only a couple months old I got a comment that infuriated me. Although some adoption comments bother me, I have really tried just to chalk it up to ignorance and somehow not think about it, but then there are those comments that you can't believe someone would say with your precious children present. (I might have posted this story before) I really think this lady "meant" well, but after talking about adoption she said "Its nice that there are people like you that take unwanted children" UNWANTED? What if my girls were old enough to understand that? At that time, my mouth literally dropped open and I didn't know how to respond. I kindly said something and walked away about in tears worried about how my girls would feel if they heard this comment when they were older. Back to today, I went back to this store to search for something and an older lady that works there came up to me and started talking, when she asked something about the girls being adopted, it hit me, this was her.... and sure enough she started to say it "Its so nice that people like you adopt children..." and that's as far as I let her get - as soon as she was in the midst of saying children I said "Well, my husband and I feel like we are so extremely blessed that God would give us these precious girls" She smiled, I smiled and I left (after buying the cute little "glass slipper" decorations I came for. :) Again, I don't think she was purposely trying to be mean. She's a much older lady and I tend to get comments or looks from older women because I don't think many of them understand adoption. With Isabella, one older lady told me that it was neat how agencies "match" up families to look alike. Which in itself cracked me up because Yes, Isabella has dark curly hair, but if that was actually how things worked, I doubt they would say "Hey lets match up this white family with a hispanic/asian baby." Things were done differently 40 years ago and I think some people are stuck in that mentality -- but for me I don't want my children to ever hear that, I don't want one "ignorant" person's, whether well meaning or not, comment undo anything we've taught them. And I definitely don't want anyone to think we have done something "saint like" by adopting our girls. I believe I needed them much more than they needed me!!

And it starts......

I had to share these pictures with you (as well as had to take these pictures before cleaning her up.) Amelia got into her first big mess today -- what am I headed for with her? She doesn't have an actual "highchair" just a booster in one of our chairs so I end up moving it around. Today I moved her into the family room, sat on the couch while I fed her some cereal and fruit. After she got done eating what she wanted of the cereal, I sat it down on the coffee table and went and got her a bottle. After the bottle and a little play time with mommy she decided she was ready to roam so I put her down on the floor, took the bottle into the kitchen, but totally forgot about the cereal bowl. When I came back in the room, this was what I found. I don't know how she did this in the time it took me to walk into the kitchen, rinse and load the bottle in the dishwasher, but I'm going to have to start watching her like a hawk! :) I'm not sure if the last picture there comes up extra bright on your screen, but I brightened so that the shadows behind her weren't so dark and you could see all the hair she is getting. Its so cute!!! She has the softest curls -- I love it!!! My mom keeps saying, boy when it all comes in you're going to have fun. I'm not sure if she is forgetting to look at what my hair is like now, or remembering too well how "fun" it was to comb very curly hair on a little girl. :)

Updates

Since Amelia turned 9 months just before Christmas, I thought I would give a few updates about what the girls are up to (in to) right now. Amelia, of course, is crawling around everywhere and getting into everything. She is really content just crawling around and playing by herself. Isabella on the other hand, still doesn't want to play by herself. She loves playing with her toys, but doesn't last too long with one thing unless mommy comes and plays with her. Like I've said before, she thrives on having others around her. In some ways this is good, because she makes friends so easily and really does great playing with others. I just hope that her and Amelia play good together as Amelia gets old enough to "really" play with. Amelia had been pulling up in her crib and on us for a little while, but then on Christmas Eve she decided she could do that other things as well. So now I get to worry about her around the tables, slipping on the kitchen floor as she tries to pull up on the cabinets, etc. The funny thing is that if she pulls up and doesn't have her footing just right, she can't figure out how to get down and she will start screaming -- I know I shouldn't say its funny, but it is. :) She still has no teeth, although this morning I thought her bottom middle gums looked and felt more swollen, so maybe soon. I'm not sure what we're going to do if she doesn't have any teeth to eat her first birthday cake in a few months. :) She still loves to suck her thumb and is just too cute when she grabs her little stuffed horse and holds onto it with one hand and has the other thumb in her mouth. I try to enjoy how cute this is and not think about how this might be a couple years from now. She still is such a good baby -- she is happy most of the time and is still so easy to put to bed. As soon as its time for a nap or bedtime, I lay her in her crib give her a blanket and stuffed animal and she will cuddle up and go to sleep. She loves all the little toys that make noise and is really cute squealing and kicking when you show her a toy. Oh, but she crawled over Isabella's little play vacuum yesterday and turned it on and wasn't too happy about that. She is even cuter giving her little kisses now, she'll give them to you when you ask and then sometimes just out of the blue. They are slobbery and normally open mouth, but cute nonetheless. And she likes to give you long kisses, she'll kiss you and then just keep it there with a silly little grin coming on her face until she's done. She loves to eat and now thinks anytime someone else is eating that she has to eat too. She's still a little peanut though -- long and lean, lucky girl, long and lean! She's still pretty fearful of strangers or pretty much anyone other than mommy and daddy -- at least until she gets to know them. She's actually a little scared of my brother Mike and we're not sure why. On Christmas she crawled over to him and was climbing up on him (I think she was thinking it was her daddy since Mike has dark hair and a goatee like Kenny) but then she looked up at him and freaked out. Certain people can talk to her and she'll smile, but others she will just start crying and she ALWAYS puts her head on our shoulder and grabs us a little tighter when someone talks to her. I'm actually hoping this stays this way kind of (although it would be nice to be able to leave her in the nursery once in a while) because Isabella is the absolute opposite, to the point that it scares me and I am wondering how to teach her about strangers without taking away the innocence of everyone being her "new friends". And the best thing of all about Amelia..... she's becoming more of a cuddler. Although it has been nice that she will go right to sleep in her crib, I've missed cuddling her as much as I did Isabella. She used to arch her back when she was tired so that we would put her in her crib, but now she has decided its ok if we want to rock her a little before bedtime. Isabella will be 3 in 13 days!!!! I can't even believe that, but we are in birthday party mode. We aren't planning a big party, just my family and her little friend Makenna, but I will probably still go overboard on thinking of how to decorate everything. She is having a princess party -- although she loves the Disney princess, we aren't doing any of those, just a pink and purple princess party. I think it will be really cute and I'll be sure to post pictures after. Last year she was so into Elmo that we had an Elmo party, against my hopes of having all girly parties. :) Like I said, Isabella is almost too friendly to people, her new thing starting this past month has been asking everyone (yes EVERYONE) "What's your name?" and that's not enough, if they tell her their name then she will ask "What's your mother's name? What's your father's, brother's, etc name?" We try to forewarn people and tell her to stop or they will be standing their all day. :) And she is quite open to introduce all of us to them as well. The other day when my cousin Alyssa was here (she calls her La la - yes she can say Alyssa, but long story) anyway, she asked the people in line behind us what their name was and then she said "This is La La." Right before Christmas we watched the Wizard of Oz and then Isabella became obsessed with it, she kept asking to watch it, but we didn't have the movie, so we decided to buy it for her for Christmas. She doesn't normally call it Wizard of Oz though, she normally calls it "The bad lady" (obviously for the witch) or "bad lady and the girl with the dog". Sunday after Christmas, while Pastor had the kids sitting up front before Children's Church he was asking them about what they got for Christmas. I couldn't hear what Isabella told him, but afterwards Jamie (pastor's wife) said "It sounded like Isabella said something like bad girl" I laughed and had to explain what she probably said. Thankfully no one else heard her or they would have thought we told her she was a bad girl and didn't give her any gifts. :) Ok, that's all the updates I can think of for now -- I guess it ended up being longer than I thought.

New Year -- Grateful for 2006

As we have entered into 2007, I thought I would post and say how thankful I am for 2006. I am really thankful for God's leading in our lives this year. (I know this may sound like a broken record since I have mentioned the same thing several times on this blog. ) Many of you got this picture on your Christmas card this year so I thought I would post it here now. When I had these printed off, Kenny and I went to pick them up and as I looked at this picture I started to cry. Of course, Kenny worried right away that I was upset about something, but instead I'm just too emotional :) I told him that in looking at this picture, I was in awe of how God had ordained these 2 girls to be our daughters!! I obviously don't know what its like to have biological children, but for me, just knowing that God in His wisdom had chosen these two precious girls for us and us for them, that He had picked them as well as their birthmothers for us-- to think about that just overwhelms me. Isabella was our miracle -- I still look at her and can't believe that God brought us throur our trial of infertility and gave us such a special blessing -- a miracle indeed! Amelia (although a miracle as well) to me is considered my "silver lining". After going through the adoption fraud, we were discouraged, but we couldn't give ourselves to that discouragement. Our silver lining --- we knew that God was in control and would bring us the child He had planned for us. I don't understand His reasons or all of His way, but she is that wonderful silver lining after that dark cloud. And I really can't complain, because so many people have gone through harder things and even many who have gone through that same trial have to wait for a long time until God reveals that silver lining.
We've started the Veggie Tales Family Devotional Book with Isabella and the first devotional was talking about this particular thing that God has a plan for everyone. The verse we are trying to teach her with this is one of my favorites: "The Lord will fulfill His purpose for me; your love, O Lord endures forever" (Psalm 138:8) May you all have a blessed 2007 and I hope you see God's plans worked out in your life and see Him fulfill His purposes for you!!

Cousins

Here's the picture of our girls with their cousins on Christmas morning, you'll have to excuse the weird coloring, I can't figure out what is up with my Adobe. Anyway, the kids all had fun together that day (well, Tyler and Uncle Kenny watched a football movie) Of course, as soon as presents were opened, they spent very little time playing with their new toys and went straight to Papa and Noni's playroom and got out the old toys. :)

Our Christmas (finally!)

Wow - I can't believe how quickly Christmas came and went and now we are into a brand new year. We had a wonderful Christmas! On Christmas Eve we had a short candlelight service and it was great. I had never actually been to one like this before where the Pastor was reading Scripture and the Christmas story and they were using candles to represent Mary, Joseph, Jesus, angels, etc. It was really great and had a wonderful message. Christmas morning, I didn't take a ton of pictures of the girls opening presents because we were videotaping and if I can figure out how to add my videos to this I am going to put a couple on here, because Amelia cracked me up with getting excited about gifts. When she is excited or when she is upset as well, she throws her hands up in the air. Isabella was so sweet opening presents. When she got up, (She got to sleep with mommy and daddy Christmas Eve) before we left our room we sat down and read the Christmas story from a little pop up book that I found. I was so excited I found one that actually told the story rather than a more made up "story". We had a book kind of like it when I was growing up. Then we prayed and talked a little about it being Jesus birthday. When we got out to the family room, we had one of her presents a little play tent house set up and she walked out, didn't notice it at first and then saw it and whispered "Wow!" :) We decided that we were going to take turns opening gifts so that she could open a couple, then it Amelia's turn or it was mommy's turn, then daddy's - so that she wouldn't get too caught up in just opening and going to the next or doing that at my parents house later. I was pleasantly surprised at how sweet she was. She would open and then say "Your turn Mommy" (Of course, she liked to help me too) Then it actually took us a few hours opening gifts, not because we had a ton to open, just because she would open something and sit there and play with it for a while. We actually rushed her along at the end because we wanted to get brunch ready for my parents to come up. Then we had a relaxing day at home, got Isabella down for a nap so she wouldn't be too hyper later and then went to my parents where my brother and his family came down. As soon as Isabella walked in their door and saw Garrett, she said "I want to give Garrett his shooter" She had been so excited for weeks to give Garrett this little flying disc gun that she had bought him at the $ store. She was cute handing out her presents to everyone. Here are a few pictures from down at my parents house. I had tried to one of my nephews and niece with the girls as well, but blogger isn't allowing me to post it. (I guess I'm going to have to update to the new blogger even though I keep hearing problems about it.)

All together we had a really nice Christmas season, it just went by way too fast!

Then a few days after Christmas, my cousin Alyssa, her husband Todd and daughter Caiti (pronounced by Isabella as Kay -- Tee) came down to visit and celebrate New Years with us. This is the second year they've done this, so we're hoping this will become a tradition. It was so much fun having them visit and to be able to spend New Years Eve at home, shooting off a few fireworks and playing some games. Although, I'm late in saying it, I hope everyone had a blessed Christmas and New Years!! Now I'm off to plan a 3 year old birthday party in the next couple weeks as well as going on a retreat with the youth group next weekend, so I guess I'll be pretty busy this month as well! :)