Crafts and Cookies

One of the best parts about Audrey being a little older this Christmas is that we were able to do a bit more crafts and a lot more baking with her this year. She had a cold this month that kept us home for almost a full week but it gave us a lot of opportunities to try out some new things. First up were some "glue ornaments". She had a lot of fun squeezing the glue onto the wax paper but even more fun sprinkling them with glitter. They dried a little funny so I'm not sure if we'll be saving any but they were fun to make. I think the trick is use a lot more glue.

We also made a cotton ball snowman. She was a pro at this activity since we had done a sheep a few months ago.

Last up was my favorite - a footprint Christmas tree. We traced her feet out on some green cardstock (she liked it so much we had to do her hands and feet multiple times). I glued two together to make a tree shape and then she glued on some decorations and then stuck the star on top. Once everything had dried I added some hole punches and a quick pipe cleaner loop and now we have a cute ornament for our tree.

We were able to do a lot of baking this past month and Audrey was always eager to help by standing on her stool and adding stuff to the mixer. She also had to have her own bowls with flour or sugar in them that she mixed. Her grandparents must have been listening when we told them about all the baking she likes to do because she now owns not one, but two aprons and chef hats along with some baking tools for her own kitchen.

Christmas Eve actually began with a lot of baking (8 sourdough bread bowls and some sugar cookies for Santa). Our poor oven got a workout that day. We put on our aprons and mixed, rolled, and sprinkled the cookies - it was a great start to the day!

Christmas - Parts 1, 2, and 3!

This Christmas was filled with lots of family time, a big change from last year in Maryland. It also meant we got to spread things out a bit, which is always nice with a two year old.

First up was Grammy, Papa, and Aunt Katie! Grammy and Papa stopped by the week before Christmas on their way out to Kentucky. We were able to have some pre-Christmas fun with them before they left. After opening up some presents for herself, she graciously offered to help others open some gifts as well. We especially liked how she had to lay down "just like Papa" when helping him open his gifts.

The second event was Christmas Eve at our house. Uncle Steve, Aunt Laura, Nana, Great Uncle Ken and Kelsey came over for some yummy cheesy chowder in homemade sourdough bread bowls. We also exchanged gifts with the Santoki's that evening. Audrey had a blast playing with her cousins and there were just a few moments of sharing 'issues'. When we were leaving out some cookies for Santa, she might have taken a nibble (or giant bite) of Santa's cookies and the carrots for the reindeer - to make sure they were okay, of course!

Last up was Christmas morning itself! Nana, Ken and Kelsey spent the night and were unfortunately woken up at 6:30am with an unhappy little one (Sorry! She really does normally sleep in until 8. A day later we discovered two 2nd year molars coming through, so they may be to blame). While Audrey did enjoy everything in her stocking, the binoculars were an instant favorite. She was also super excited about the tricycle that Santa left her. The pace of toddler present opening was a little slower than we were used to, but it was a nice change. It's not surprising that opening a really cool toy only to have to immediately put it down to move on to something else is difficult for a little one, so we eventually moved on to Christmas eggs and saved some presents for later that day. Then, after a much needed nap we drove down to Nana's house for a delicious dinner and some more family. We ended up back at home for a late bedtime with a very happy little girl (okay, she might have been a little crabby while getting ready for bed but we got some really good snuggles in while singing songs).

It's All Business With the Big Guy

Audrey's serious face comes on when Santa comes to town. She loves the guy, was so excited to see him, immediately ran to him with outstretched arms, happily sat on his lap, but never cracked a smile the entire time. We even tried to get her to say "cheese", or "peaches". She responded with "no". She did manage to tell him what she wants for Christmas this year: "Cookies."

We have to thank Aunt Lala for showing us the best place to see Santa. Our past experiences have left a bit to be desired, but this time? I mean, you can't go wrong with that belt buckle!

Clam Lights and Snowflake Lane

Our second Christmas activity was the Ivar's Clam Lights and Parade of Boats in Renton. As corny (or clammy?) as that sounds, they did a pretty good job lighting up almost every tree in Gene Coulon Park. The boats were fun to look at but watching the drunk people on the boats singing their heads off was probably the most entertaining part.

Our third event was Snowflake Lane in downtown Bellevue. We heard about it from my sister who didn't have a better description than "kind of like a parade", so we weren't sure what to expect. I would describe it as a combo light and christmas music show on the sidewalks near the mall with a drum line playing along, fake snow falling, and life-sized stuffed animals walking around. That's right. Life-sized stuffed animals. Audrey was in love.

It turned out to be a good warm up for our next Christmas adventure with "the big guy". Stay tuned.

Oh Christmas Tree...

It is was once again time to go out and find the perfect Christmas tree and we were just a little excited about how many different places we could have gone. Tis certainly the area for some good trees! We got a recommendation for a tree farm and drove out with Nana on a Sunday morning.

Audrey was a big help this year. This was a fancy tree farm that gave you your own cart and she was happy to push that around.


The biggest dilemma at this place was what type of tree to get, since they all looked great. While our tree last year was pretty, it didn't smell at all. Rather than using pine scented car fresheners as ornaments, we were told to go with a grand fir this year for optimum fresh tree smell. Audrey tends to gravitate towards trees her size and this year was no exception.

It didn't take long to find the perfect tree and since this place seemingly keeps their saws sharpened, it took about two seconds to cut it down.

After we got the tree "serviced" (they have an impressive and somewhat scary shaking machine to get rid of loose needles and other debris) we took some time to warm up by sampling their free beverages. Since Audrey hasn't had hot cider or hot chocolate, Mike offered her the option of "warm apple juice" or "warm chocolate juice". As appetizing as chocolate juice sounds, she chose the apple juice.

And of course, what Christmas tree post would be complete without a picture of the finished product, toddler-proofed by putting only plastic and wooden ornaments on the bottom half. Though, she has been very good about using her one-finger touch.

It's beginning to look like Christmas!

For our first Christmas adventure this year we took Audrey to see two of Santa's Reindeer. Audrey's cousin Emma also got to see them two years ago but at only two months, Audrey was a little young then. We are very much looking forward what else the season might bring.


And for a fun picture, after we settled in from our weekend of traveling we broke out the Christmas decorations. Audrey quickly found the "socks" and knew exactly what to do with those.

Thanksgiving (x2)

Having lots of family around now meant Audrey was lucky enough to celebrate two Thanksgivings this year. Twice the turkey, stuffing, and cranberries...yum. It also meant twice the bread ripping to make the stuffing. And Audrey was a pro.


Thanksgiving was a holiday made for this girl. Each meal had fabulous food for her to enjoy, although cranberries and sweet potatoes (once she finally tried them!) were her favorites. We also learned that she currently prefers pumpkin pie over pecan (although I'm sure she'll come around eventually). And since it was a special occasion, she got her first virgin bloody mary complete with a homemade pickled green bean.


It was a wonderful weekend spent with family - we are all so lucky to have these opportunities now!

A Bright Star

Now that we are back living significantly above the 45th parallel, far west in our time zone, it is getting dark way before Audrey's bed time. One of her favorite activities as of late is to bundle up after dinner, go outside, and look for the moon and for airplanes.

Tonight was a rare cloudless fall night in our neck of the woods and she was so excited that she could see tons of airplanes the moment we walked out the door. I had to explain to her that "airplanes move" and since the dots weren't moving, those were stars.

She then looked around and pointed to a hugely bright object above our neighbors roof line and asked "Is that a star?". I don't know much about astronomy, but I did know enough to say "I think that is a planet" and luckily I had Google's star map on my phone to verify my claim. Sure enough, Jupiter was out and extremely bright. We talked a little about planets and stars and I knew you can see Jupiter's moons with some heavy duty binoculars so I thought it was worth a shot with my camera. I thought it might work, but I really didn't know if I had enough magnification.

I grabbed my longest lens (200mm), which on my camera is about 6.3x magnification. I braced the camera against my truck, turned on "live view", zoomed to 10x in live view (so, now we are at 63x magnification), manual focused, turned on image stabilization, and sure enough there were little tiny dots next to the "bright star".

I made Kelly come out and brave the cold to get a look and we tried to hold Audrey up to see it but I finally decided to go grab my tripod so I could do it "hands off". Once we got it set up, Audrey came over, looked at the back of the camera, and actually counted the moons of Jupiter (the visible ones, at least). How cool is that?

The first picture is the ~6x magnification. If you click through, you should still be able to see some faint dots. The second picture is a crop of the 60x magnification, so it is magnified even more than 60x.

We came back inside and looked at "good" pictures of Jupiter and the rest of the solar system to cap off our first big astronomy lesson. I think she now firmly knows that Jupiter is the biggest planet and we live on the one that is half blue. Scientist in the making? Who knows.

Four Videos

Four videos. Three of which (surprise, surprise) are in her high chair. Apparently that's the only time we get the camera out.

We'll start with another culinary first:

We'll follow that up with a classic rock reference:

And one completely obscure reference. Taught, performed, and uploaded for one specific person:

And finally, one video out of her high chair, performing an interpretive dance to Rock-a-Bye Baby. Our favorite part is "when the wind blows".

Thursday Pictures

Some pictures from just another Thursday evening.

How We Screwed Up Our Kid - Part 1: "Tucking in"

I think we'll start a new series here, called "How we screwed up our kid". The first installment is just a quick snapshot from this morning when we learned how to tuck in our clothes. Right now, we'll allow it in the house, but not in public.

Summer 2011 Videos

We haven't been good about uploading videos recently. So, for our 150th post, I present to you three videos from the last few months.

Audrey's play has always been somewhat timid but she has gotten quite a bit more physical the last few months. She is now jumping on a trampoline, going down slides, intentionally falling down on an air mattress, and playing tag, or "catch daddy" in the house. I think somersaults helped start the ball rolling. Here is her first "gymnastics":

Along with her language explosion, she is also much more interactive with music. She has always had her favorite songs but just recently started singing along. Now, more often than not, a good chunk of our dinner time is spent listening to her perform her favorite songs. We also managed to catch her singing the "big finish" of happy birthday - something that thoroughly entertained us through the August/September birthday season:

We are constantly amazed how much of her books she has memorized. Take any of her dozens of favorite books, stop reading at a critical passage, and she can normally finish the sentence for you. Recently, however, she started doing it on her own. So lastly, here is Audrey "reading" a few selected passages from "Are You My Mother?" while we tried to covertly catch it on camera.

The Sweetest Dog

You came into our family when I was already in college and even though I only lived with you for a few short summers, you always greeted me like a best friend when I walked through the door.

But you were truly my mom's dog. You followed her from room to room, happily greeted her when she came home, played daily games about coming back inside, and kept each other company.

From surgeries to being kicked out onto the deck to skin problems to having your ears tugged at by little children, you put up with so much and only gave us love in return.

You didn't have many tricks up your sleeve--no flipping bones off your nose or howling when we sing, but anyone who spent more than five minutes with you knew you as just one thing: the sweetest dog.

Goodbye Romy. We loved you very much and will miss you dearly.