Dear Maggie & Gracie....

How do you feel about smiling for mommy today???

....that pretty much sums it up.... :)

Clarence the Elf....

Clarence the Elf struck again. Apparently Clarence is the Chief Elf, and Santa sends him to decorate Maggie's playhouse for Christmas. I thought Santa just sent Clarence last year because I was too pregnant to climb a ladder and put the lights up myself....but apparently Santa had repeat mercy on me this year and he sent Clarence again. YAH!!!!

Maggie was SO excited when we drove down the driveway and she saw the lights. Then she saw the DORA...it'a a good thing she was strapped into her car seat or she might have jumped out of a moving car! When I finally got her out of the car, she ran into the yard, then quickly came back to the garage to report to Grace and I that it was in fact "real" elves that came, and their Reindeer had once again left poop in our yard.

Clarence came at the perfect time, I think maybe big sister is feeling a little left out, with all the attention on Grace and her helmet the last couple of days. She was so happy!



this is Maggie and Dora doing the "christmas is coming" dance.



Yah!!!!


Clarence left Maggie a book of lifesavers and a note telling her not to feed them to Grace, because she's too little.....hmmmm.....Maggie's a pretty good big sister, but I think her kindness runs out when it comes to sharing candy. No worries there Clarence.


After we checked out the playhouse, Maggie started decorating her little tree in the kitchen. Of course, it is m&m themed...





Gracie watched her big sis and "sang" her some christmas songs while she worked.


Gracie is doing okay today. She's not loving her helmet but I think she's getting more used to it. Today she had to wear it for 2 hours at a time, by the end of the 2 hours, she was generally fussy and ready to get rid of it, who can blame her??

Slowly but surely our house is starting to look more like it's decorated for christmas and less like the christmas boxes blew up in the living room. Hopefully tomorrow I can wrap it up.

Before we left Omaha today, I let Keeli cut off all my hair....so far I think I like it, it was time for a change.....we'll see how I feel about it tomorrow when I can't have my ponytail and I have to do it by myself. Is a hair emergency a legitimate excuse for missing my 9 o'clock meeting?


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so far, so good....

After an hour or so of fitting and modifying, we are finished and Grace has her helmet. The adjusting was miserable for her (and me too), she doesn't seem to mind so much wearing the helmet, but she doesn't like the on and off process. Now that we're home and she's had a nap, she's doing ok. When she notices the helmet she fusses for a minute, but once she starts playing she seems to forget all about it. She has toppled over a couple of times, I think it will take a little while for her balance to adjust. we'll see...









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I hate when I get behind....

It makes me sure I'm going to forget something important. We had a great Thanksgiving weekend full of family, friends and of course FOOD. We're blessed to have so many wonderful people in our lives.

This year, I'm especially thankful for my beautiful, healthy and happy girls. Grace gave us a bit of a scare yesterday (okay, actually she scared us half to death, but I was trying not to be dramatic or use bad words.) She slept unusually late and at 8:33 her apnea monitor (the breathing monitor in her crib) alarmed, Arnie jumped down half the steps and grabbed her. When I got to them Grace was a little glassy eyed and pretty pale, but she seemed ok. We sat with her for the next several minutes and noticed that she really seemed to be 'sucking' in air and she was making lots of noises as she took each breath. So we took her to Urgent Care, thankfully one of our favorite doctors was there. He checked her out good, assured me she was breathing okay and just called it a "random incident", she's very stuffy so he had several possible scenarios about what might have happened. We'll never know and we'll never know if she'd have been fine or if that monitor startled her awake. It was a GOD thing for sure. Friday night, Arnie and I had a conversation about how long we should leave the monitor in her crib, she's big/old enough she really shouldn't need it anymore, but we decided there was no real reason to stop using it. Thank God!

While I took Grace to urgent care, Maggie went along with Arnie to basketball practice, she did so good. He told me several times how proud he was of her for acting like such a big girl.

The girls and I came back to Omaha tonight, tomorrow is helmet day! Say a prayer for us.

Here are a few pictures to catch you up on our lives...



Maggie decided we should brush Gracie's teeth, I've hidden the tooth brush because Maggie thinks she should do it all the time.


Maggie teaching Ella to play rolly ball.


All the cousins got to play for a few minutes on Tuesday night before Cooper and Ella's bedtime.


Maggie learned about Thanksgiving football...she's happy to tell anyone who asks that she likes basketball better.


Maggie and Alex had their own Thanksgiving table. By next year there will be 5 little cousins (Maggie, Alex, Ellie, Gracie and Oliver). We're going to need a bigger picnic table.


Great-Uncle Mike fed Gracie a bite of Mincemeat pie....she pretty much made the same face the rest of us would have. GROSS!


Poor Oliver, he doesn't have a chance around these girls.


"Mom, I think I've got him pinned!"


Gracie cheering for the Huskers on Friday.


Maggie's winning Turkey got a whole page ad in Friday's paper. She was so excited to see it. If you ask her about her turkey she'll tell you she's the "Biggest Turkey in town." :)



Today we got our tree standing, it's not decorated, but it's standing. More christmas decor to come....

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SHE WON!!

Maggie won the Norfolk Daily News Turkey contest! She was so excited. She pretty much new she was going to win her age group, but she didn't know she was going to win the whole contest.

She also didn't know she was going to get a prize, so when I told her she won a $100 gift certificate to the mall she was really excited. She asked how much $100 was, Miss Lauren told her it would buy 100 slushies at Sonic....I wish I had a picture of her expression. Needless to say, I think she'll be spending lots of time considering how to spend her winnings.

She has lots of thank-yous to say for all the votes....I think everyone we know might have been casting votes. The last count we saw was 799....I'm hoping when we pick up her prize they will be able to tell us the total. Lots of people were a HUGE help....so Thank you!  One little girl is very happy. I'll keep you posted on what she comes up with for her winnings.

CHOCOLATE MILK!!

Baby Chocolate Milk has been missing for several weeks. We've searched our house and mom & dad's house several times looking for her...Yesterday, Maggie and Grandma opened a drawer and there she was! Maggie was SO excited to see her.

Saturday morning it was REALLY icy here. Arnie headed for basketball practice and the girls and I slid our way to Carly and JJ's to play for a bit. Then after basketball we all headed for Omaha.

Last night on the way home Maggie said, "I have a frog in my throat, but it's not the hopping kind." thank goodness for that!

Here are a few pictures from our weekend....


Maggie picked a snowman book for Grace at the book fair last week, apparently Grace likes it.



Next week when Grace gets her helmet, she'll have to move to a bigger car seat, so last week got Maggie new BIG girl car seats (so Grace could have the toddler ones). Maggie says she's "safer" in my car because I went with the pink seat. Daddy picked black and grey so that's not as "safe" or cute.  We are now the owners of 6 car seats...we could start a store.

Grace's new favorite trick. When she's done eating she likes to bite the spoon and just let it sit there.

"Mom, what is this??"  Maggie and JJ found these tapes Saturday and Maggie
had never seen one before.





Saturday night after we sang Happy Birthday to Daddy again, Maggie wanted us to sing
Happy half Birthday to her. That's right, she's 3 and a half!!!



Maggie and Grandma had quite the paper doll village built yesterday. That drawer in-front of
mom is where Chocolate Milk was hidden.

Happy Birthday Daddy!!

Birthday's are hard work!

There are presents that need to be wrapped....

 and cupcakes that need to be decorated!

Didn't she do good?

Last week Maggie told me she wanted to get daddy a John Deere tshirt for his birthday, so he could wear it when they were "tractoring". We went and bought it and then I told her she couldn't talk to daddy about John Deere for the rest of the week, because she might give away the secret. The next day on the way to school, as they went by the JD dealer, Arnie suggested she count the tractors, like they do most mornings and she quickly responded with, "Daddy, we're not allowed to talk about John Deere."



HAPPY BIRTHDAY DADDY!

 



yum, yum!! CUPCAKES are delicious!

 Apparently all Grace wants for Christmas is for someone to give Maggie some bubble wrap....
http://youtu.be/H0lkvCgwoKU

And Maggie is working on her singing career....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WASLeUuUTcg

Speaking of singing, tonight at dinner, Maggie told the waiter we had cupcakes at home for daddy's birthday...so then he brought a brownie sundae and all the waiters in the restaurant back to sing to Arnie :) he turned pretty red!

A moment to remember...

Maggie's 1st School Pictures

 

Yikes, next time maybe I better dress her in something a little more neutral.

Last year, Maggie was at school on picture day but she went running from the guy and told him that only her mommy takes her picture, so this was a HUGE improvment. The preschool director asked me if I'd do the pictures this year, I thanked her for asking, but told her that's not really what I do. Can you imagine trying to take pictures of 60, 3-5 year olds?? Gives me a headache just thinking about it!

Good for a laugh....

How come rolls aren't this cute on grown-ups???

my kids are going to kill me someday :)

A little bit of this and a little bit of that....

Yesterday, I overheard the following conversation- "Gracie, Mom says you're going to have a helmet. Don't worry I'll tell everybody your beautiful little head is under there." ...such a good big sister!

Maggie made a Turkey for the newspapers Thanksgiving contest. We decided it was going to be a little hard to mail, so we hand delivered it to the office yesterday....Maggie walked right in and told the woman at the desk she'd brought her a turkey. She seemed like such a big girl.

 Maggie and I made a pudding pie yesterday, it's one of Arnie's favorites. Maggie kept thinking of things she could add to "surprise daddy". We settled on Oreos, chocolate ships and sprinkles (instead of carrots, cheese sticks and half an apple.)

I know, you don't look at this and think....."Wow, that looks delicous!" BUT it is.  I was at Teri and Joe's Sunday taking pictures of their cute little family when I happened across a shelf of this stuff....Joe convinced me to take a jar (it's canned meat)....and last night I decided to give it a shot....well it made some AWESOME beef and noodles. Arnie and Maggie both loved it.  Maybe I'll just have to ask for the recipe.

Helmet Clinic??

Yesterday, Gracie, Arnie and I spent the morning at Children's Hospital, in the Helmet Clinic. The pediatrician recommended some time ago that we have Grace assessed there, but the clinic is only available a few hours a week so it took us a couple of months to get an appointment.  After meeting with a few different people, we made the decision to fit Grace's sweet little head for a (pink) helmet. The therapists assured us that while Grace didn't need the helmet for developmental or gross-motor reasons, when she was a teenager she would thank us for making her head a little more round. Grace's head is very wide across the back and is noticeable more flat on one side then the other.  We go back the Monday after Thanksgiving to get the helmet, and she will likely wear it for 3-4 months. 

When it was time to actually start the fitting process, they put this soft "cap" on her head and marked her ears.

Then they laid her in this machine, she didn't love it!

It was pretty cool, the machine has 4 moving cameras in it, they scanned her head and immediately an
exact likeness of her shape appeared on the computer screen.

 We keep hearing that it will be much harder for us to get used to then for her, it doesn't sound like most babies really mind their helmets.  In Gracie's case, we think she might like it, it will provide an additional layer of protection from BIG sister! I've really been dreading the idea of covering up her sweet little head, but I'm starting to come around.  I know in the long run it's what's best for her and she gets to have a break for a couple hours a day, so we'll still get to see all of her, sometimes.  Besides, I think Maggie and I can come up with some creative ways to decorate the helmet.  I need to find a cute stocking hat, send it to Uncle Evan and have him wear it for a few days to stretch it out good :)

As you can see, it didn't take Grace long to recover and be back to her normal happy self....
http://youtu.be/77ApOUGko4I

Here are a few other pictures from the last couple of days...

Unlce Jeff gives her a carrott...

....and Aunt Trisha gives her ice cream....hmmmm wonder who she likes better!

Ellie got a birthday present in this box and then Maggie & Alex played with it for a couple of hours.

Yesterday, Maggie helped Grandpa frame a few window.