Christmas 2012

We started Christmas Eve with our usual tradition of the kids opening up their holiday PJs.  I must say that I didn't do as good of a job finding matching PJs this year.  For some reason it is nearly impossible to find matching pjs for an infant, girls and a boy.  I could find PJs for an infant and girls, but not a boy, or I could find PJs for girls and a boy, but not an infant.  In the end, my friend KL told me to just get matching colors because no one really cared except for me!  So I got blue snowflake PJs for all the girls and I got blue polar bear ones for Eli.  And he actually noticed the difference!  I had to reassure him that the colors matched perfectly, so then he was ok.  Next year I'll have to look harder. But they still looked very cute!

For us, we can't open Christmas presents right when the kids wake up in the morning because we have to wait for my parents to wake up.  They are night owls, so they usually aren't out of bed until 10am or so.  We promised the kids they could wake them at 9am on Christmas morning though.

J woke up early and made the kids a Rudolph breakfast with pancakes and bacon.  So cute!

Usually we just rip right through the gifts, but this year we decided to open gifts in a more organized and civilized manner.  We let the kids take turns opening up gifts so that they could take their time and really know who gave them the gifts.  Since the kids had way more gifts than we did, we would let them go a few rounds and then we'd have them take a break so the adults could have a turn.  It was difficult for the kids to wait their turn and it took a long time to open gifts, but I think it was better this way.  Sometimes we miss reactions to certain gifts, so I liked doing it this way better.

This year was really all about Evie.  She's at that age where everything's exciting...she has no expectations...so she couldn't believe she could open this many gifts!  She just got right into everything and was so excited about every gift.  I love this age!  Don't get me wrong, Elina and Eli were excited too, but there's just something about Evie's pure enthusiasm.

This year Santa got each kid exactly what they asked for.  If you can believe it, Elina asked for a pocket knife!  Her best friend AM had one and brought it on our last trip to the River so she wanted one too.  I asked her what the knife was for and she said that she and AM wanted to start a company whittling toothpicks out of branches.  How funny, right?  Eli asked for a Nerf gun and Evie asked for a new baby doll.  B said that this year Santa promoted knives and guns.  Oops!

Here were some of the gift highlights: Evie got lots of baby doll stuff, a cupcake set, and a CD karaoke player (since she loves to sing).  Eli got spy stuff, dino stuff, and a plasma car (which has been the biggest hit, especially on our hardwood floors!).  Elina got spy stuff, teaching stuff (for Learning Tree), a Crayola Light Designer, and a license plate game (because she's determined to find all the US license plates).

Here's our annual wrapping paper mess picture...of course Eulee has another frowny face.  I think she doesn't like the "Cheeeeeese!" song the kids sing when they take a group picture.

For Christmas dinner, we had yummy hot pot.

We had our annual gingerbread house contest a little late this year.  I just couldn't get my act together...plus, we thought it would be more fun with more family around.  Boy, were we right!  I think from now on we're going to have to wait for all the family to arrive to do the contest.  It was SO much fun!  Granted, I didn't get to participate because I was nursing the baby, but I did get great pictures of everyone in action.

We had 6 teams--Eli and J, Uncle D (Aunt A's fiance), Aunt A and Evie, Aunt A and Elina, Ah-Gong and Ah-Ma, and B.  I was supposed to be B's partner, but Eulee decided that wasn't a good idea.  Aunt A was working double time, helping both Evie and Elina.  She mainly helped Elina build her base and then she worked with Evie.

Eli mostly supervised J's work.  For some reason he was feeling tired and didn't want to participate as much, but he did enjoy watching J work.  When she finished, he sweetly said, "It's just how I imagined it would be!"

We were very impressed with Ah-Gong and Ah-Ma's work.  Ah-Gong was very detail-oriented, even cutting notches into his graham crackers to make it more stable.

Evie was all about putting on layers and layers of candy (while eating a whole bunch).  She didn't care that all the candy would create too much weight.  Her house started caving under all the candy.  But at least she was happy!

Elina was very thoughtful about candy placement.  It took her a long time, but it came out really well!

B had his own ideas about his gingerbread house.  He wanted to create this 3 story castle, but in the end it couldn't stay up that way.  Especially since he wanted to cover the top with icing and then he wanted to melt the icing with a hair dryer!  He was going for technique, I guess.  But the whole thing started to melt, so he ended up with just one level and a chimney.

Uncle D had lots of problems making his house stay up.  He had to put his base back together numerous times.  I mainly blame Parents magazine for this.  Usually I make an icing to serve as the glue, but this year Parents magazine suggested using peanut butter.  Wrong!  Totally doesn't work well, folks.  Don't try this at home.  The peanut butter just got too soft.  Lesson learned.

I made awards for everyone and used Evie's new CD karaoke machine to announce the winners.  We had each team run up and give everyone high fives as they came up to get their awards.  It was SO funny!

Here was the outcome: (there's one less house in the picture below because as soon as I snapped a picture of Uncle D's house, he immediately bit into it!)

Best Chimney--B

Best First-Timers--Ah-Gong and Ah-Ma

Best Decorations--Elina (since she worked alone doing the candy part)

Best Roof--Eli and J

Best Effort--Uncle D (for having to rebuild so many times)

Best Landscaping and Greenest Lawn--Aunt A and Evie

So glad we can have fun with so much family on Christmas!  As Eli said, "This was the best day ever!"

Holiday Happenings

I had to begin this post with our BEST Santa picture EVER!  Look at this...all the kids are looking and the older ones are smiling.  I LOVE IT!  Ok, now let's move onto what this post is really about.

Every year we use a countdown-to-Christmas calendar and each day there is a different activity for the kids to do.  This year....the activities...ehhhhh....were few and far between.  I blame it on Eulee and her quest to make me sleep-deprived.  I wasn't quite as fun as my usual self this holiday season because of the whole new baby thing.  Of course, the only kid to notice was Elina.  She knew I wasn't up-to-par. She'd change the advent calendar and ask, "How come there's no activity for today?"  And I'd give my usual response, "Oh, sorry, Mommy's been really tired."  I can't wait until next year when I will have my act together....hopefully.

Anyway, we did some of our usual things...made homemade ornaments, had picnics while watching holiday movies...decorated the bedroom doors...saw Christmas lights in PJs while drinking hot cocoa...

decorated sugar cookies... (FYI, Eli drew a picture of Santa on the sleigh-shaped cookie)

saw Santa...(I love how Santa looks when he's talking to the kids...and I love how Eli is whispering in Evie's ear, telling her what to say)

One of my favorite ones each year is "Write a family member a love note and leave it under his/her pillow."  The kids really spend time writing these notes.  And for some reason, this year they chose to write a note to me.  B kept asking them, "What about me?"  

This year we also rode the North Pole Flyer out of Austin.

It was pretty fun because we got to see Santa and Mrs. Claus while riding a real train.  The kids had a blast, but B wasn't as impressed.  He said it could have been more Christmas-y.  For example, the cookies they handed out were snickerdoodles.  B wanted to know what was Christmas-y about that.  He would have preferred Christmas-themed sugar cookies.  Plus, Santa took pics with the kids, but he didn't ask any of them if they had been good and what they wanted for Christmas.  But at least the kids loved the whole thing!

The other new thing we did was Breakfast at a Beastly Hour at the zoo.  We did the holiday one with the rhinos. It was so much fun!  First we had breakfast, then we decorated boxes for the rhinos.  We went into their pen (while they were away) and all put out our boxes and put food inside them.  Then they let the rhino out to eat the food.  It was a little anti-climactic because the rhino didn't really eat any of our food. He was just checking things out, but not really eating.  The zookeeper told us that since there was so much new stuff in the pen, he'd probably need all day to check things out in order to eat.  Oh well.

They made it up to us by letting us touch the rhino afterwards!  It was amazing.  They are so much bigger than you think.  And the skin is tough, but soft.  We loved the whole experience! (In the pic below Eli is also holding a rhino horn.)

We've also been having lots of fun with our new fire pit.  We drink hot cocoa, roast marshmallows and the kids explore the backyard in the dark.  It's been great!

It's been such a fun holiday season!

4 Months Old

Eulee is now 4 months old!

Weight: 14 lbs 10.5 oz (75th percentile)

Height: 24" (50th percentile)

Head: 16.25" (50th percentile)

And here's what is going on with Eulee--

She is definitely awake and alert more often during the day now.  She loves to smile and coo.  Her laughs are still harder to get.  Her coos are longer and louder strings of sounds.

She loves to suck on her pointer finger.

She still despises tummy time.

She started sitting in the Bumbo!  And now she's not a fan of her bouncey seat.  I think mostly because it's reclined.  She loves to push her head forward to try to sit up, so I think she doesn't like to lean back as much now.

She has the most awesome hair ever...without hair product.

She holds her hands together a lot, like she's mulling things over. (The way she has her hands in the Bumbo picture above.)

She stops crying when she sees one of us walking toward her.

She takes pretty good naps during the daytime, but she also only takes naps at nighttime!  To our dismay, she doesn't sleep through the night yet.  She likes to wake at least 2 times in the middle of the night.  We are reaching our limit.  Fortunately, we've gotten the "ok" from our pediatrician to begin sleep training.  Merry Christmas, Eulee!  After looking over Eli and Evie's stats at this age, I can't feel guilty about letting Eulee cry it out.  Eulee is the same weight and almost the same height as Evie when she was 9 MONTHS!  We trained Evie around 3-4 months, so I know that Eulee can do this if we just teach her.  There are going to be some sleepless nights for us, but it will be worth it if Eulee can learn to sleep.  I think she will be such a happier baby once she can do this on her own....we will be happier as well!

 Happy 4 months, Eulee!  

Eli is 5!

Look at our happy 5 year old!

Weight: 36 lbs 9 oz (25th percentile)

Height: 41" (10th percentile)

Eli is such a cheerful, happy-go-lucky boy.  To him, life is just about having fun without a care in the world.  We love his spirit and his curiosity.  But sometimes that curiosity is what gets him into trouble.  For example, the time he got bitten by the assassin bug.  Or when he decided to rub his finger across the scissor blades (thank God he didn't cut himself!).

He's always quick to give out hugs, kisses and snuggles.  He was also the first one to really love on the new baby.  He didn't even care that he didn't get a baby brother...he immediately embraced Eulee.  That's just who he is.  He says things like, "I just love her soooo much!"

He started liking so many different things this year (although dinosaurs still top the list)....ninjas, martial arts, spies, swords, pirates, and insects.

Now that Eli is 5, he wanted to write out his own "favorites list."  I was quite impressed.  It took 2 sittings to complete it, but I was happy he wanted to do it.

Here is a translation--

Favorite animal: tiger

Favorite color: gold

Favorite book: Predators by John Seidensticker (it's funny how our kids tend to pick these type of non-fiction books whenever we let them pick anything they want at a bookstore!)

Favorite activity: camping

Favorite food: mac n cheese (although A says it looks like he wrote the word "mariachis")

Favorite drink: Sprite

Favorite restaurant: Red Robin (he loves their mac n cheese, plus there are lots of tvs around)

Favorite show: (this one was a tie) Jake and the Neverland Pirates and any Jeff Corwin show (he loves watching nature shows and this is his all-time favorite right now...he thinks that Jeff Corwin has the "coolest tools" to catch snakes.  He even asked me, "How did Jeff Corwin get his job?"  He wants to do the same kind of stuff when he gets older.  It's so cute!)

Favorite movie: Cars 2

Favorite dinosaur: Giganotosaurus

Favorite piece of clothing: PJs (this guy is all about comfort...he would stay in these all day if he could...I wonder if I'm rubbing off on him?)

When I grow up, I want to be: a bug explorer (I guess he's not deterred by the assassin bug bite...good for him!)

Happy 5th birthday, Eli!  We love you!