baby CLAIRE

We knew it was a girl, we knew we’d meet her on March 5 and we knew she’d be as cute as a button.  But the miracle of a new baby always takes your breath away.  Meet my little brother and sister in law’s little girl: Claire Marie

She’s beautiful!  Love the name, love her long toes and little nose, love that I see both Laura and Christopher in her.

Alexis has had some sniffles lately and a bad cough, so we decided to wait on bringing her up to the hospital for a couple days.  But I ran over that evening before heading to the SDSU men’s basketball game.  Laura was doing well, recovering from surgery.  Baby Claire was doing well too.  But what was the most fun to watch was how instantly Chris turned into a dad.  He seemed like a natural as he shushed Claire’s cries and already knew her likes and dislikes. 

Of course, Auntie Carissa is a pro with all the babies.  :o)  She told me I could come to her for pointers on being a good auntie!  LOL

These three photos below are my favorite – Christopher again demonstrating that Claire likes to be on her side.  This is the football cradle…

But… when baby’s hungry, touching the sides of her cheek leads to “rooting”… searching for food, that is.  Love this one of her trying to eat his hand!  And then there’s the milkshake… he’s actually gently wiggling her up and down in the next picture.  What a kook!

 

Uncle Brent is always a hit with the kids… which is true with babies too.  No fusses for him! 

Laura was in the hospital an extra day because of the c-section, so we were able to bring Alexis and Noah up after her cough calmed down a little.  Dzia Dzia got to introduce her to Baby Claire, but she seemed a bit shy to meet the little one, which I found rather interesting considering she loves her baby dolls lately.  I guess a living, breathing baby doll is a bit different.

Noah, on the other hand, was ALL ABOUT Claire.  He loved seeing her and wanted to be near her.  The only two things he cared about in that room were the water bottle Busha gave him and Baby Claire.

See above… water bottle in hand/arm.  This was just as everyone was saying, “water, water, WATER!” And then it poured out of the bottle and onto the floor! LOL Stinker!

Stairtop Reading

The kids love reading.  And they’ll apparently do it anywhere!  I found them perched on top of the staircase this afternoon with a stack of books beside each of them.  I was cleaning the living room so it worked out rather well.  And before I knew it they were laughing and reading to each other.  Precious!

(That’s right! I’m only about a month behind in posts now! Just wait until you see the addition to my brother’s family! She’s a real sweetheart!)

Mommy’s Snowman!

Snow! We got snow, finally!  There was enough for Bill to finally fire up his snow blower.  It worked like a charm, of course.  But the kids still wanted to help out.  We got all bundled up in their snowpants – which I was proud of searching out and buying in like, NOVEMBER! They’d been just hanging there, as if they were saying “wear me.” But until today, there was no reason to!

We made snow angels!

Went down the slide!

And made a snowman!

Okay, I made the snowman while the kids threw snow at each other, but they still were proud and called it their own.  The snow wasn’t quite sticky enough to roll into a ball at first, so we used a mound the neighbor had plowed into our yard as a base and shaped that into the lower two balls first.  Then I was able to get a ball rolled enough for a head.

After about an hour outside, their cheeks were rosy enough to say we were done.  Neither one of them ever said it was cold or had problems with snow anywhere it shouldn’t have been!  Their mittens held up well and so did mine. I couldn't have asked for it to be any more fun!

Princess Alexis

Bill and I decided to surprise Alexis with a trip to see the Disney Princess production that came to town.  But I like keeping things a secret until the very last minute.  So, it was perfect that she woke up that morning and wanted to wear her Tangled Rapunzel dress.  Okay, she asks every day.  But today I got to say “Yes!” 

She pranced around the house in it for a little bit before I told her we were going somewhere special and that it was a surprise.  As we got her coat on, though, we couldn’t find Noah to say goodbye.  We were at the door when I turned around to find this:

He had gone up to Alexis’ closet, pulled out a dress he liked, went into the bathroom and grabbed a sparkly headband and put it on like a tiara.  He was ready to get dressed up as a princess too!  He’s going to kill me for posting this when he’s older, but even Dad thought it was hilarious!

Unfortunately, Noah couldn’t come with.  Alexis and I were off to see the princesses… but she still had no idea.  I told her in the car on the way.  Then, she had no idea what I was even talking about.  But when she saw the other girls in their princess dresses, she knew she was right where she was supposed to be.  We found our seats (after deciding against standing in the monstrous lines for drinks and over-priced souvenirs) and settled in for the show.  (It was extremely fitting that Auntie Carissa gave her a light-up ring from the jewelry store the weekend before!)

Mickey and Minnie Mouse, Donald and Goofy all told the story of three princesses, Snow White, Cinderella and Belle of Beauty And The Beast. 

Note to self – bring the “big” camera next time.  It was actually funny to see how many parents brought their digital cameras because when we were sitting up higher, all you could see was the lit-up screens of point and shoot digital cameras as parents recorded scenes from the show.

Alexis sat in awe as the actors on stage acted out Snow White.  Though, she DID NOT like the wicked queen – she told me over and over again and then some more after the show.  She’s never seen the movie ‘Snow White,’ so she wasn’t quite sure what to think about it at first.  But when Cinderella came out, she got the idea as she’s more familiar with that story.I knew Anna was bringing Mollie to the show and it wasn’t hard to find them… they weren’t too far from our seats.  So, for the second half of the show, Anna and I put the girls on our laps and we sat next to each other.  They basically had to be on our laps to see over the heads of the people in front of us, so it worked well. 

[Our news director got a kick out of this picture.  She says it looked like two KELO producers were put in a time machine and turned into 3-year-olds.  LOL!]

When it was all over, she seemed to have enjoyed herself, not to mention being ecstatic about wearing her princess dress! 

The Puzzle Master

Alexis is a wiz at puzzles. We’ve actually known this since we got her some wooden puzzles a few years ago. She learned how to put the fish in the right spots very quickly, so we figured she was memorizing them and turned the puzzle picture upside down. She STILL got them on the first try. So, for Christmas, she got a Disney Princess puzzle that had three levels of difficulty. Then all three puzzles come together to make one big puzzle.

She got the jigsaw puzzle concept very quickly and was putting together the largest pieced puzzle in no time. It was about two weeks before she was fluent in all three puzzle sizes. Time for some new puzzles!

A Little Bit Of Snow

January brought a little bit of snow but not enough to really have fun with.  We’ve been waiting to go sledding or something all winter.  So, when it got warm again, we went out and played in what *was* out there.  The kids found the most fun in just stomping around on the snow and hearing it crunch below their feet.

The wind was nice enough to drift a decent sized pile in the back yard near the play gym.  So, the kids found it fun to jump off the ridge into the snow below.

Then Daddy showed them how to throw snowballs, and apparently Mommy was a good target.  But their little fingers got cold so Daddy warmed them up with his hands.

And, yes, I take pictures of everything now trying to learn how to use my new camera.  Hope you enjoy it!  I hope in the future, the kids feel like they’re the ones who benefitted from it.  I look back at pictures now and they are what tend to spark my memories.  Otherwise, I don’t remember a whole lot.

She Can See!

When kids make faces at you, it’s adorable (most of the time).  But when ONE of your daughter’s eyes slowly turns into her nose while looking at you, it’s kind of freaky! 

Then we noticed it was happening a lot more often… and then other people noticed.  It kind of came on quick.  I immediately called the eye doctor and got her in.  It turns out she is very farsighted. 

I’m nearsighted. So, I’m not very familiar with what she can and can’t see.  The doctor says her vision is on the border of not being able to see near or far (combination of her mom & dad’s vision? – He sees far, I see near.  Perfect combo, right?).  So, basically she can see things in the distance, such as trees, but can’t see the details of the leaves.

Well, I noticed the “turn” the weekend before open enrollment closed, so I was able to add her to my vision plan, just in case (added Noah too – might as well, he’s probably next!) But her coverage on my vision plan didn’t begin until after the first of the year.  So we waited until then to order the glasses and save some money. 

It turned out they didn’t have any glasses small enough for Alexis, so they ordered in three frames (there were very few that even came small enough!) and went back to try them on and pick one out last week.  She picked out the “burgandy” ones.  Really, they’re a dark pink.  But Dad & I also agreed they fit her best.  Then, they just had to order the proper lenses to fit and got them finished up today… just in time for the weekend!  We rushed over before they closed and TA DA!

She’s had them for about three hours now and is doing a pretty good job of keeping them on.  She only took a few wobbly steps as we left the doctor’s office – OP! spoke too soon.  She just knocked her head into the piano bench.

Early reviews (through of a bad cell phone photo) are positive!

Now, I’m curious to see whether this helps her behavior.  I’m hoping a little that she’s been acting out in frustration of not being able to see.  Aww, come on, a mom can hope, right?

**PS: I’m still working on updating posts from August through December so keep checking back!  Hope to get some work done this weekend. I’ve also already taken 600+ photos with the new camera! So you have those to look forward to too!**