Hey Delilah

My friend Paige brought Elliot over for a Princess playdate last week in an effort to exhaust the girls and give Taylor an opportunity to show off all of her new Christmas loot. And it was also a perfect opportunity for Luke to put the moves on Miss Delilah, who may have been the first lady ever to reject my son's flirtatious advances.

Smart girl, playing hard to get. But she'll come around. We ladies always do.

An epic Christmas

As anticipated, we had a fabulous Christmas. Let me rephrase that – We had the best Christmas ever. Now that we are a blessed family of four, and now that Taylor is old enough to really enjoy Santa Claus and unwrapping presents, Chris and I were in heaven just sitting back and watching our children’s big blue eyes light up and pure happiness radiate through their smiling faces as they tore paper off their new treasures.

Taylor received quite a few costumes and other glittery, magical toys from family:

Luke scored big with lots of new boy-toys:

And, of course, my baby boy ate his fair share of wrapping paper:

Santa was gracious enough to slide down our chimney, stuff all of our stocking full of goodies and leave the Princess her coveted ballerina doll and Luke got a firetruck.

And then we opened gifts from our family of four, ending with Taylor squealing in delight when Chris brought in her fancy Princess scooter from the garage:

It was perfect. And I truly hope that all of you had as much love and joy swirling through your house and hearts as we did. Happy Holidays!

An early Christmas with Santa - Um, I mean Grandma & Grampy

Chris’s parents made a long-detour from Texas to come to Asheville for a few days on their way up to Northern Wisconsin to celebrate the holidays, spending three straight days spoiling and smooching on their grandchildren. And their visit was a total treat for Chris and I as well, not only to have family in town, but allowing us to take advantage of the free-babysitting that grandparents generally pride themselves on, and giving us the opportunity to finish up our Christmas shopping and partake in such luxurious activities as taking naps and watching football games without having to switch to cartoons during commercial breaks.

And because it is so close to Christmas, and because our tree was about to tip over with all the presents they brought to put underneath it, we let Taylor and Luke open up a few gifts from their Grampy and Grandma, allowing Greg and Sue the pleasure of seeing the kids erupt in pure joy and excitement as they ripped the paper off their new, favorite treasures.

And Chris and I were just expecting Luke to have zero interest in the toys beneath the shiny, crinkly paper that they were wrapped them, as Taylor was so preoccupied with the bows and wrapping at his age. So imagine our surprise when Luke went absolutely bonkers for the first toy he opened. It probably had something to do with it being a huge truck, especially since, up to this point, he had been playing with all of the Princess’s hand-me-down pink, plastic toys.

Y’all, if you could have seen him in action you would have died laughing. He was whooping like a bird and bouncing up and down on the seat of his truck. And when Chris tried picking him up off of it, he screamed and held on so tight he actually lifted the monster-toy off the ground. It was hilarious. He’s very happy about his new macho toy, and I think it’s rubbing off on him.

So while their visit was short, it was packed full of fun. As hard as it is for us to be so far away from our families, especially during the holidays, it is equally as hard for them as well. And I like to remind both my parents and Greg and Sue that now that we are nearly nine years removed from the Midwest, Chris and I, and now Taylor and Luke, have come to savor every second spent with family, and we fully realize that it’s not about the quantity of time we spend together as it is about the quality of the visits. And this was a truly wonderful visit. And it was the perfect preview for the fabulous Christmas weekend ahead of us.

Doctor doctor. Gimme the news.

Eight months old

The most beautiful baby boy in the entire world is eight months old.

I mean, COME ON! How on earth am I ever going to be able to say No to this precious little person? When he stares at me with those blue eyes and then cracks a huge two-and-a-half-tooth grin, it is physically impossible for me to not grab his chubby cheeks and try to put his big bald head in my mouth. If this kid would start sleeping through the night, I’m pretty sure he would qualify as the most perfect baby ever created.

Yes, we are still working out the kinks in the sleeping department. And I’ll blame teething and colds and whatever else I can come up with, but what it boils down to is that as chilled-out and happy as Luke is during the daylight hours, when it’s time to sleep he just wants to be in MY arms. And while I adore my son and realize that at some point he’s not going to want to be rocked to sleep, I AM EXHAUSTED. And no expensive undereye cream or concealor can mask the overtiredness that has taken over my body. But THANK GOD! for my borderline-unhealthy addictions to coffee and exercise-induced endorphins, and for my ever-tolerant and helpful husband. Otherwise I would have totally hit the wall by now.

So during the time spent when the sun is up, we are having a blast watching Luke’s little personality develop. He is just so happy, and when he gets really excited he whoops like a bird, swings his arms in the air and bounces up and down on his tush so enthusiastically you would think there was a pot of gold in front of him. But it’s just a plastic ring entertaining him, or a glimpse of his big sister running through the room, or a little roly-poly time on the carpet with Ruby.

Something that is sure to put him in a delightful mood is his bath. And now that he is so stable sitting up, we just let him freestyle in the tub without a baby-bather. And he’ll just sit there and pump his arms up and down and up and down in attempts to pop all the bubbles and splash every drop of water out of the tub. It’s adorable. But you just need to make sure you’re at a reasonable distance if you want to get pictures.

Playtime is getting more and more fun for Luke, as he is totally content just sitting in the middle of his big, soft blanket with a bunch of toys surrounding him. We’ve tried bribing him with every shiny, plastic thing in the toybox to get him to crawl, but as soon as he flips over onto his back he just starts doing the happy carpet-dance and forgets all about getting onto all fours. And as anxious as I am for him to reach that milestone, I am totally fine with him waiting until after the Christmas tree is gone before going mobile. Because cleaning fistfuls of pine needles out of a baby’s mouth sounds pretty awful.

But he will crawl eventually. And I also know that at some point he is going to sleep through the night. And somewhere down the road he’s going to be too big for me to wrap my arms around his soft, warm body and snuggle in the rocking chair in the wee hours of the morning. So I need to enjoy these baby-moments – His smiling and shrieking and splashing, because when he’s grown, these are the things that I’ll miss the most, and NOT the sleeping. And no matter how old he gets, he will always have my heart wrapped around his finger, and I will never ever be able to frown at him while he’s looking at me with those big, blue eyes.

Hark! Taylor's preschool class sings

For the past few weeks our house has been buzzing with the selected Christmas carols that Taylor’s class was chosen to sing in her first-ever preschool holiday program. Each day at school, Miss Kim and Miss Kay would go over the lyrics, melodies and adjoining spirit-fingers for about five songs with all the kids, and each afternoon when I picked up Taylor, she would belt out the tunes in the backseat our entire ride home. DECK da halls wif foughs of bally, FAH-WAH-WAH-WAH-WAH! WAH-WAH-WAH-WAH!

And the night before the big event, the Princess was SO excited that she was buzzing through the house squealing, TOMORROW! TOMORROW IS MY CONCERT! And after putting her to bed over and over and over and OVER! again, she finally fell asleep at 10:30 that night, only to shoot out of her bed like a bullet at seven the next morning, all jazzed to put on her super special Christmas dress and get to school to get the party started.

So it really was no surprise that by the time the noon concert started, Taylor was a total wreck. And even though she looked like she could fall asleep at any minute, she was still the most beautiful Christmas angel I had ever seen.

She totally rocked Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, but by Silent Night you could tell she was exhausted. Here she is giving the business to one of her chipper classmates:

And she was hardly fazed by a surprise appearance by Santa Claus:

But after a quick refreshment break after the show, she was sugar-buzzed and ready to be festive and merry with all of her classmates again.

Did y’all catch that above? Notice Miss Elliot’s dress? Yep, without knowing what Taylor was wearing, Elly-bean went shopping with her GiGi and, of all the dresses, she picked out the exact same pink-fluffy design as her best buddy. How adorable is that?

In fact, the entire concert was adorable. All these little, dressed-up kids screaming the holiday classics at the top of their lungs. It was fabulous, and probably one of the more entertaining things I had ever seen. And I am thrilled that we are now able to add it to the ever-growing list of holiday traditions and happenings for our family.

Here comes Santa Claus

We attended the Bound family’s rocking Christmas party last night, with an extra bit of holiday cheer included: A special appearance from the big guy, himself – Santa Claus.

And I’m happy to report that this is the first year that the sight of a real-live Santa Claus didn’t scare the bejeezus out of Taylor. In fact, she was totally awestruck. And this is pretty much the expression she held on her precious face the entire time he was at the party:

So Santa was sweet enough to bring each of the kiddos a little gift:

And then also read them all a Christmas book. And, only in Asheville, would Kris Kringle remind all the little children the importance of recycling during the holidays.

And then came the big Tah-dah! – Being able to sit on Santa’s lap and ask him what you wanted for Christmas. And Taylor showed no fear, as she climbed up onto him and quietly asked him, face-to-face, for a ballerina doll.

And after she told me what she asked for, I was all, A Ballerina? Really? And she said, Yes, Mama. Santa said he bring me a ballerina doll that I can name and dance with. Which is good to know, considering this Santa hasn’t done ANY Christmas shopping yet.

And then, just for kicks, I introduced Luke to Father Christmas:

Classic. We had to get a Screaming-baby-on-Santa’s-lap picture for our collection. Like I said earlier, this was the first time Taylor didn’t scream or run away crying from Santa. So I’m glad at least one of my kids won’t get a stocking full of coal this Christmas.