Uncle DJ

This past weekend DJ came to visit and Hailee was so excited. The day before he arrived Hailee said "Tomorrow we are going to have two kids at our house." I was a little confused because at the time we weren't talking about DJ coming, so when questions who the two kids would be she said "DJ and me mom." Now it's been long thought that Hailee thinks her aunts, uncles, and grandparents come to the house just to play and entertain her, it was just so funny to hear it put that way. I guess they are in the "fun" or kid category and not the "mom and dad" category. She was thrilled when we picked him up from the airport and didn't leave him alone until we dropped him off.

Here she is teaching DJ how to play Sudoku. She couldn't believe that he had never played. She absolutely loves playing.

Saturday while DJ was here we decided to spend the day in Portland. First we went to OMSI (Oregon Museum of Science and Industry), a really fun educational museum. We went to the IMAX there. It was Hailee's first time seeing an IMAX movie. Watching her reactions was really more entertaining than the movie. The movie was really fun, but it was cute to see how big her eyes got while watching.

We ate at a fun downtown Italian restaurant. Hailee also convinced us she needed a baby penguin from OMSI.

Another fun new thing we did was ride the MAX, which is Oregon's light rail system. Hailee was so excited to ride every time. I like it because it is a nice relaxing way to get around downtown.

We finished the busy day going to a Portland Trailblazers game. It was so much fun to spend the time together. Hailee loved the cheering and getting popcorn.
On the way home after a busy day. She loved riding the MAX.

Breakfast time...

It has been a long standing tradition in our family that Hailee gets to decided what she wants to eat for breakfast. Usually it's something normal like cereal, eggs, toast, waffels etc..., but we have had the occasional macaroni and cheese, ice cream, or chicken nuggets. Today I was surprised that she wanted a tomato. Yep a whole tomato, which she ate the entire thing and then decided she wanted some toast as well. Funny girl, she loves tomatoes, but she usually eats them for lunch or dinner.

Tuesday Hailee started to get a little bit of a cold, nothing to serious, just a low fever, runny nose and a cough. Yesterday when we got home from running a few errands and going to the doctor she told me. "I wish no one ever got sick mom. Then we could always share cups." She likes sharing whatever anyone is drinking, but she knows when she is sick we try to not share germs, so no sharing cups.

The other funny conversation we had last week was after the break we dropped Todd off at work she asked me, "Why does dad always have to go to work?" I tried explaining to her that Todd went to work so we could have money for food, clothes, a place to live etc... To which she responded "Oh I hope he makes a lot of money today." When asked why she wanted that she said, "So he won't have to go to work tomorrow." Ahh wouldn't that be nice if it worked like that.

I just remembered one more funny conversation with Hailee. At my doctors appointment I had to go to the lab and while we were there the lady behind the desk let Hailee choose a sticker. Of course she picked out a Princess sticker. When the lady made a comment Hailee said...

H: I love Princesses
L: I do too, my niece used to like Princesses but now she likes Hannah Montana
H: Oh Hannah Montana, I hate Hannah Montana. She wears dresses that are too short.

I don't know where she came up with that, we've never had a talk on Hannah Montana modesty issues. It's amazing to me the things she pays attention to.

"It's kinda like dressing up mom"

Yeah...kinda. Add that to the list of things you don't want to hear out of your kids mouth. At least the pen was easy to get off in the bath. Hailee was a little confused when we asked her to wash it off. "But cats are beautiful too mom."

You kinda look like a snowman

I am officially pregnant. The other day when I wasn't feeling very good Hailee decided to color me a little picture. 2 minutes later this is what she brought me. It is a picture of her and I and a heart on the top, which she informed me meant love. How sweet. Then I noticed how round my tummy was to which she responded "Yeah, you kind of look like a snowman mom." Oh how lovely, but I guess from her perspective I am mostly tummy now.

This pregnancy has been quite different from the first one (at least from what I remember). But things seem to be going well. I can feel him moving around a lot more now. My favorite thing is when I switch from side to side at night he gets so annoyed and spends the next couple of minutes trying to get comfortable again. It will be so fun to finally meet this little one.

The other difference in this pregnancy is how sympatheic Todd has been. Last pregnancy Todd gained no sympathy weight. What a terrible husband. He is trying to make it up this pregnancy. I swear he eats his weight in chocolate every day. It's so funny to me because he is usually not a big chocolate eater, but now I can't keep enough in the house. It doesn't help that the smell of chocolate made me want to throw up in the beginning.

Hailee was so sweet to take this picture of me the other day. I'm 28-29 weeks here. I guess I do look kinda like a snowman, unfortunately I have almost 3 more months of growing to do.

8:30 Church

This is what 8:30 church looks like at our house. Really who decided that 8:30 church was a good idea. We just had 11:00 church and it was so lovely. I was so sad to remember last night that we had switch schedules and I had to set my alarm. I woke up and went to go get Hailee up. When I went in her room and started to wake her up she just kept saying.."No mom, let's just cuddle." I carried her into my room and put her in bed and started getting ready for church. A few minutes later I came back in to discover this sweet picture. It was quite a shame to have to get them out of bed the second after I took this picture. Agh! A whole year of 8:30 church, what is this little family going to do.

Christmas Eve

After a week and a half of snow (and no snow plows in our area) we hadn't had a lot of time to get out and finish our Christmas shopping. I was so glad to have a few hours in the morning to all go out together and get everything done. The roads weren't very icy thanks to a little bit of a break in the cold, but there was a lot of it on the roads. It's funny that I had to move to Oregon to use snow chains. I never even saw them used in Utah. But after a fun time shopping we were ready for Christmas. One of Hailee's favorite things is to go shopping with Todd and I for gifts for each other. She loves being in on the secret and I think it helps her not get too commercial. She still gets excited about getting toys, but she gets just as excited about giving presents. She loves picking out presents, wrapping, and watching us open them. She has gotten much better at keeping secrets.

The other thing we did on Christmas Eve was make cookies for Santa. Hailee had so much fun.

We made a great team, I frosted the cookies and she put the sprinkles on.
I loved how serious she was about the sprinkles. She knew exactly what colors she wanted where.

Before going to bed we read the Christmas story in Luke. When Todd was done Hailee said, "let's read another one of baby Jesus." After reading the account in Matthew she wanted another story. When Todd told her that was all the baby Jesus stories she said she just wanted a Jesus story. It was quite sweet.

Then it all that was left to do was leave the cookies and milk out for Santa and go to bed. Hailee said, "Mom how am I suppose to sleep?" As I was helping her to bed, I couldn't help but remember the days when it just seemed impossible to sleep. She was a little disappointed when I told her Santa wouldn't come if she was awake, he was hoping to see his sleigh. As she was going o sleep ever little noise would wake her up. "Oh, is that Santa" "No Hailee that is your dad feeding Roslynn." She was always a little disappointed to find out that it was usually Todd or Roslynn that were making the noises. After a million questions about Christmas she was finally on her way to dream land.

Family Traditions

So this is our first year to celebrate Christmas as our own little family. I have to say it was kind of weird to not be traveling, but after seeing the messy roads it was nice being home safe and warm. We decided that we would start establishing "our" family traditions. We have been deciding which family traditions we would be keeping, changing, or starting new.

One of my favorite family traditions is on the Eve of Christmas Eve (so the 23rd of December) we sleep under the Christmas tree. It's the night we get to play games, get new pajamas and then fall asleep in the front room watching a Christmas movie. I like spreading it out a little bit and it's always fun to add an extra day of celebration.

Hailee wanted to know if she could sleep "under" the tree like this. She thought that would be more fun. Once we got out her princess sleeping bag she was fine just sleeping so she could watch the movie. She did request the tree lights to be off (she always likes it really dark to sleep) once the movie was over and it was time for bed. My family used to keep them on all night.

We ate breakfast for dinner. This is one of Todd's family traditions. We did however change the night to be the night of our sleepover. It was a lot of fun, Hailee thought it was great to eat breakfast for dinner.

Hailee's new pajamas. Of course I tried to get her and Roslynn in front of the tree. After about 10 pictures this was the best we did. Dogs+a hyper 4 year old...not a good combination.

Hailee getting ready for the movie. I couldn't get the DVD player to work (ever since we got DirectTV it hasn't worked in the front room) and while I was waiting for Todd to see if he could get it working this was our conversation...

H: Mom how come it won't work?
N: I don't know Hailee I just can't get it to work, we need to wait for your dad.
H: Is it because you have a baby in your tummy?

I guess I've been blaming too many things on the baby. But then again maybe that is the reason I can't get electronics to work.

Hailee waking up to new snow in the morning she was so excited. "Dad get up it's Christmas Eve and it's snowing!" I have to say that if you would have told me we would have a white Christmas in Oregon I would have laughed out loud. Who has ever heard of this much snow here. The news said the last time it snowed like this was 1968.