Christmas Break

Austin gets off 2 weeks for Christmas break so I took the time off from work and used up the rest of my vacation. I actually have to go back on Jan 2nd though. :-( I have tried to have a bunch of fun things for the us to do while we are off. So far we have gone to the Butterfly Wonderland, Zoo Lights, had a play date with Jaxson and McKenna, gone bowling and Build A Bear. I wanted to take Austin ice skating again, but the place we took her was closed and we decided to go bowling instead. I am hoping in the next two days we might be able to fit that in. ;-)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Christmas 2013

On Christmas Eve Austin and I baked and decorated cookies for Santa. I had bought the girls matching pajamas to wear and all I wanted was a good picture of both of them. Below is Luke's many tries. After we set out the cookie and milk for Santa and carrots for the reindeer we put the girls to bed and then the real work began. The girls were so excited in the morning to see the stockings and gifts Santa had left them (American Girl for Austin and a water table for Wesley). After opening all of our presents and breakfast we got ready to host Christmas. I made lasagna like usually and we had Luke's Mom, my parents, my brother and his girlfriend Lauren and Joseph, Jessica and Tanna over again. I really wanted to get a nice family picture and as you can see below no one was cooperating. Oh well, that is the story of my life. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

December update

The first part of December was quite busy for Luke and I. The first weekend ASU was in the PAC 12 Championship and they hosted it at Sun Devil Stadium. We were hoping for a win and a trip to the Rose Bowl..but maybe next year. While we were at the game, my parents took Austin to see the movie Frozen and when they came out of the theater they had a make shift ice skating rink set up. My Mom said Austin did really good and actually had great balance.

Wesley turned 15 months and had her well baby check. She is weighing in at 23lbs 10.5oz (81%) and 32.5 inches long (97%). The doctor told us we just need to work getting her off the bottle. She currently still gets 2 a day. One before nap and one before bed. Our goal is to work on the before nap one during Christmas break. Wesley has recently had a language explosion and is saying all kinds of words, Dada, Mama, Yaya, Siss, Up, Down, Hi, Drink, This, Shoes and Nana just to name the ones I can think of. She has become quite a terror when it comes to climbing on things. Nothing stops her! Wesley will be starting school/daycare in January 2 days a week. We decided to do a trial day to make sure the infant classroom was the right place for her. They said she didn't nap well, but she had a pretty good day. I on the other hand was a wreck. Wesley will be going to the same school as Austin, it will just be at a different location.

The next weekend was Luke and I's annual trip to Las Vegas for the WNFR. I felt last year was a bit of a bust because we brought Wesley and I was still nursing. I was ready to live it up this year. We had such a wonderful time with our friend's the Harney girls. We had a great time eating and drinking our way through Vegas. I only over did it on our last night there and this made for a miserable car ride home. While we were in Vegas, my parents took Austin up to the North Pole Experience again. I actually haven't gotten the pictures from my Mom yet, but I at least have the one below of them with Santa.

Like I had said in my previous blog, Austin picked out the cutest glasses. Almost a month later they were finally ready for pick up. As soon as Austin tried them on I noticed they were not the same frames she picked out. After another trip to the eye glasses place and another week gone by Austin has picked out another frame that will hopefully be here this week. Fingers crossed.

The other pictures below are from Austin's holiday concert at school. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

November Update/Thanksgiving 2013

Soccer finally finished for Austin and she had her end of the year party at a pizza place where they handed out trophies to everyone. Austin is not in any activities right now and I am not sure what we are going to sign her up for next. We finally made it to Austin's eye doctor appointment and sure enough she needs glasses. The doctor said there is a big difference between her two eyes and her left eye has started to get lazy because of it. He also said that he wanted to see her in 3 months and if the left eye is not getting any better she may have to wear an eye patch for a couple of hours in the evening. :-( Austin seemed pretty excited to be getting glasses and picked out the cutest frames...that was over a month ago and she still does not have the right frames. Austin's school did a Thanksgiving feast/play. Austin's line was "I wonder if their feast was as big as ours." I know this by heart because she practiced it over and over. Austin was off school the Wednesday before Thanksgiving and this is the day my Mom takes Wesley's to Kindermusik, so Austin and my Mother in law Sandy decided to tag along and they happened to catch this cute picture of them below. 

We "hosted" Thanksgiving this year, but my Mom did about 90% of the cooking. We had my parents and my step brother Joseph, his girlfriend Jessica and her daughter Tanna over. All in all is was a nice low key Thanksgiving. We normally wait until the Friday or Saturday after Thanksgiving to put up our Christmas Tree and all of our decorations, but with Thanksgiving later this year, I made Luke get everything down before Thanksgiving. Austin and I decorated the tree while Wesley was napping and I was a little worried with what Wesley was going to do with it when she woke up...but she never touched it. I actually had to tell Austin a time or two to leave the tree alone. I was so surprised because at this point Wesley is into EVERYTHING. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Santa 2013

While we were having the girl's portraits done at JCPenney's Austin asked if we could go see Santa. I was so surprised since last year she was freaked out by Santa and did not anything to do with him. When she saw him she ran up to him and gave him the biggest hug. I wish they would have taken that picture. We weren't sure how Wesley was going to react, but as you see below she was not bothered by him either.

 

Getting Ready for the Holidays

A few weeks ago I went on my last work trip for the year and man was is it a doozy. I flew Tuesday morning to Houston and was in Houston until Thursday evening and then I flew to Burbank (with a layover in Phoenix) and finally was home Friday afternoon. I could not wait to get home to see my babies and Luke. One of the things I thought about during my travels was how Wesley is almost 14 months old and I still have not gotten professional pictures taken with both girls. I thought I would go the easy and cheap route and just do a cute portrait shoot at JCPenney's. Man, why did I not learn my lesson from the first time I went there when Austin was 1 month old. I am sure if you look back at my blog I vowed never to return, and here Luke and I were on a Saturday morning with both girls at JCPenney's. I have learned my lesson and I am definitely not a portrait type person. Plus Wesley is just at the age where is next to impossible to get her to sit still or do what you want.

Since Thanksgiving is late this year, its throwing me off on everything. We decorated the Christmas tree today. I don't think we have ever had our Christmas tree up before Thanksgiving in my life. If I could have convinced Luke, I would have liked to have the Christmas lights up outside too.

The bottom pictures are Austin's class picture and school picture that finally came in. I felt that they waited a long time to take them and then it took a good month for them to come back. Austin is doing good at school, although she did get in trouble for the first time the other day. She got a little physical with another girl at recess. I was so upset about it that I could not even eat dinner that night. I worked from home the next day just so I could take her to school and talk to her teacher about what happened. Austin had been fighting a cold and so her teacher chalked it up to her being tired and not feeling well because it was so out of character. Although she did mention that Austin is still being bossy, but now she is being "stealth" about it and actually whispering her bossiness so the teacher cannot hear. I have to admit I do think that is pretty clever.

Wesley is wearing us all out! She is always on the move, into everything and climbs!!! She has had a terrible runny nose that just wouldn't seem to go away, but then we realized that she had cut two molars and is about to cut two more. She still is not talking a lot, but added "shoes" and I swear she was saying "up" today. She grunts and growls a lot. Luke said she sounds like a zombie.