Digging Out . . . and an anniversary

Maybe one of these days I'll get to a post on our wonderful Christmas, and our busy December, but probably not tonight. I will however write about our record 20.2 inches of snow we got on Christmas!! We left a day early, to get to my parents in time before the blizzard hit, then were snowed in at their house for a few days with my whole family. It was nice and cozy! Our neighbors called us to tell us how much snow we got, and that the snow drifts were covering 3/4 of all our doors, so there was no way we would even get in our house. In the past, when we have been gone and gotten lots of snow, our neighbors would snowblow for us so we could get in our house. This time, not even a snowblower would do the job, so Monte called someone in town with a loader to clear the snow out before we got home. Our normally 4 hour trip back to our place from my parents took about 5 and a half hours, due to icy roads. Then, we got more wind, and it took Monte 5 hours to snowblow our driveway the next day!

Also, as of today, Monte and I have been married for 7 years! (A couple of pictures from our wedding day are located here.) The three of us celebrated by going out to eat at our favorite restaurant tonight. Then Monte and I played our usual nightly game of Scrabble, a great night!

What we've been up to

What I've been up to - making yummy Christmas goodies (and probably gaining 10 pounds in the process!) . . .

What Isabella's been up to . . .

This and That

It's officially winter here. We had a snow storm on Tuesday, and the temperature has been near or below zero almost all week. I've made it out a few times this week while Monte has been home to watch Isabella, but she hasn't set foot outside the house all week, other than the holy day Mass on Tuesday. I'm pretty sure she was going a little stir crazy, and that that was the cause of her crabbiness a couple of days ago. So we went out on a fun family night last night. I hyped it up to her, and kept telling her we were going on a date with Daddy, and she was SO excited! We went out to eat, made the weekly Wal-Mart trip, with an addition of going to Target, and then drove around for quite a while looking at Christmas lights. It was a perfect Friday night in my book. I was hoping she would sleep in a little today, since we didn't get home until 9:00, which is a little over an hour past her bed time, but she didn't, and I'm not surprised since that's how it usually works . . .



I have some Christmas gifts I want to make, I should probably get on that since it's two weeks away! The only thing I can cross off my list so far is a baby doll blanket I made for Isabella. She is SO into baby dolls, I love it! We got her this doll for Christmas, and let me tell ya, I would have LOVED this doll when I was a little girl. Here's the description of it from the website - "Now your little girl can tend to her very own baby doll - as adorable and lifelike as a real baby. This interactive doll breathes, takes naps, cries and features realistic facial movements. When you give the baby doll the pacifier, her mouth makes sucking movements and her eyes blink. When you remove the pacifier, the baby doll coos. The baby doll cries when she is put down. When you feed her, she gets tired and falls asleep." I was going to make some cloth diapers for the doll that Lenetta linked to a while back, but I think I'll wait on that until she gets the doll, so I know for sure what size to make them.



I love to bake, and every year I bake all of the Christmas cookies and candies for our Christmas with my family, this tradition started before Isabella came along, by the way. So far I've made a triple batch of Peanut Blossoms, Peanut Butter Bon Bons, and Kringla, I've got a ways to go. I have a new recipe I want to try this year - Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Truffles, they sound heavenly!!



I had a great girls night out with some friends on Thursday night while all the kiddos (except the littlest babies) stayed home with their dads. There were 12 of us all together, storming the aisles of Target (until 10:30!) together after our supper together. A couple of months ago we raised money to buy Christmas presents for 3 young siblings from our local sharing tree. So we did the shopping for them on Thursday night, it was so much fun to pick out things for them, especially when you know they don't have much, and they wouldn't have had any presents otherwise. It inspired me to pick someone for our own family, too. I explained it to Isabella, that some parents can't give their kids any presents, and she was excited to help pick out things, though I don't know for sure how much she understands, she seemed to get it.



My mom was supposed to come visit us for most of last week, but that didn't happen, due to the snowstorm. I was so bummed! Hopefully, weather permitting, she can come this week instead.



Next weekend we'll be having our Christmas get together with Monte's parents, then we're off to my parents for Christmas.

Monte and I have been playing Scrabble every night after Isabella goes to bed, we are addicted! I forgot how much I love playing board games in the winter!

Light through the window

Isabella's sleeping habits have changed a little in the last couple of weeks. She's always been pretty predictable about getting up at 7:30 every morning. Now she's getting up at 6:30 instead, bummer. I'm hoping it's a phase. She's a kid that can pretty much be talked into anything, so I thought I would try something. I told her that she can not call for Daddy (he has to go in and get her, since she won't get out of her bed) until she sees light coming through her window, and that if she doesn't see any light coming through, that means it's still night time, and she can't get up. She said okay, but I really thought this was one thing she couldn't be talked in to. When the next morning came, I heard her rustling around in bed at 6:30, and talking to her stuffed animals, but she did not call for Daddy until 7:00. When he went in to get her, she said, "Daddy, I see a little bit of light through my window!" It was definitely hard to see, but yes, there has been the teeniest, tiniest, amount of light coming through her window now when she calls for daddy. :)

A Little Lady

Downsizing

When we moved to our house, we inherited a huge Christmas tree from my parents. It's a beautiful tree, but it takes hours to put together (which is why my parents didn't want it anymore). I don't mind putting it together, I love Christmas decorating. Now that we have a piano, our space for the tree is limited, as we used to put it where the piano now is. I still put the tree together this year, and soon realized it looked ridiculous anywhere we tried to put it. I felt like it was overtaking our house. So I made a trip to Wal-Mart and got a cheapo, skinny tree, and we love it. It's perfect for our little house. Isabella had a blast "helping" me decorate. All the ornaments ended up on the same branch, which I evenly distributed later. This time of year is so much fun, she really understands what's going on this year. She loves reading about baby Jesus, singing Christmas songs, and of course the Dora Christmas DVD Grandma gave her is quite exciting as well. :)



BTW, these posts are in random order, this was before she got her hair cut.

Praying with the babies

The other day, Isabella was playing with her babies (which is about ALL she does lately), she put them to bed in their crib, and then said they couldn't go to sleep without saying their prayers. She then said all the prayers I always say with her before nap and bed time.

First Haircut

On Monday morning, I took Isabella to get her first haircut. My mom has trimmed her hair once, and I've trimmed it once, but she's never had a professional cut before. She thought it was really neat to get her hair cut, she was just chatting away with the beautician the whole time! After the haircut, my mother-in-law came down for the day to join us for a day of shopping. It was SO much fun. Isabella just walked beside grandma and held her hand the whole time. At one point a lady came up to us, and started chatting with Isabella. Then, as were were leaving the mall, the same lady came and told Isabella since she was such a good girl, she had something for her. She gave her a magnetic Nativity set. How sweet - a random, sincerely nice person.