Christmas Break

Well, the year is drawing to a close and so is our Christmas break... it has been a great and an eventful couple of weeks, especially for one member of our family. Evelyn is frequently the perpetrator of acts of mischief but this week she took initiative not to commit daring deeds, but to potty train herself. She just decided one day to voluntarily go pee on the potty and the rest is history. I haven't had to change a diaper in almost a week now! There have been a couple little slip ups, but so far, this has been my easiest potty train yet!

One of our friends had done this cute little thing with her daughter last year at Christmas to give up her bottles (or soothers, I can't remember which...), and we had planned on doing the same this year, although with both bottles AND soothers. The plan was for Evelyn to go cold turkey... wrap up her bottles and pacifiers and put them out for Santa so that he could take them to a new little baby who needed them. In exchange, Santa would leave her an extra present. We talked about it with her in the weeks leading up to Christmas and she agreed to it. I was a little bit scared that we would have some sleepless nights until she got used to it, but Evelyn has been amazing! She has asked once or twice for her "ooshies" (soothers) but we stayed strong and she has all but forgotten about them now. I am relieved and sad at the same time. So proud of her for being such a big girl, but so emotional about my last baby growing up!

So! Some stuff we have done over the break...

Breakfast with Santa at a local berry farm... Evie and Mylie waiting to see Santa pull up:

Eating our pancakes with stewed blueberries on top!

Laina, Mylie and I went ice skating with friends to a winter wonderland theme thing...

There are a lot of things about this picture that I want to make excuses for.... the way Mylie has let the headband fall down over her bangs, the fact that they are wearing white tights under their skirts but with knee socks over... the way Mylie is pushing her tummy out and squinting... but Adam took this picture of them while I have having a Mommy time-out (ie. the kids were pissing me off, so I had to go to my room and take deep breaths until I was back in control) These were their Christmas outfits from Gap:

Christmas Morning!! Matching Carter's jammies

Evie with the thing she asked Santa for... a Winnie the Pooh stuffy

Love the look on Evie's face here... she was just so excited opening all her presents this year!

Laina got a Karoke machine from my mom... that should drive me crazy...

Sitting down to dinner... is it tradition for everybody else to wear the stupid paper crowns from the Christmas crackers?

This is Gigi... grandma to 10, great-grandma to 14! This was her first Christmas without my Grandad and we were all missing him...

My niece Jazzy enjoying her Christmas dinner

AAAAAANNNNND... if you made it this far, here is my first Valentine's project, haha, yep! I already am moving on to the next holiday!! This is a shirt, and yes, Evelyn is pants-less here... it looks like a short dress but isn't. I will probably make some leggings to go under this or maybe just put on some skinny jeans.

Updating...

I think about blogging a lot and wish that I did it consistently. I love looking back at the pictures and remembering all the little details of our daily life. Just things that you think you will always remember, but slip away without documentation. So here is a little attempt at an update rather than just waiting for a bunch of nice pictures to post.

What have we been up to? Much the same... my days are spent ferrying the kids from activity to activity and my evenings are spent watching TV with Adam or sewing up a storm. I just finished a large order for 15 aprons for a friend to give out as Christmas gifts, and surprisingly, despite sewing so many of the same item, I really enjoyed it, and think that aprons are something I might want to focus on when it comes time to open up an etsy shop with my sewing.

Evelyn is still very much a rule-breaker and mischief-maker... several of her exploits lately have involved food... we had to install a fridge lock on our refrigerator after she repeatedly helped herself to drinks of orange juice and milk by placing a sippy cup on the floor, then dumping the entire contents of the carton on top of the cup. The final straw came when Adam busted her gnawing on a half of a ham in her room after pilfering it from the fridge. She also had a little spell of climbing onto the counter in order to microwave food for herself (let's keep in mind here, she is only 2). When I caught her microwaving a banana in the skin, I asked her, "What the heck are you doing?" To which she replied, "warming it up" as if it was the most normal thing in the world. I guess I should just consider myself lucky that she wasn't microwaving something metal! She has since stopped trying to use the microwave after a very stern talking-to (although who am I kidding? She has probably just stopped for a short time in order to lull me into a sense of safety over the matter)

Mylie picked up a case of Hand Foot and Mouth disease from preschool which sounds much grosser than it is, but s extremely contagious. So she was quarantined from school for a week during which time she passed it to Evelyn and then Laina. So at prime Christmas shopping time, I had all three kids home and wasn't able to get out to shop without them!! Luckily my in-laws stepped into our den of contagion and gave us a break to get out and get some stuff done. Mylie managed to make it back to school in time to star as Mary in her preschool nativity play. Here she is with Joseph:

Laina has graduated to a big girl room... our neighbors offered us their teenage daughter's loft bed that came with a desk underneath which she desperately needed for doing homework uninterrupted. So now Mylie and Evie are sharing the room with the bunk bed, and Laina has her loft bed in the other room. Sounds pretty crazy allowing Evelyn to sleep in the room where I once caught her about to swing from the chandelier off the top bunk, but so far so good!

In crafty news, I punished myself by making and decorating sugar cookies today. Don't know why I continue to torture myself when I suck at it but I love looking at pretty cookies and cakes and keep thinking if I just keep trying I will eventually get better. Oh, and I enjoy eating them too...

I am also testing a new sewing pattern in 3 different sizes, so I should have some new pictures to share of those soon!

And random info: Mittens came in from outside today with half a forest stuck to her undercarriage. Like seriously, I have no idea how she got all this stuck in there, and it was thoroughly entangled! I had to cut some fur out just to get the biggest stick out from under there. How did she even walk to the back door like this? She was very confused and kept trying to chase the large stick in circles.