Bye Bye Santa!

Not all of our Christmas season was spent in Texas.  We started at home and ended the year with family in Utah.  Here are snippets from the beginning and the end of the month.

On December 10 we went to Springs Preserve to check out their Holiday Express.  We are so glad we did!  We had a blast and hope to do it again next year.  Atticus loved the train and, even though he did NOT like Santa at first (anyone can see that from the photo!), Santa was all he could talk about for the next couple of weeks afterward.

Right before Atticus and I set out on our Texas adventure (see the previous blog post), we went and got a family photo shoot with the fabulous Heidi Brown.  We loved her and we LOVED the photos she took:

  

 

  

We love them all, but this one took the cake (and is now on our wall): 

Thank you, Heidi!

Right after we got to Utah, Atticus got to see his Aunt Trace and cousin, Kennedy again.  It had been a year but I think he still remembered them.  It was so sweet to see them both!

Sadly, Trace left just a few hours after we were able to see them, but we still had a great time.  

We spent Christmas Eve at the Maes home (Atticus even helped set up the luminarias!)

and we spent Christmas Day at the Brough home.  Here he is, showing off his Christmas stocking spirit and a couple gifts from his great grandparents. 

We even went to Thanksgiving Point a couple times.  Once to their new event, Luminaria (awesome but very cold!) and once to the Curiosity Museum with Mimi:

But probably our favorite part of this trip was relaxing with Bobba and Nana:

After a very stressful couple of weeks sharing Mommy's attention, Atticus was the center of attention again.  He loved every minute of it.

 

Still, like all good things, our wanderings came to an end.  I, for one, was thrilled to come home and sleep in my own bed after so long.  While Atticus has enjoyed playing with his friends, 

 he is definitely missing his grandparents and extended family. 

Here are a few more milestones and memories:

The worst milestone of the month happened right after his birthday.  Atticus got the stomach virus and threw up for real the very first time.  There were many, many encore performances, I'm afraid.  It was a rough 36 hours or so.  But he was surprisingly sweet (when he wasn't starving and begging for food- which would then upset his tummy again and cause more vomiting...)  Oh I'm so glad that's over!

A more fun milestone is counting!  This boy goes beyond three now.  He can count from 1-10 (he always skips 6!  Even when he goes "ba-wurs" or backwards).  He even shocked us a few days ago by counting "leven, delve, dirteen"...!!!  Wow!

He loves sword fighting, especially with the swords Bobba and Nana got him for Christmas.  He is very exclusive, however.  For the first week he would only sword fight with Bobba and Nana.  Mommy and Daddy were not allowed.  

We're pretty sure this is due, in part, to his excellent memory and desire to keep things as they were the very first time.  For example, if someone was sitting on his right and another person sitting on his left for snacks, he wants them to be sitting in the exact same places every time he east.  There are countless other examples of this. 

He also loves Star Wars and often asks to watch it!  This was inevitable, given his lineage, but still, we are pleasantly surprised at how quickly he has come to love Chewie, Yoda, Luke ("Lute") and Darth Vader.

One of our favorite developments this month are his food dances.  You saw one during our stay at my sister's, but these occur multiple times a day, as he's eating something yummy.

The boy loves his apples and peanut butter (it's one of my favorites, so I love it.)  But there's more to this than meets the eye.  Whenever Atticus thinks (or knows) he's in trouble, he'll say, "Eat!  Apples, Peanut Butter!" in order to distract.  It's also a go to when he's in bed and wants to convince me that he's not tired and needs to come out.  It can be a little frustrating but it's also pretty funny.

A more embarrassing milestone/phase that we're trying to overcome is hitting.  Not long after his birthday, Atticus started getting angrier and angrier.  He's always had a bit of a temper but I guess the Terrible 2s are coming out right on schedule.  For a while there he was taking almost everything out on Mommy, but now he's an equal opportunity hitter.  We've tried a few different ways to help him (we love the Daniel Tiger method).  Our apologies to those he has hit and to the others he will probably hit in the near future!

He's also pretty bossy.  It can be hilarious to hear his monotone voice tell you, "Seet down!" or "Lay down!" (think Arnold Schwartzenegger for the accent he uses).  We do need to work on this, however.  While he knows to say, "Please" and "Thank you," he often doesn't.

Don't get me wrong, he's still a darling little boy and he'll steal your heart in seconds if you give him a chance.  He is so easy to take in public, smiling at cashiers and strangers with a pretty much perfect combination of shyness but sweetness.  He's just got an incredibly strong will, coupled with a fantastic memory (it certainly exceeds mine!) that is going to make the next few years difficult, to say the least.

So that was our December/Christmas.  Bye bye, Santa! Until next year!

A Very Laney Christmas

This year Atticus and I started out the Christmas season with a last minute trip to Texas.  Flying by the seat of our pants, we set out on a week and a half adventure with my sister's four children.

We just love these kiddos.  There were many tender moments during our stay:

 

We also tried to make each day special by doing the 12 Days of Christmas, photo style.  Here's what we came up with:

On the First Day of Christmas, my true loves gave to me:

The Kids in a Nativity.

 2 Group Hugs

 3 Cheesy Grins

Cards with nice words

5 Random Things

  

6 People Playing

7 Races Winning

 Tiny Helpers Helping

One Baby Dancing

Little Laneys Leaping

Eleven(ty Billion) Bums for wiping

All the Drummers Drumming

Here's us singing the first few verses:

So we really tried to have a good time, and we often succeeded.

I would be lying, however, if I said it was easy.  Every single day there was drama, messes, and poop.  Lots and lots of poop.  That happens when you have two 2-year-olds and additional obstacles to overcome.

I'll spare you the poop examples, but here's just one example of the drama that I think you'll enjoy.   You know that cute Nativity photo we took?  Here's everything that happened before hand:

First off, our angel not only did NOT want to hold her star or wear her wings,

but she also felt the need to save (kidnap!) our Baby Jesus doll.

This upset poor Mary to the point that she no longer wanted to participate, which meant that I had to step in as Mary.  Joseph was more than a little exasperated.  Our Shepherd, however, was quite amused by the whole scene.

Finally, Atticus offered to step in as a much older Baby Jesus, on the condition that he got to hold his water gun and point it at the camera.

So it all turned out, in the end.  It was a perfect, awkwardfamilyphotos nativity.   And I guess that's how I could describe the week and a half.  It was perfectly, awkwardly awesome.

Here's a little more of our awesome, awkward action:

 #lighttheworld with the kiddos.  The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints had an initiative this year that we loved- trying to be a little more like Jesus in 25 ways on 25 days.  On this particular day we donated some clothing at Salvation Army and ended up having some fun in the store, while we were at it.

Gingerbread men decorating

The Nutcracker with Ellie

We even spent a couple afternoons at the park:

They even made my birthday special cookie cutter pancakes with a birthday pancake.  I thought it was adorable.

There were tickle fights and movies, eggs in a hole and smoothies.  The shenanigans were fun sometimes and often not so fun.  It only took a day or two for me to feel the weight that my dear sister has to carry 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.  I can't begin to express my love and gratitude for her (and all moms with multiple children, for that matter!)  I have so much admiration for their strength, fortitude, patience and determination.  

As you can imagine, Atticus and his momma were spent by the end.  Here he is when he passed out on the airplane ride to Utah.  

We miss our Laneys, but we certainly did have a joyful reunion with Bobba at the airport!

Until our next get together, Laney Crew!