D IS FOR DOG

You can see our D is for Dog tot school week HERE at our tot school blog! Enjoy!

CHILDREN'S MUSEUM

We took another trip to the Children's Museum today, this time with Cousin Molly and Aunt Cali. Morgan had just as much fun (if not more fun) this year, and Cali and I had fun watching the girls enjoy themselves so much. We also went out to lunch afterwards. It was a fun morning.

Water Play

Grocery Shopping

Trains

Playing "Mommy" - These babies were real size / real weight dolls, so it gave Morgan good practice for holding her baby brother or sister soon. :)

"Practicing" Teethbrushing

(Don't worry....She never really stuck the brush in her mouth for real!)

The girls really enjoyed the slide.....a LOT!

Look at the joy on their faces......

Rock Climbing :)

Peek a Boo Tunnel

Don't know what this is called, but you put a ball or scarf in these doors, and the object flies through a maze of tubes and shoots at a different hole. Fascinating to toddlers!

Feeding the Cows

Driving the Combine

Making hand (and face) prints in the "needles."

Playing the Piano with their Feet.....Oh boy did Morgan love this!

Painting!

And more painting!

ANY TIPS?

We have a water / ice dispenser on our fridge, which I love, but I have one problem......

It often looks like this. I have tried lots of different things, but it just keeps getting worse. I can wipe it down every morning, and it will look exactly like this again by afternoon. Anyone have any suggestions what to use to get rid of the nastly build up?

MAID SERVICE

The last 3 weeks or so I have added a "chore" time into our schedule right after breakfast. I usually do my "daily job" after breakfast when Morgan is having her playtime in her room, but I decided I wanted to get her involved more in daily chores around the house. She was already putting away her pj's every morning and helping me unlaod the silverware from the dishwasher and putting it away every so often, but that was about it for "chores" besides the usual picking up and putting away toys. Anyway, at this point, I don't have one set thing that she does every day, but so far she has "helped" me gather the garbage from each room (I take out the old bag, she puts in the new bag....sort of), clean the bathrooms (I gave her a cleaning wipe and she loved wiping down the counters), fold the laundry (I would tell her what item to hand me and she also attempted to match socks), vacuum (she follows me with her own real looking and sounding vacuum that Grandma found at a kids' consignment shop), make my bed, and dust (I gave her her own little rag, and she was "dusting" everything she could think of.....)

I love that she enjoys "helping" Mommy so much right now and even tells me after breakfast, "Go do chores now." I have this euphoric idea that this will continue as she gets older.....BUT, reality says it won't. However, I want to start early instilling in her the concept of helping, hard work, and doing things with a cheerful attitude.

FIRST BELLY PICTURES

I took a few pictures when I was pregnant with Morgan, but not really until the end. I probably won't take them weekly this time around either, but I wanted to take a few every now and then. I am 17 weeks right now, and definitely "showing!" I remember with Morgan not really showing much until the end of Feb / early March. So, yeah. It's true that you show earlier the second time around. Between my first and second appointments I had lost 7 pounds, between my second and third I had not gained any back. But now that I am feeling much better and eating more normally, I have a feeling some of my "baby bump" could very well be just the fact I am gaining weight. Who knows. We'll see at our next appointment.....which is already the anatomy sono! I can't believe that will be half way already!

D IS FOR DINOSAUR

You can view our D is for Dinosaur tot school week HERE at our Tot School blog. Enjoy!

S IS FOR SPIDER

You can view all the fun things we did for our S is for Spider Tot School week HERE at our Hart 2 Hart Tot School blog. Enjoy!

DAIRY FREE NO MORE!

Yes, that is yogurt that Morgan is enjoying for lunch today. We have slowly been introducing more and more dairy products, and we really are now to the point where I don't read any labels, and she pretty much eats whatever we eat. I don't have to pack food when we go places either now, which is SO nice! When we first started this trial / introducing dairy back in September, she was dealing with seasonal allergies as well, so it was sometimes hard to tell what was causing some of her symptoms: the food or the season! But now that she is over that, we haven't had any complications at all to her eating dairy / milk. I have yet to give her straight milk to drink, but other than that, she has been able to enjoy pizza, cheese, yogurt, ice cream, mac and cheese, and a bunch of other things. She of course is loving it all! We see the allergist again in Feb. for an update, but I see no reason at this point why we can't say we are "all clear." Hip, hip, hooray!

TOT SCHOOL

We finally got back into our normal routine and got to do Tot School again this week. You can check out our "S is for Snowman" theme HERE.

SNOWMAN BREAKFAST

Our Tot School theme this week is "S is for Snowman." So, I made a snowman out of pancakes for Morgan today for breakfast. She sat and ate the.whole.thing. Every last marshmallow and pretzel. She wouldn't let me have any of it. (I was planning on eating at least one of the pancakes.) She won't be hungry for lunch! :)

WHAT A WEEKEND

Jared surprised me for my birthday (which was last week) and took me to Chicago for New Year's Eve and New Year's Day. He had arranged it with my folks to keep Morgan for two days, and we enjoyed a very nice getaway. We did some shopping and ate out on New Year's Eve, then spent the rest of the evening chilling out in front of the cable TV at our hotel without feeling guilty about doing so. (I know...real partiers on New Year's Eve, huh?) Our hotel was nicer than what we usually choose for just traveling, which was fun for a change. It even included a buffet / cook to order breakfast in the hotel restaurant - not just your standard continental breakfast at the kind of hotels we usually stay at.

Now, there IS a catch..... Jared had to be in Chicago anyway on New Year's Day because the basketball team at his school was playing a conference game against another local high school....but at the United Center before a Bulls game. Cool, huh? So, I got to tag along. Good thing I like basketball.

During the third quarter (when our team pulled ahead), Jared noticed Derek Rose from the Bulls standing in the tunnel watching.

Our team won by four points, and since Jared was on the VIP list, we got to sit right down on the court and watch it all "up close and personal." It was just fun to say we got to be on the same court as the Bulls play on.

After the game, they made us leave the arena for an hour while the Bulls had a closed practice. Then, they let us back in a half hour before the doors officially opened for the game, so we could sit in the lower bowl for bit and watch some of the players warm up.

Once the doors opened, though, for the game, we had to go to our assigned seats for the Bulls game: in the nosebleed section. But it was still so cool to be in that atmosphere at the UNITED CENTER! When ever are we going to get that opportunity again?

(During the Bulls starting lineup announcement with the lights off in the arena.)

Since we were at the United Center for lunch time and dinner, we obviously had to buy food there. Talk about sticker shock! I ended up with the cheapest thing I could find for lunch: a $4 pretzel. But for dinner, we went all out. We found a "specialty" stand called "Sweet Baby Rays" and spent a good chunk of change for chicken tenders, fries, pulled pork nachos, and a drink. Back home, we could have eaten at a high class restaurant for what we paid there. But let me tell you, it was so worth it!!! (The nachos were out of this world, by the way!)

Mom and Dad had offered to keep Morgan that night, too, seeing as we got home late, so we didn't pick her up until Sunday morning before church. It was SOOOO good to see my little girl again, but she had a blast with Grandma and Grandpa, and Jared and I had a much needed break away just the two of us. Thanks, Hon, for a great birthday surprise!