Christmas Conversations

Marielle (abbreviated Me) and I had some great conversations this last week. The first one stemmed from Grandma's reading of The Lion King as a bedtime story. Me became fixated on the the elephant graveyard, bringing it up again and again. MK thought Me is too young for the full explanation, but Dad, as a self-respecting carnivore, took the opportunity to explain the Circle of Life. Holding nothing back, I explained the bones were dead elephants eaten clean by hyenas. Two days later dead elephants bones were apparently still on her mind. This little gem of a conversation comes from Christmas Eve:

Dad: ...and Santa brings presents to the good girls and boys. You've been good haven't you? You help mom with Jenna.
Me: I help her eat. But not like the hyenas. They eat the elephants skin and ears. [pause] But I don't know what happened to their eyes.
Dad: Yeah, I don't know.
Me: I think they ate them.
Dad: Yeah, I think so.
Me: And their noses. [pause] And their teeth.
Dad: No, not their teeth.
[Cue mom, coming in to say goodnight, and horrified that they are YET AGAIN talking about that page!]


Lest you think my daughter only talks about elephant bones, here is another conversation I found funny. To make sure you get where she's coming from she calls any time in the past "last week."

Dad: Who gave you the floor puzzle?
Me: Grandma
Dad: No, Mom and Dad gave it to you.
Me: When did you get it?
Dad: We bought it at the store.
Me: No, when did you get it?
Dad: Last week.
Me: Oh, before you had kids?
Dad: No, we had you and Jenna. You just weren't with us at the store.
Me: Who was I with?
Dad: Me.
Me: Oh. And mom bought it?

See Marielle, we do have lives even when you are not watching.

Merry Christmas Confusion

This year has been really fun for me as a parent because Marielle is starting to understand what Christmas is. But I will emphasize, starting to understand. The fun began when we brought out our box of decorations. First, Marielle wanted to know what presents were inside, so I had to explain it just had decorations and the presents would come later. Thankfully, she accepted this and waited anxiously for me to open the box. Once we opened the box, I enjoyed hearing Marielle ooh and aah over every ornament exclaiming each time, "Look what Santa brought us!" I thought it was so cute, so I just let our Christmas surprises continue. Her excitement hit it's peak when she found a Santa ornament, "Mom! Santa brought SANTA!"

Another source of confusion has been the advent calendar. We have a cute little house with 25 doors. Yesterday we were at the checkout at Kmart (don't judge me, we have no Target) and Marielle asks me, "What Christmas is it today?" I was so confused but after I probed her more, I realized she wanted to know what door we should open today, or more specifically is it time to open the big door with a 25 and a cupcake on it? As I have said many times since the initiation of our advent calendar, "Not yet."

Today I asked Marielle what she wanted Santa to bring her for Christmas. She answered simply, "I don't know, I'll decide when he gets here." I'm just wondering how she thinks this visit is going to go considering she refused to go anywhere near Santa this year at our Ward Party.
This was a close as she was getting. We didn't even try to get a picture on his lap this year. On the other hand, Jenna was an easy sell.
A fun tradition we started this year is each morning after breakfast we read a Christmas picture book cuddled on the couch while we're still cozy in our PJs. One of her books shows a scene of kids reenacting the Nativity. Marielle wanted to try our own so I happily complied and pulled out blankets and towels. We didn't have a lot of roles in our Christmas scene, but all the major parts were filled (notice we did have Pink Bear and Pig attending the manger). Baby Jesus was slightly uncooperative, but Marielle had a good time singing lullabies anyway.
Tonight we went for a drive to see Christmas Lights. Marielle was really easy to please and gasped anytime we saw even the tiniest string of lights. We were on our way to particular house I'd heard about, but our little Marielle was asleep before we arrived. It wasn't even 7:00 yet, but then again she was awake at 6:30 this morning. I guess we'll try again tomorrow night.
Hope your Christmas Season is turning out wonderful too!

She Knows My Heart

This morning Marielle wanted to draw a picture for me. I was delighted when she held up the picture and I saw a picture of the person I love most in all the world (children excluded of course).

Do you recognize Ryan? I think he looks smashingly handsome in person and in print.

A Fancy Shmancy Day

Ever heard of Fancy Nancy? She's the spokesperson for all little girls in tutus, beads, crowns, and sunglasses. The book is adorable, and can be life changing (Marielle refuses to wear shorts now because only skirts are fancy). We're relatively new to the craze, but not so new that a Borders Fancy Nancy Party didn't sound like a great family outing. If you don't know the story, Nancy teaches her parents how to be fancy, dresses them up and they all go out for burgers and ice cream while calling each other darling and sticking out pinkies. The story fit us quite well since Nancy has a Mom, a Dad and a little sister. So at eleven o'clock today we looked like this:





After the festivities we went out for burgers and shakes at In-N-Out. They were pretty messy burgers for such a fancy family, but boy did they taste good! I out-ordered and out-predicted Ryan on shakes since he didn't think we'd be satisfied sharing two shakes amongst the three of us (none of us finished our shakes) and my Neapolitan shake tasted much better than his chocolate. Ryan was shocked to learn another In-N-Out ordering code and accused me of withholding secrets until he became a California resident. What can I say? I thought it was common knowledge. When we finally walked out we were quite satisfied. (That's a fancy way of staying stuffed.)





In retrospect, the party was a lot like my Junior Prom. The real fun was dressing up and then hanging out afterward.

P.S. Marielle ate every Froot Loop on her necklace once we got home.

Jenna Photo Shoot

Jenna was looking oh so cute the other day, so we got out the camera and got snappin'! In case you are wondering, yes, she is on her way to crawling. You go girl-- 5 and a half months and she's movin' and sitting up like a little lady. This girl is so easy to love, but hey, I'm just the mom.

Happy Halloween!

Well the costume dilemma was resolved and as you can see Marielle the ballerina was accompanied this Halloween by the cutest little hot dog you ever did see. Hope your Halloween was fun and we'll be checking your blogs for pictures of your cuties. :)

Marielle's Bible

Here at family housing we have a little gem called the Swap Shop. It's an empty apartment you can drop off your discards and pick out what you like...for free. Think Thrift shop minus the cash register. Marielle and I love bringing home goodies so I try to restrain myself from going more than once a week. To illustrate, last week as we left home to go shopping for Marielle's tennis shoes, she was surprised as we veered toward the parking lot and asked, "aren't we going to the swap shop?" On one such visit to the swap shop Marielle found a jumbo sized coloring book. Some of the pages were colored, but many still blank so we grabbed it. She affectionately calls it "my bible" due to it's large size. The other night when we called her for family home evening she ran to the back and said "I need to get my bible!" She brought it out and after opening song and prayer very solemnly told us a scripture story about Elmo. It was cute, but long, and Dad eventually had to cut her off. I taught the lesson that night and recounted Joseph Smith's first vision. It was cool to see her start to understand. After I finished the story she even asked, "what church did he go to?" I love teaching the gospel in such simplicity. It really brings the spirit into our home. I don't have a picture of her bible, so a bible sized pumpkin will have to do.

Jenna

Mom's still trying the Anne Geddes thing...

Marielle Turned Three (Again)!

This year Marielle scored an extended birthday. It was practically a birthday season since she got a themed party in Houston, then two months of birthday limbo where she thought she was three because she already had a party, but was really still two since her birthday hadn't come yet. Well the limbo is over and she can confidently put up her three fingers now that October 23rd has passed. Her first party was Under the Sea. We aimed to downplay the princess theme, but still keep Marielle happy with Ariel in the mix. We had such a fun party with her little friends in Houston.
Yum! We made seaweed and fish cake.

We took pictures at home to stall a very excited birthday girl.

We had dinner.

We found Ariel's treasures in the woods.

We danced with seaweed streamers to Under the Sea.

We hovered over presents. :)

We had a blast!

Then on her birthday DAY we had more fun:

We had "M" pancakes in a birthday tent built by Marielle and Dad.

We went to the pumpkin patch.

We ran like crazy in our new princess tennis shoes (Note: Mom,Dad and Jenna did not get new shoes).

We had a birthday dinner. (Marielle's request? Chicken and corn. Nice.)

We ended our day with presents and cake and ice cream.
Seriously, I want to turn three next year. Marielle's birthday rocked.

What to do, what to do...

Here's my Halloween dilemma:

Should I make Jenna wear this (bought for a buck when I was convinced I'd be birthing a boy)

Or splurge and buy this ($17)


What do I do? Does Jenna's natural cuteness overpower the hot dog? Is the peapod costume that much cuter? How important is it really to stick to your budget? Seriously people, I need advice!

Oh, and Jenna was blessed on Sunday. Here's the real cuteness:

A Tribute to Jenn

Marielle and Jenna have some pretty cute cousins who live down in Orange County. Their mom put up a post titled "Is There Anything Cuter than Matching Jammies?" And now as a mom of two, I submit that there is not.

(Name the comedian?)