Christmas Update

Kayla and Colin were overloaded with Christmas presents this year.  Whether we were at a grandparents or at our house, present opening typically went something like this.  Colin would open the first present and which ever present that was, he's get super excited about it and want to open it as soon as possible.  Ignoring the rest of the presents, I would then have to open them since he only cared about whichever the first one was.  On the other hand, Kayla would open her presents one at a time, say how cool it was, then move on to the next present.  Once done, she would help me open the rest of Colin's, then move on to mine and Jordan's, and then any other presents that need opening.  They were both pretty cute.  Here is Kayla wearing a super cute Dora hat while playing 'Pet' on one of our phones.

Kayla's been getting into playing memory games.  She's surprisingly good at it, and her teachers at school have even noticed.  At school she plays a game matching big and little letters.  Once a match is found, she then has to say the sound of the letter.  Kayla is so good at these letter and memory games that her teacher made a note of how much she well she does with these.

Kayla got a kid laptop computer with games already downloaded on it.  I haven't figured out who likes it more, Kayla or Colin!

On Christmas Eve, we wrote a nice note to Santa, and the next morning, Santa delivered!

Now why couldn't we get this nice of a picture when we were trying to take our Christmas card photo?!  Either way, we have a great photo of all of us now.  : )

Mmm....blue sucker.  Colin has started calling Jordan and I by a different name instead on Mama and Dada. Now it's Dahdee and Mumee.  It is sooooo cute!

After a whirlwind weekend of lots of grandparent visits and presents, this is what our car and kids looked like going home.

When we made it home, the kids discovered that Santa had visited our house too!

Colin went right for the car and Kayla headed for the kitchen.  They were quite happy with what Santa brought.

Although the car was definitely the favorite between the two and they still have trouble sharing that car.  Hopefully once we take it out in the spring and it joins our fleet of kid cars and bikes, we won't have to worry about sharing quite as much.

Kayla and Colin have been playing so well lately and for Colin, more independently.  They'll go play upstairs with the car or the ball pit, then back downstairs playing chase or hide and seek.

Dahdee and Colin playing and giving goofy smiles.

Kayla watching her youtube shows on the computer when Colin came over to watch with her.  When that didn't last long, Colin actually started to wrestle with her!  It was so cute to watch and Kayla played back for a couple of minutes.  It didn't last too long since she wanted to get back to her shows, which is why she doesn't look too happy, but we were amused.

For New Years Eve, we took Kayla to downtown Chicago again to see the fireworks.  We took the train and stopped at the Rainforest Cafe for dinner.  Kayla got her picture taken with a frog!

Happy New Years!

Kayla is still loving school these days.  She has two 'best friends' that she plays with everyday, Madelyn and Ainsely.  The teachers even know how much these three are friends and make sure they sit next to each other at lunch or when they're walking to the library.  Kayla had her school pictures taken a few weeks ago and they are the most adorable grown-up photos of her ever!  She even has a beautiful smile with them.  We practiced smiling for days beforehand and I'd always get a cheesy smile, but she brought out her pretty smile for the pictures.

Our weeks have gotten slightly busier now that Colin is old enough for toddlertime at the library.  Kayla goes to storytime on Tuesdays, which she loves and Miss Minetta knows her very well from when she visits the library with her school.  Colin goes on Thursdays and even though he's only gone a couple of times, he loves it too and is always trying to get the other kids and parents to smile at him.  That boy is not shy one bit!  Here they are at a joint kid time before Christmas making snowflakes.

Colin just discovered Sam our gecko.  He even brought the step stool over and now likes to watch Sam eat his crickets.  I took Sam out for Colin to see and he did his happy dance and get really excited just watching him crawl around.  Kayla didn't have much interest in Sam at this age, but Colin loves every animal he sees, even geckos.

We were at Jordan's parents and they were both eating breakfast.  I was the only one in the kitchen at the time and told them I had to leave for a minute but I'd be right back.  I only walked slightly out of sight when I heard Kayla say, "Don't worry Colin.  Mama will be right back.  I'll protect you."

Colin has been adding to his vocabulary and can name a couple of colors and can count to 2!  Some new words are puppy, mine, crack crack (this sounds bad but it's really just cracker, I swear!) and potty.  He tells us when he pees and poops-I'm really hoping for early potty training for this guy, although when we took the potty chair out, he thought it was a hat and got it stuck around his head!

Kayla and Colin had a fabulous and whirlwind Christmas visiting all the grandmas and papas then coming back to our house for more presents.  We started our visits with grandma and papa Rowe.  They have a fireplace and even though they had both seen fires before, this fire was somehow different and captivated them.  Both of course were completely booty neked.

 

Aww...Colin, owl, and mama all cuddly.  I love when he is this cuddly and secretly hopes it lasts as long as possible.