Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Christmas Cookie Baking

I completely forgot to mention our Christmas cookie baking extravaganza in the last post, but I believe it's worth its own post anyway. A few weeks ago, my prayer group got together at one of our member's house to make and decorate cookies. Although one of our friends could not make it because her little girl was sick, the girls and I had a great time with Grandma (my mom) and two of Addie's Godmothers :)

Addie loves to help me in the kitchen, so she got a huge kick out of being a part of the cookie making. She got to sift the giant amount of flour...and said it looked like a "flour mountain" in the bowl.

Linda let her pick out what color she wanted to make the dough and the first color she picked was PINK, imagine that. She also got to pick the design for the first batch of spritz cookies and she chose a flower design.


Using the Spritz gun was a bit challenging at first, but she got the hang of it quickly. I love her face in this one, squeezing with all her might!


While the spritz cookies were baking, she got to decorate a gingerbread girl cookie with lots of icing and sprinkles. In this picture, she is deciding what color of sprinkles she should add next (as if it needs more).


Lydia took part in the decorating as well....her first task, UN-decorating a gingerbread man cookie! I decorated it and encouraged her to add more, but she had a better idea: to eat the M & M candies as I kept putting more on ;)


While big sister was focused on baking cookies, little sister practiced her dance moves on Dana's kitchen floor!


She had the time of her life running around and keeping me on my toes! I think her favorite part of the evening was when Dana's dog, Maggie kept making appearances in the kitchen...and she even got to pet her. Maggie was quite the talk of the evening once we got home!


Very special thanks to Dana, Linda, and Grandma (Ma) for making the girls feel so special! I was sure worn out by the night's end, but we all had a blast!

Tuesday, December 22, 2009

A Blogging Hiatus...well sort of

Wow, I haven't blogged on THIS blog forever! I HAVE been blogging, a lot however, on our school blog so if you'd like to see a little more of what we've been up to and more pictures and videos of the girls, visit Sharing Our Learning Adventure.

I will try to sum up the past two months by using some of my favorite pictures. Our little baby girl, who is just about to turn 14 months, is growing and changing SO fast! I just love this age when her personality is REALLY starting to shine (although she's been showing us her strong personality for quite a while now!). Lydia actually says more words at this age than her sister did...she says, "Mama," "Dadda," "Addie," "Joe," "Papaw," "Amen," "baby" (her favorite), "bird," "ball," "bear," "bowl," "snack," "Pot" (for potty), "bye-bye," "hi," and a few others I'm forgetting at the moment. She is walking like a pro and rarely lets anything get in her way! Our chunky little baby has thinned down to be a miniature replica of her big sister, skinny Minnie :) Here are a few of our favorite pics from her one year photo shoot (taken by our wonderful friend Leisa of Candid Xpressions):
This little sweetie pie has started becoming a Daddy's girl, just like her sister. She has always favored Mama until recently when Daddy started to become her favorite snuggle buddy. I could just EAT HER UP! She's so snuggly and loving, giving kisses and hugs frequently....SO much different than Addie ever has been.


The girls just love each other so much...and pretty much do everything together now. Bath time is their favorite playtime together, one a little wilder and more "splashy" than the other (if you know my girls, you can guess who the *wild* one is!). Everyone has been telling us lately that they are looking more and more alike....well these next two photos show their similarities and one big difference: their skin tone! Addie is fair like her Daddy and Lydia has an olive tone like me. You can't really tell just by looking at them with clothes on so here they are being silly in the bathtub :)
So sweet and innocent :)

Wild and Crazy Girls!

The tiny one had a bit of a run in with our coffee table a few weeks ago and managed to give herself a pretty awful looking black eye. It had cleared up a little by the time I took this picture, but you can still get the idea of *who* won this battle. The day I took this picture, we were at a friend's house baking Christmas cookies and I found Lydia in the spare bedroom ON TOP of a little kiddy table....hmmmmm, wonder how she gets hurt so often!?


Just wanted to show a picture of how you dress when you have a big sister who is into fashion...pajama shirt, brown leg warmers (or warm leggers as A calls them), and big sister's swim suit. And just to clarify, this was all Lydia's idea (well the leg warmers were my idea to keep her warm). She sees Addie going through numerous outfit changes daily and wants to be just like big sis! She will grab an article of clothing that Addie has recently thrown off and bring it to me and raise her leg wanting me to put it on her (yes, even if it's a shirt, she'll still raise her leg!).


We received a package from some very special friends of ours yesterday and among many WONDERFUL gifts, was Addie's birthday present from them: a Princess Book/Playset!!! She immediately got it open and set up at the table...and said, "Oh I love my Princess Bible!!" I guess she knows how important the Bible is and this Princess book/playset ranks right up there with it! She makes me laugh so hard! Oh, the helmet was an early Christmas gift from Gma and Papaw and it was worn the entire evening also.


Merry Christmas from our family to yours! We hope everyone enjoys the blessings of the season and the true meaning behind CHRISTmas! I suspect I will take lots of pictures of the girls over the next week, as we have a big birthday celebration coming up right after Christmas...and I won't make any promises, but I will try my best to post some of the favorites :)


I'll sign off with our tiny singer in the family...singing a song I sing all the time and Addie loves it, the "Amen song"


Loving her big sister to pieces!