Christmas Tour 2012 - Stop #1 (Laabs)

Our 2013 Tour started at Grandpa Lee's house on Saturday the 22nd. As always, fun was had by all and Lucy received lots of cool presents from Grandpa and aunties and uncles. It was an intense 4-5 hours of eating, opening presents, playing with presents, teasing her uncles, and running around with her "big girl" cousin, Miss H. I am blessed to have married into such a fun and loving family.

Brandon decorated for Christmas. Grandma would be proud.

Cousins.

A favorite from Grandpa - "Bouncy" the dog.

Doesn't take much to get some silly out of this crowd. :)

She was out within about 2 minutes on the drive home...still surrounded by Christmas!

A Visit From Miss H

A couple weekends ago our niece Miss H spent the night with us. She is 9 and Lucy pretty much thinks she is the coolest person ever! She loved showing her cousin all of her toys and playing dress up. Anything H did, Lucy had to do, too. It was adorable, and both feel asleep pretty early, so I think the "wearing out" was mutual! H was very patient with our girl and we loved having her stay over.

Christmas Recap

We had a great Christmas at our house. Lucy really had no concept of what was going on, but she enjoyed opening gifts and talking about "Sata" (Santa). We had Husband's family over for the afternoon, so she got more presents and all kinds of attention. It was a blast. Here are some highlights:

A beanbag from Santa. I think she's got the hang of it, huh?!
A gas card for Brandon...driver's license is coming soon!
Grandma and Grandpa and the aunties and uncles showered both kids with lots of gifts. Lucy got some new babies and a little stroller to push them around in.
Of course, Lucy gave some love too! Here she is with her cousin, Miss H. Is this not the CUTEST?!
We travel to Iowa for another Christmas this weekend, and a special anniversary celebration for Grandma and Grandpa. Should be lots of fun!

Cousins

Lastnight we had our niece Miss H for an overnight stay. She was very patient and basically let Lucy follow her around, climb on her, and mimic her every move with little complaint. They even conspired and joined forces to climb on Brandon! It never ceases to amaze me that at ages 17, 8, and 1...they all get along so well.

Weekend Fun

My cousin Kristi came up for a visit this past weekend, which coincided with a planned overnight stay by our niece, Miss H. We girls had a lot of fun doing some shopping, walking around Mill Ruins Park, coloring, painting our nails, and watching Kung Fu Panda. It was a real treat to have them both here at once, and as you can see they became fast friends!

An Evening With Miss H

Last Friday night we had a visit from our niece, Miss H. My sister-in-law told me that all week long, she was so excited to come to "Auntie Jess and Buddy's house." Her uncle wasn't too impressed by that.

Miss H was all about Buddy. I taught her a few commands so he would learn to respect her, and although I think the dog was thoroughly confused at times because of the string of commands she would fire off, over time I'm sure they will both get the hang of it. For awhile there Miss H thought Buddy needed to rely on someone else to tell him what to do...all the time. I had to convince her that sometimes, Buddy can just sit, or walk into another room, or do something all by himself. After awhile she caught on.

She is also very into "make-up" right now, and toted along a whole arsenal of lip glosses and chapsticks. After the application of about 6 layers of different lip lubes (and completely cracking me up with her faces in front of the mirror), she was satisfied and I assured her she was quite beautiful. Saturday morning I also painted her fingernails (alternating dark and light pink, with press-on rhinestones, of course). She's all girl and all fun!

An Afternoon Amongst the Flowers

Today I went to Gertens, a local gardening center, with my mother-in-law, 2 sisters-in-law, and my niece, Miss H. None of us had every been there before, and let's just say we were overwhelmed by the amount of flowers, plants, shrubs, trees...this place is huge! Once we got acclimated to the sheer size of the place, it was pretty interesting to have so many plants in one place. Everything is very well organized into sections (annuals, perennials, etc) and labeled with photos of what the flower will look like once it has bloomed. It was helpful not only in picking out new plants, but also to see what some of the plants coming up in our yard will look like, and to come up with new ideas. Mostly, it was just nice to be outside and hang out with "the girls." Miss H held up pretty well, but eventually she was so over it...

I picked up 2 beautiful hanging baskets for the front of the house that were on sale. They are dark pink impatiens and look really nice up against the blue of the house. I also got a pink salvia plant to try along the side of the garage (I guess I liked pink today). I will plant the salvia tomorrow; I hung the baskets as soon as I got home, and unfortunately we had another suprise round of rain, high winds, and hail. They took a little beating, but not too bad. Tomorrow looks to be a gorgeous day, so I'll try to take a photo then!

The Joys of a Five-Year-Old Companion

Yesterday after our morning of house-hunting, I told Husband I needed "a boost." He promptly called up his sister and asked if we could possibly have our niece for an overnight visit, knowing that a little time with Miss H always cheers me up. My SIL had her husband out of the house for the evening, and needless to say, having the house to herself for the evening sounded pretty appealing, so about 4PM our little visitor was dropped off.

Oh, the fun we had! We played cards, we read books, we baked a cake and made supper, we watched the movie Heidi (which I wasn't sure about, but she seemed to really like) and as always, had some interesting conversations. I've shared some H-isms in the past, but here are a few from this visit:

[playing Go Fish]

Me: "Shall we play another game?"

H: "I don't think so. I think maybe it's too hard for you.

Touche...she did beat me 3 games in a row.

[reading "Barbie Loves Cheerleading"]

H: "Which one of these cheerleaders do you like the best?"

Me: "Hmmm...I like this one. She has pretty brown hair."

H: "I like this one." [points to page] "She has glasses and I just can't stop LOOKING at them!"

I wish I could adequately express the emphasis and importance she conveyed when she said this, it was totally hilarious!

[While eating supper]

Me: "OK, if you have 2 more pieces of potato, then you can be done."

H: [sticks one piece in her mouth] "I just stuck one piece in my mouth, and I bited it, and so now it's two!"

How can you argue with rationale like that?

[before going downstairs to "surprise" Husband and Brandon]

H: "OK, I'm going down there to sneak up on them. So you gotta be very quiet up here, don't move, and don't make a peek."

Me: "Don't make a what?"

H: "Don't make a PEEK I said!"

Consequently I remained still and not a peek was heard. :)

[Upon being asked to go downstairs and tell her uncle goodnight...I heard the conversation went down like this:]

H: "Uncle __."

Husband: "Yes?"

H: "I'M sleeping with Auntie Jess, not YOU."

There you have it. She was tons of fun, as always, and I am sufficiently boosted. Thanks H!