4 steps

We were over at our neighbor's house earlier this evening and baby j was busy crawling around as usual and cruising along holding on to furniture. Later on, we were all in the living room when baby j crawled towards the TV cabinet. He hung on to the cabinet for a while trying to open it even with the child proof lock on it. Then he turned around, let go of the cabinet and took 4 steps towards me....Woohooo!!! Baby J's going to be walking soon....o, oh!

dada time

Snowboarder spent the morning with the kids while I went out shopping on Black Friday! I left the house a little before 7am and told snowboarder that I'd try to be back before the kids got up(yeah right) and if I wasn't, to call me. I got wrapped up in my shopping that I didn't get home till 10am. I walked into the kitchen and snowboarder was with the kids. He gave me a quick update on what went on in the house: made pancakes with nael, changed baby j's diapers, gave him his milk and that they were all done eating breakfast, including baby j! WOW....pretty impressive and not one phone call(snowboarder said he didn't want to bother me, another WOW.) Then, snowboarder and I played a round of Chutes and Ladders with nael. Apparently, snowboarder and nael had already played a game of Candy Land while I was away this morning. While baby j was napping, snowboarder decided to take little nael out for a hike while I "unpacked" my shopping finds as snowboarder put it. When they got back, we had lunch, waited for baby j to wake up then headed to the Children's Hospital to visit a friend. During dinner, snowboarder asked nael what she did today. With the help of her father. she recounted her day and said that she spent the whole day with her dada!

french toast

nael wanted to make pancakes this morning but I told her that we didn't have enough sour cream to make a batch so I suggested making french toast instead and she agreed. With the help of snowboarder, little nael donned her chef's hat and apron and spent the morning making french toast with her dada.

cake time

Little nael had a busy Saturday! I took her to Tyler's 4th birthday party in the morning. Tyler is one of little nael's classmates in school. He had a jumping castle in his backyard and Dinger, the mascot for the Colorado Rockies, came over for a visit! The kids loved him. He had photos taken with each kid and gave each one of them an autographed baseball! And before Dinger left he also gave the kids a Rockies bag filled with goodies. What a treat...
In the late afternoon, snowboarder and I took the kids to another birthday party. This time it was Tate's 1st birthday party. Unfortunately, little nael didn't get a chance to nap today but seemed to be full of energy anyway. She was playing with all of Tate's toys and sat next to him when it was time to blow out his 1st birthday candle. Come to think of it, little nael also sat next to Tyler this morning when it was time for the birthday cake. She sure knows where to sit when it's cake time...

dada's bday

It was snowboarder's birthday last Thursday and we just celebrated at home with take out dinner from Jose O'Shea's and a German Choco birthday cake from Whole Foods. Snowboarder was too tired to go out and I got too busy to bake a cake so we did the next best thing, ordered food to go!

sick!

Took little nael to school this morning and when I got home I had two messages from her school saying that she was sick! According to her teacher, Mrs. Mesa, little nael had gone to the bathroom then came out crying saying that she wasn't feeling well. Odd thing for me was that I usually don't check phone messages when I get home from taking her to school. I usually just get baby j's breakfast ready then I feed him. But this morning, strangely enough, as soon as I walked into the door with baby j in my arms, I checked our home voicemail for messages. We had 2 messages and I thought they were probably birthday messages for snowboarder from his family since it was his birthday yesterday. To my surprise, the messages were from Mrs. Mesa. I am soooo thankful that I checked my voicemail!!! So, I called the school back to let them know I got their messages then baby j and I rushed back to school. When I got there, little one was laying on the couch at Ms Mary's office with Ms Mary at her side. Ms Mary said that nael had already thrown up once. Little nael did look pale and felt warm. I carried her back to the car with the help of Ms Mary who carried baby j. On the way home, nael said she had to "spit up" (aka throw up) so I pulled over and gave her the bucket and rag which Ms Mary lent me to take home just in case. I must say, good thinking on Ms Mary's part! When we got home, little nael just wanted to rest on the couch which she did. She woke up a couple of times to "spit up" but immediately fell back asleep afterwards. When she finally got up at about 2pmish, nael exclaimed that she was feeling better. She had some soup and crackers for lunch and soon after was back to her old self...talking, running around, playing, and being silly! Thankfully she got better pretty quickly. What got her sick? I don't know. Everyone else is saying that it was a 24 hour bug but it sure didn't last that long. And, I sure am not complaining....

puppets

I took the kids to see a puppet show this past Saturday over at the Denver Pupper Theater . Little nael's friend, Allie and her mom joined us for the afternoon. We saw African Animal Tales featuring a spider named Anansi. The girls seemed to enjoy it and had the opportunity before the show to color/decorate their very own paper puppet. After the 45 min show, the girls also had the chance to play with some puppets/dolls/props. They had a wonderful time pretending to be different kinds of animals. On our way out, we passed the party room where kids can have a birthday party and make puppets. Little nael saw the room and exclaimed that she wants to have her birthday party there with her friends so we'll see. Every week if not every day she's always talking about what she wants for her birthday and where it's going to be so we'll see....

school helper

Snowboarder took the morning off from work yesterday to help out at little nael's school. He was one of the parent helpers and I think little nael was pretty excited to have her father in school with her! Snowboarder was assigned to the "feathers on a toilet paper roll" craft during free choice time and he read a book, Bear wants more, to the kids during lunch bunch.
I asked snowboarder if he'd be willing to be a school helper again and he said, "yes" so...i'll mark him down to help out in January, February, March and April :)

playgroup

We had playgroup at home this morning. There were about 8 moms (including me), 5 babies (under 1) and 5 toddlers/preschoolers! Little nael was pretending to be a dog...barking, licking and walking on all fours! She also played with Allie on the trike, taking turns pushing each other and had snacks with Makenzie (twice!)
Baby J is usually up by 8am and naps by 10am for a couple of hours. However, these last 2 days, he's been waking up at 10am and napping at noon. So this morning, he was awake during playgroup and didn't miss any fun. His usual friends were here, Avery and Brynn but Baby J also had a couple new playmates, little boy Tate who is just 4 weeks older than him (we met Tate and his mom in music class last Friday) and sweet lil Annie Rose who was the youngest baby in the group. She and her mom just joined our moms group.

Hi

Earlier this evening, the kids and I were busy playing in the playroom. At some point, little nael rushed out to use the potty. Minutes later, I hear the phone ring and little nael yells out, "phone is ringing, Mama." I walk over to the kitchen and I see little nael reaching up to the phone hanging on the wall. She manages to grab the receiver and says, "Hi!" I take the phone from her and fortunately it was just Taylor's mom. I give the phone back to little nael and she and Taylor's mom are chatting a bit. This is a first!!! Normally, she'll only say a few words here and there while I hold the cellphone to her ear then she'll walk away, but this time, she's on the landline, holding the phone by herself. Anyhow, later on in the evening, I'm busy upstairs getting baby j ready for bed and my cellphone rings. Litte nael offers to get it and runs downstairs. It stops ringing and I hear her say "hi" again. I head to the kitchen and little nael is once again on the phone! I try to get the phone from her but she says she's not done yet. From her conversation, I could hear that she was talking to her dad. She chats a bit with her father, telling him about her day. She finally gives me the phone and snowboarder says that this was the longest phone conversation he's ever had with little nael. I agreed and I had to tell him about her first phone call earlier in the evening. Our little girl is becoming a phone chatter...Oh, oh!

Cinderella

Little nael's class had a Halloween party on Friday and she was dressed as a princess, of course! Her Auntie Ame had given her a Cinderella dress and she has been obsessed with it ever since. Auntie Ame and Nonny also sent her a beautiful princess hat a few days ago to match her dress. Thankfully, the weather was nice during the day (in the low 70s) and not too cold in the evening. I was concerned that she'd be too cold in her dress but the weather was cooperating. They had a parade in school and had given out some treats to take home. After preschool, we had to go to a makeup music class since we missed 2 classes. It looked like little nael had fun in music class since the other kids were dressed in costumes too.
Unfortunately, our little Cinderella got a late start trick or treating in the evening. She was so tired from the day's activities that she napped from about 3:45pm till 8pm. We had plans to head to our neighbor's house for some drinks/appetizers so we took Cinderella to a few houses in our neighborhood where she did get some candy. Then we headed to our neighbor's house for our last stop. Snowboarder and I are fortunate that our Cinderella isn't too crazy about sweets (more for us). I don't think she even ate any candy or chocolate that night.