Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow

We've had a quiet one thus far. I guess that's good. I've had many people call to ask if we spent our 1st New Year's Eve in Time Square. In short, no way! Not with 2little ones. Instead, we had a quiet evening at home. That was until the 2am cannon shots going off. I don't know if it really was a cannon, but it wasn't your typical OTC fireworks either. It felt like we were going to war. Luckily the noise from the heater in the girls room kept them sleeping.

On a different note, I've decided that for the month of December (oops, January), I'm going to do my best to post a picture a day for your viewing enjoyment. I must run, apparently the girls have trapped themselves in the crib together.

Here's your first picture. This morning, Lise' came running to tell me it was snowing outside. Sure enough, there were flurries. She was so excited! Unfortunately, you can't see them in the pic, but I figured you'd get a kick out of her getup anyway.
Happy New Year!

Helpful Hints

B and I just discovered the most amazing thing you may or may not know about. We've had a silver plated tea set that the girls just love to play with. It was passed down from my grandmother, and was so tarnished, it was almost black. We had tried a little silver polish and elbow grease, but it was way more work than it was worth, so we just left it alone.

Then, the other night, I was surfing the web and came across suggesting a new technique that doesn't require silver polish!

You'll need:

--Some kind of container (bowl, roasting pan, etc) lined with aluminum foil
--Boiling hot water with added
--salt (a few tablespoons should do it)



Just place your tarnished items in the aluminum-foil lined container and pour the saltwater over them until they're fully submerged. If you look closely, you can actually see the tarnish disappear. Leave it for a few minutes (you may also have to repeat the cycle). Then buff the silver items to dry them off and make them extra shiny.

Another hint for removing crayon from walls, use a little toothpaste and sponge.

That's it for today, but if I come up with any others, I'll be sure to pass them on.

It's all about Abri Day!

All week, I've been planning on telling you how Abri's doing these days, but just a short while ago was a big moment in her life. She took her first 3 steps.

It's no secret that she's been pulling up on everything since Aug. She is a determined little one, and many guessed she'd be walking by 9 months. I prayed she would not. I would have been happy for her not to do it until Feb. or later. Oh, well.

She's just changing so rapidly these days I don't know where to begin. It wasn't long before we moved that she transitioned into being a real little person. You could start to see her mind work and understand cause and effect. She adores Lise' and wants to do everything Lise' does. I think that's part of the reason she's so determined to walk. They have their own language and laugh and play together quite well.

Another one of Abri's favorite things to do is climb. She will climb anything and everything! She's quick to find a way too. Her favorite thing is stairs. She's already tumbled down a set of carpeted ones once and survived. Unfortunately, our new house has them too. Just last week, things got mighty quiet and that mom intuition told me to go find her. Sure enough, she had bypassed my wall of boxes meant to prevent her from getting to the steps, and was upstairs playing.



One thing we've noticed is that she's very intune to music. Much more so than I ever remember Lise' being. I'm saying it now, she's going to be our musical child. Here's her kazoo recital.

Santa Detox

(pants courtesy of Flossie :-)

As for the tree, I had big plans to have our front room (seen in pic below) cleared out enough to have a real tree. That isn't even close to happening, so I settled for our emergency back up tree complete with kid friendly ornaments. The kids didn't seem to mind, and I don't have to worry about Abri eating tree needles.



Christmas came a few days early when a box arrived from Grandma & Papa

Merry Day After Christmas!

It's a chilly one up here in the Northeast. The girls and I are still in our pajamas revisiting all the exciting "prizes" that were opened yesterday. We're soon going to head out to Home Depot b/c they have their 18 gallon storage bins on sale today and tomorrow for $10 for 3. For now though, we're waiting for the ice to melt off the windshield. I'm in no hurry.

With just the 4 of us, Christmas was a quiet one this year. This was the first time Lise' really understood Santa's role in the process. As you saw from earlier postings, she didn't want to be in the same room with him, much less speak to him, so we didn't push the Santa side of Christmas. It all changed about a week ago when I took the girls to an indoor play group. It was their Christmas party, and Santa was there to take pictures. I asked Lise' again if she wanted to tell Santa what she wanted to Christmas. Her first response was NO, but as the hour went on and she saw that he wasn't out to get her, she let her guard down. By the end of the event, she had told him that she wanted a dollhouse for Christmas. After that, it was all Santa.

On Christmas Eve, we made cookies for him. Man were they good!!!! Here's the recipe for the Raspberry Cream Sandwich Cookies from Martha Stewart. Nothing for the best for Santa. The next time we make them, I think I'll make them a little smaller. They were just so rich. Even Santa couldn't eat all 3 of his.



With the cookies and milk in place, we all went to bed to wait for his arrival.

The next next morning was fun. The cookies were gone, and low and behold, there was a dollhouse for Lise'. Santa had remembered. Lise' even allowed Abri to play with a few things in the dollhouse. Her favorite thing was to look through the windows to see Lise' on the other side.



Another favorite item of the morning was blocks. It was definitely a block Christmas. I think we got a total of 4 different types. There will be a lot of building going on here. We should be able to turn one of the girls into an architect yet!


After our bellies were filled and all the presents were opened, we decided to hit the road and explore our backyard. It was a pretty day, so we settled on sailing the Staten Island Ferry from Staten Island to Manhatten. It was a chilly one, but fun nonetheless. It was a training run of sorts for when you all come to visit. We searched out the best location to view the Statue of Liberty and not freeze your tush off and learned which ferry to ride for the best sunset shots this time of year. So bring it on!

One more just for fun

Lise' watches the snowball card over and over, so I created another for her enjoyment. Hopefully, you'll enjoy as much as she does.

Don't send a lame Holiday eCard. Try JibJab Sendables!

The Annual Christmas Card

Well folks, our move has finally affected us. For months now, we've known that in order to get the card out and in your mailboxes by Dec. 24, we'd have to be organized. I'm here to tell you we are not! For starters, we couldn't decide where the card should reflect...Alabama b/c it was our home for 11 months of the year, or NJ b/c it's where our Christmas would be. Add in the stress of the move and general disorganization (like where in the world is my address book) and you still have no card.

All hope is not lost. We still intend to send one out, but when it arrives is anyone's guess. In the meantime, I hope this tides you over.

Thanks to our guest appearance by Uncle P.J.

Don't send a lame Holiday eCard. Try JibJab Sendables!

B here....I just completed the personality profile.

Ok. Julie showed me her personality profile and I knew that I could do better than her, so here it is:



This is my first time posting anything on the blog. Interesting, this blog thing is.