Visiting Santa

December was a terribly busy month for Jason and I with him being gone for 2 weeks. I decided if we wanted the chance to take Rachel to see Santa this year (we couldn't last year because we were moving and because of all the snow we got) that we needed to do it early. Geri sent me a list of Christmas events that were going on and it looked like the best event was going to be up at the 4-H Fairgrounds. We took the chance and went up there and I hope we can do that again another year.

It was amazing. It was set up somewhat similar to Reynolds in Fishers. You drive through the fair grounds and look at the lights set up along a small driveway. We were one of the first people there, so there was no line and also no idea which was the entrance and exit. It was also completely FREE. I was stunned. 

Once you drive through all the lights you end up at a building with a sign to denote Santa's Workshop. We were early so the door was still locked. I figured it would be like the mall - you wait in line, have someone take a photo with Santa and you walk away. We stood out front for about 10 minutes before they let us in and O. to the M. to the G. I was blown away. It wasn't just a doorway with a Santa in it....it was a proper workshop. It looks like a workshop that's turned into the North Pole. There were probably 50 fully decorated trees, animated marionettes, a cookie bar with cookies and cocoa for sale, and a very well dressed Santa. Talk about authentic. And FREE. It was by donation only and under all the tress that were on the main floor were buckets. You put pennies in the buckets to vote for your favorite trees and I assumed the money was going towards the 4-H club. One lady we talked to said that she's been going there since she was a kid (I assumed she was in at least her 60s) and some of those marionettes were the same ones that they used when she was a kid. They were that old and still in amazing condition.

Rachel was so over stimulated by everything she kept running back and forth looking at everything. There was another little boy about her age that went in at the same time we did.

I had tried to explain to Rachel that we'd be going in, sitting on Santa's lap and he would ask her what she wanted for Christmas. I was attempting to avoid the screaming child on Santa's lap scene. Not sure if that was helpful or not.

Because in the midst of her running around and trying to play in Santa's workshop with this little boy we kept trying to get her to go sit on Santa's lap before a bunch of people showed up and we did have to wait in line. Then we'd let her run around she wanted in Santa's workshop.

We finally got her attention and she ran over to where Santa was sitting in the corner of his workshop and before he could put her on his lap she exclaimed "MONKEY!" and tried to bound away to play. We finally coaxed her to hold still for a little bit to take her picture with Santa and he asked her what she wanted for Christmas to which she repeated, "Monkey".

Yes. All our daughter wanted for Christmas this year was a Monkey.


She's not afraid in this photo....it was just an unfortunate capturing. My phone would NOT cooperate, so I had to use Jason's. The quality may not be very good, but at least you get the point!

 

Turning 4

Each milestone we've had over the past couple of years has been met with a healthy dose of chaos. Rachel's birthday came in the middle of a million activities and budget constraints. So, to make it special we decided to have 2 separate birthday parties for her. I'm not yet to a point where I want to shell out a bunch of money for a party of screaming kids, most of which we don't know. (Kids at her school have birthday parties constantly and just invite kids from school, which I think is a great idea. However, I'm not ready to host a part of so many unknown faces just yet). This year I asked what she wanted to use for decorations for her birthday and the selected theme was My Little Pony. Perfect and appropriate. I started calling around and of course most bakeries are booked up because it's so close to Thanksgiving. So I settled for the usual grocery store cake and I thought they did a really good job! We had a family gathering at the house and Jason and I decorated the dining room in balloons and MLP decorations. (Which sadly I had to pick out and purchase with Rachel because I honestly did not have enough time to sneak out to get the decorations without her).

I thought we did a fantastic job of transforming the place. Her cake was adorable too!

The ponies on the cake, in my opinion, were much more durable and fun to play with than the normal ponies you can buy. Regardless, her collection of ponies has grown and she loves it.

Jason's family had a lot of fun bringing her gifts and she had a wonderful time!

Since the week after her birthday was Thanksgiving and we were spending it with my family, they asked to do a birthday cake and some presents. My mom took care of the cake:

Our girl is now 4!

The Bra-ttitude

Oof. 3 months since I've posted. I'm tres behind and I apologize. I have a few stories and lots of photos of Rachel to share. Let me start with the most recent and work my way back.

A few days ago Howell informed me the washing machine was broken. In preparation I pulled a lot of my stuff out of the laundry room and into the dining room. Included was my laundry cart. I was sitting in the living room watching tv on my phone while Rachel watched cartoons when she left the room. She does this often to get a snack or play with Papa. A little while later she came into the room wearing MY BRA. I had no idea she'd go through the dirty laundry in the dining room, let alone pull out my unmentionables! I'd like to think I don't embarrass easily, but this one left me feeling so silly. I asked Rachel what she was doing and she told me she was playing "dress up" and she wanted to be an "animal." I thought Howell was going to explode he was laughing so hard and trying to be quiet. I had to leave the room or I'd have broken into a fit of giggles myself. It was so hard to keep my composure! I was too mortified to take photos. However, I was relieved she does this embarrassing stuff at home and not in public!
Here are some photos that may or may not be considered "recent". The below photo is of Rachel and Jason playing around in the yard. This was after we'd opened a pumpkin to carve....and Rachel refused to put her hand in it. So....I cooked it instead!

Oh look! Another Elsa! I was somewhat relieved she didn't choose this as her Halloween costume this year. However, GramE got her this while we were visiting one weekend and she was SOOO excited!

Our annual trip to the pumpkin patch! This was actually a pretty neat place. It wasn't too cold and Rachel ran herself silly with all the activities. There was a 20' slide, a big jumping thing, and even a zipline she could ride!

 

HALLOWEEN:

 

 

 



 

 

For Halloween this year we went out the weekend before. Here in Newburgh they have a "walking parade" where the kids go into businesses to get candy rather than door to door. It's an amazing and sweet thing all the businesses do. In about 15 minutes you've walked the entire downtown area and the kids have baskets just full enough of candy. It's safe, and it's a great way to get into some of the businesses you might not have time to see (at least in my case, I was thrilled). The weekend before Halloween it was 90° outside. That's not an exaggeration. That's seriously how hot it was. In this photo above? I'm wearing a sweater and I was absolutely drenched by the time we walked home again! Rachel decided to be Belle....and that dress is one Aunt Cindy picked up a year ago for her to play with. She wears it constantly. But she was thrilled!

 

 

This photos below was a costume I picked up last year on clearance (it's the only way to buy costumes, amiright?) It's a Raccoon costume she wore for a birthday party we went to at the local YMCA for a pair of twins from her school. That's right! We actually got out and did something social! Usually I'll opt out of it, but I knew Rachel would have a good time and she did. They painted bird houses, ate cake, then went into the game room to play games. She loved it!

Look at how big those headphones on her! She's finally big enough to wear the headphones in the car when we travel to Indy. Jason and I are thrilled. We're REALLY tired of the usual DVDs we have in the car!

 

 And of course, 3 weeks ago it was 90°. One week ago it was in the 60's. This past weekend? 4" of snow. Ah Indiana.....if it weren't for our families living here.....we'd be OUT OF HERE! Anyway....Monday I needed to take Jason to the airport so we decided to take Rachel in to school a little later than usual, which gave her time to play in the snow while it was still fresh. She was beyond excited. I needed to start work so I let her play outside in the backyard by herself for a bit. Every time I checked on her she was running down a hill, eating the snow, laying on her back looking at the sky or just running in circles. She was squealing and giggling the whole time. As soon as she was out the door she exclaimed, "Mom! It's Elsa's snow!!" Closer to time to leave I headed out and took her out in a sled and pulled her around the yard. That night when we got home we had just enough daylight to take the sled to the side yard (which has an almost treacherous hill to sled down) and I took her down a few times. Not a hill I'm ready for her to slide down by herself....it even scared me a little bit. We went down a few times and now that it's Wednesday the snow has already mostly melted. One good thing about living further south: You don't have to deal with the snow for as long!

As we drive through town Rachel is always looking for Christmas lights. She's been doing this since around the beginning of October when people put out lights for Halloween. Closer to Halloween we were on our way home when we noticed a new batch of lights and she said in a really funny voice, "ohhhhh, Christmas lights! What time is it? Is it Christmas?" I had to inform her it wasn't even Halloween yet!

The other night as she sat on the couch I looked over at her and realized she has gotten so long! When she stands up she doesn't seem taller, but just seeing her sitting on the couch I can actually see that she's taller.

That's all I can think of off the top of my head.....and quite honestly all I have time for right now!

Sometimes.....I Call You Momma

I posted before about how Rachel calls me Momma and I don't care for it. I was a little surprised by some reactions on that one. Just a personal preference.....I like Mommy. So I told Rachel I would rather she call me Mommy instead of Mommy, which resulted in her telling me a few weeks ago, "Sometimes.....I call you Momma". Bless her heart. She's so sweet. But I did tell her that I would just rather she call me mommy.

Recently she's taken up to giving us roles. And at first it was cute. Now it's just kind of worn out its welcome. I'm fairly certain this was learned when she spent some time up in Indy with my side of the family and her cousin was constantly telling her, "I'm the mommy and you're the dog. Now go fetch." She likes to tell me and her grandmother that she's the princess and we're the sisters. One weekend she insisted on calling me queen, Jason king, and herself princess. The WHOLE weekend. The "game" as it were, only lasts a few sentences then she's off on the next thing. And perhaps 5 minutes later will tell me she's the mommy and I'm the sister. I finally started replying, "ok, you can be the princess, but I'm still the mommy." I love my daughter and I LOVE her imagination. But sometimes I do get weary of it.

So.....let's do a photo posting! I'll probably think of more stories as I go:

The next few photos are going to be from Rachel at school. (I really like the blog her teacher posts). This summer the school went on a field trip EVERY week. They'd go to local parks, the library, pretty much every place you take small kids except the zoo (the zoo came to the school). All excellent field trips and I'm glad she got to go on them! This one is at the Evansville museum, where Jason's mother and Grandfather are docents. Howell made sure he was the docent on the day that Montessori came to the Planetarium and he did the show. When I picked Rachel up from school that day she was excited to tell me that "Papa was in space!" And for a few weeks afterwards she would ask him if he was going back to space again.

This past weekend she decided she wanted to wear a pretty outfit. I honestly don't get to dress her up hardly at all. Since we now all watch church on Saturday mornings together I don't even get to dress her up to go out to church on Sunday! So I have a lot of cute outfits and she rarely gets to wear them. When she wanted to dress up I instantly thought to myself, "No! She'll get the outfit dirty and ruin it!" which was quickly followed by, "Meh. It's not like she ever gets to wear her cute stuff....just let her." So she did. And I grabbed my camera and went for a walk to try to take a ton of photos and hope for at least one really good one. I got a couple.....

Here she is holding her baby cousin August:

Here's another cutie pattootie outfit I got for her.....and the Jesse doll I found that she adores:

And here's a really good story:

The magnets in the photo above have been on our fridge since before Rachel could walk. She doesn't play with them often. But I noticed the other day she had rearranged them and you can see the word "Pray" came out of it. She doesn't know her letters by sight yet, let alone can she spell. No one else ever messes with the magnets, so this had to be done by her. The reason this is a good story...

When we first moved here I decided that every night we would all sit around the table and have dinner together. (Yeah yeah, once in a while we eat in front of the tv...) And each night we pray before dinner and Rachel just seemed intrigued. So much so, that one time we forgot and she insisted we needed to pray. I think she enjoys it and of course I'll encourage that! She's even taken to praying on her own before dinner. Right now it comes out, "Thank you for puppy dogs.......thank you for kitty cats...." and sometimes there's a thank you for mommy, daddy and papa....although not so much recently. So when I came into the kitchen and noticed that was on the fridge I HAD to take a photo to remember it.

Before bed we always read a book. On the weekends I try to make it a biblically-related one as I've managed to acquire several. Her favorite seems to be the book about prayers. It's a tiny book that Jalaine got for her for one of my book showers and I'm elated that it's one of her favorites. It's really helped me to be able to open up to her and teach her about God since we're not going to a church now with a children's program (although I know she misses it....I do plan to take her once in a while if it works out). So the fact that my 3 yr old likes to pray and likes to listen when I talk to her about God....I truly feel blessed!

This photo above was my birthday dinner. I've already posted that Rachel like sushi but on this night she insisted on eating my Ikura (Salmon Roe) which is not normally anyone else's favorite. She loves it! She used the kids' chopsticks to pick up the roe balls one by one and eat them. We got her chicken fingers and fries and she didn't touch them. Ah.....love that she loves sushi and tofu!

We are really blessed that our hard work to keep Rachel from constantly wanting cookies, ice cream and candy have paid off. Rarely will she ask for any of those things. She knows those are earned. When she does something I know she doesn't want to do without complaint I'll let her get some M & M's from the candy jar. When she eats a good dinner without a lot of prompting there's usually ice cream. And once in a great while we'll all go out for ice cream together. This has resulted in her helping herself in the fridge and she'll actually ask for foods she knows we won't say no to....bananas, apples, cheese, juice/milk. I try to put a lot of that on the lower shelves and for the most part she helps herself.

I can also tell her to go upstairs and get dressed and she'll pick out an outfit that (usually) matches and dress herself. HOOOOOOOOOOORAY for independence!! I love it! Bathroom time usually doesn't need much help from us anymore.

After dinner she'll asked to be excused and immediately go in and wash her hands and face.

She's really listening and understanding (most of the time, not all!) and this has led to Jason and I feeling a lot of relief. She does still need a LOT of help and she honestly gets restless at home on the weekends when we're exhausted and she wants us to play with her. She does entertain herself to a point, but hey, she's 3. We can't expect her to spent 12 hours a day entertaining herself. This past weekend I decided to get her tricycle out and take her to a local elementary to let her ride it. Her knees are barely below the handle bar. We're going to have to get her a bike in the spring! I'd love to get her one for her birthday.....but that would be cruel. November is cold and she'd have to wait 5 months to ride it. So I plan to get her one in the spring with training wheels. There's also a really nice playground there and yesterday Jason and I were just worn out. No energy and Rachel was chattering/climbing excessively and I could tell she needed out of the house. So we took some chairs and set them up and let her run herself silly all over the playground. I felt a little guilty sitting there in a chair watching her play but I keep telling myself that at least I wasn't playing on my phone and at least we made an effort to get her out of the house and doing something active. I had really wanted to take her to the zoo...more to justify the purchase of the membership pass so I could go whenever I wanted than anything, but it's been too stinkin' hot. Not to mention it's a 30 minute drive over there so I feel we'd need to stay at least 2 hours to justify the drive alone. We'll get over there again sometime soon.

Anyway....those are the stories I can think of right now.