Last One In Is A Rotten Egg!

This Friday night Ellie got to go to Mimi and Pa's house for a winter wonderland party in their neighborhood, and a sleep over. She loved all of the winter stuff - the sledding, the snowball fights, the petting zoo that was off in a corner, not in the snow (even though she got pecked by a duck.) Then in the morning, she got to have Pa's special pancakes. We were asking her about her experience on Saturday afternoon, and she very vigorously informed us that Pa used rotten eggs in the pancakes. She mentioned it several times, and even when we said "do you mean raw eggs?" she said no, she definitely meant rotten. She couldn't eat the batter because Pa said the eggs were rotten.

Upon further review, the adults in the situation said that it was indeed raw eggs that he was trying to steer her from eating, but you know, it's a he said, she said situation. Just goes to show again, that you can never trust a three year old!

There's a Certain Slant of Light

Both of them, once they could crawl, love to crawl over and look at the books. It makes me proud.

The Christmas Train

It's that time of holly jolly year again! Time for our family to head out to the Irvine Park Railroad to visit Santa and chuckle to ourselves while Ellie sobs in Santa's lap. Now with bonus second child!

It was a really nice night. Last year we met up with Lexi and Whitney by chance - this year we all had an early dinner and caravaned over for maximum fun (and then met up with Jonathan and Nathan by chance!) We arrived closer to 7, which meant almost no waiting in lines. We got on the train quickly, had our ride through all of the trees adorned with twinkle lights and then were right in line to meet the big guy. Ellie had been saying all day that she was excited to see Santa, and she was going to sit with him, and she was going to ask him for a candy cane, and when the time came, she watched Lexi and Buddy the Juddy (as she calls Judd) hop up and talk to Santa and then... SHE DID IT! SHE SAT NICELY WITH SANTA!

As you can see, it definitely took her a minute. And she did not touch the big red man, but then she was happy to chat with him. All she wanted was a candy cane and in that bag next to the arm chair was a whole pile of them for her to pick from. PERFECT.

The girls had a great night - they had plenty of time to chase each other around in circles (which they love) and this also helped keep them warm, since it was pretty chilly in the canyons. Especially for Ellie, since I assumed her fleece hoodie was in the car, but it got left at school today (thankfully, Lexi had a hoodie that Ellie squeezed into.) And see Adam's cute socks? Neither of them made it back to the car, somehow. Thankfully, despite all the warnings about the cold, we survived and the Christmas Train did not turn into the Donner Party. Obviously we would have eaten Adam first, as he is helpless and probably not as gamey as Ellie.

After our ride back to the station, we went and had refreshments. Ellie had her first ever hot chocolate, which, SURPRISE SURPRISE, she loved. Everyone got to bed late, which I feel like is the theme of the holidays. Poor Adam was so tired that he fell asleep in the car, and since Tim was picking up our second vehicle, I just shut the garage door and let Adam continue to snooze while I got Ellie into bed.

The kids' cute matching outfits were a present from Mimi, and we love them. They have horses on them, which means that they can be used for days to come, after Christmas has passed. I think the kids look so cute - we may end up doing matching outfits every day from her on out.

All he Wants for Christmas.

Yup, those are some legit fangs!

A badly lit video of Grizz with his Pal. Though the sound is the best part.

Cat Lady.

Our poor sweet Rocky - Ellie wrapped him up like a burrito the other day and he remained in that pink blanket for a good half hour. Rocky is the sweetest of cats - he is very into Adam, which is funny to me. If Adam is on the play mat, Rocky likes to come check him out. The other day Adam was on his stomach and grabbed ahold of Rocky's tail. Rocky got nervous and tried to pull away and just ended up pulling Adam across the floor a bit. Poor kitten tail!

And here she is with her baby boy Thory. Please note - Thor came into the room and I reached out to pet him and he pulled back, scared (like an idiot.) Ellie then came down the hallway and basically sat on him, and he just snuggled up with her and started purring. It's probably because she has learned how to get out the bag of cat treats and get him one.

This is un-cat related. Last Wednesday, my college roommate Monique came down and was my hot date to see Justin Timberlake at the Pond. It was an amazing show. Please enjoy Ellie trying to get herself an invite.

And You Can Hear, From Far and Near

THE MIGHTY BRUINS ROAR!

Bruins 35, Trojans 14!

She was not the best of spectators, but she was pleased by this pom pom that I asked a student to give her (he had two.) We were sitting smack dab in the middle of USC fans, so she needed a little something special.

Adam fell asleep so hard that he was snoring. Just when I think he's too big for all of this Ergo nonsense, he proves that he can still snooze on the go.

Though he did not appreciate when Ellie sat on him. Yes, she did ask me to draw cat make up on her again.

Thanksgiving!

Most of us had a great Thanksgiving - Tim however, had a migraine and missed out on almost all of the food and fun (he did get to go over to Gigi and Grizz's house with me in the morning, where he promptly went and laid down. I took a nap on the couch too, so I can't judge.) But Ellie and Adam were still happy to take all of our food over to Mimi's for the big family party, where Ellie immediately took to practicing her swing on the new putting green, and Adam was happy to smile and coo for all of the various aunties and uncles and cousins in attendance.

Adam wore a hand me down pajama outfit with a turkey on the butt and feet, which was pretty adorable and Ellie wore a dress I got for her at the consignment store, which features merino, angora and cashmere. I like telling her it's made of bunny and goat fur and watching how mad she gets.

This is the only photo I got of the two of them together, but it was the sweetest. This is how they were happily sitting while I was putting together mushroom casserole in the morning.

I feel sort of bad about not getting any higher quality "baby's first Thanksgiving" photos, but the only photo I have of Ellie on her first Thanksgiving is one of her sitting in Jan's guest room, wailing. At least Adam got a tiny taste of whipped cream on his first Thanksgiving! Ellie had to wait until the second year to start hitting the delicious sauce.

Now she is an old pro.

"turkey and potatoes? This in't what I ordered!"

Then today Adam really upped the ante on holiday fun. I left mid-afternoon for a quiet coffee date with myself, and when I came home, he was really crawling! Funny - that's also what happened when Ellie started crawling. I take an hour off from parenting, and come back to an even more troublesome baby!