Don Julio and the Tea Party

 

 About a month ago Addie and I were making tacos for lunch.  While I was waiting for the beans to heat up, I happened to read the tortilla package, which is when I learned about Don Julio's promise that we will love his tortillas.  I said, "Wow, Addie! It says here that Don Julio, the guy on the package, promises we'll like these.  You'll have to taste it and see."  Little did I know that this was the beginning of a small but loyal Don Julio customer.  She took one bite of her taco and said, "He was right!  I do like these!"  Then a week or so later, we were eating tortilla chips and discovered they were also Don Julio brand.  Addie asked, "Does he promise we'll like these, too?"  I read the package, and sure enough he does.  True to his word, Addie liked them.  Later that night, as I was tucking her into bed, she asked (in a very sleepy voice), "Mom, what else does Don Julio make?"  Well, that cracked me up because it seemed so odd that it was on her mind just then, but I answered her question.  "I think he makes salsas, too."  "Does he promise I'll like them?"  "Probably."  "We should get some."  " Okay.  Goodnight."
Now every time we eat tortillas or tortilla chips she checks the package to see if they are Don Julio brand.  She's excited when it is, and visibly disappointed when it's not.  Sorry Tia Rosa, but Don Julio is a man of his word.

 She kind of looks like Don Julio in this photo, but actually she's dressed up like her dad.  She likes to play tricks, this one. 

 Here's monkey Jack.  He likes to hang on to the gate for the stairs and jump.  When you try to pull him off he puts his feet up on the bars and grips on tightly with both his hands and toes.  I know he's only 8 months old, but he's already stronger than me.  Maybe I should start exercising.

We finished Addie's art gallery, the place for all her art to be on display instead of taking over the rest of the house.  Perhaps we'll have a gallery stroll sometime and put out plates of fancy cheeses and crackers, and perhaps she'll sell some of her work and pay her way through kindergarten. 

 I'm worried Jack is planning to take off running soon.  Here he is casually standing by the couch, harmlessly scoping out the front room, looking so sweet and innocent, but deep down planning a raid on all the garbage cans and cupboards in the whole house and biding his time while he conditions himself for such a feat.

 And then, just from thinking about that glorious moment when he takes us all by surprise, his face gives away a hint of the disaster within.  I'm on to you, buddy. 

Addie invited Grandma over for a tea party last Thursday.  She made the invitation herself, delivered it on her own (with a little help from the Mom Taxi Service), made the necklaces and decor (with a little help from Mom Party Supply), made the sandwiches, soup, salad, beverage, and cookies for lunch (with a little help from Mom Catering) and served up tea all on her own (with a little help from Mom Disaster Clean-up).  It was a success and we all had an enjoyable time.  I think grandma felt pretty special.  Here's to moms!  We wouldn't get far without them!

It was such a sweet little party, and it was fun to see Addie take it seriously and be so excited for it.  We'll have to do it again sometime, especially the next time Nana comes to visit us! 

Jack be Nimble, Jack be Quick

 This post is all about Mr. Jack, or as we often call him, Bubba.  He is such a happy and busy baby!  He is nearly eight months old and is already so accomplished.  My bragging bumper sticker hasn't come through the mail yet, but it's been ordered. 

He plays the piano and is self-taught! He loves anything noisy, which is probably why he loves his sister so much.

 He has the ability to solve his own thirst issues, provided he has a full sippy cup within reach.  He drinks like a pirate though, letting the water spill out of his mouth and all over his bib.  Then he swings his cup around while singing gibberish (something akin to "Drink! Drink! Drink!") and slams it down on his tray, sloshing his drink all over the place.

 He is also trained is self-defense and has developed new and unheard of methods, such as: drooling, hair-pulling, neck pinching, and face-poking.  The hardest hold to get out of is one I like to call The Leech.  He pinches both sides of his opponents neck, pulls his/her face forward into his open and slimy mouth and attaches to the forehead with intense sucking power.  Unable to pull away due to the extreme neck grip, the opponent (or rather, victim) has no choice but to wait until Jack decides to let go.  A variation of that is The Snorkel, equally difficult to escape.  He uses the same approach, but instead of attaching to the forehead he goes for the entire nose.  Sometimes he bites.

He can swim, provided the water isn't very deep and he stays on his back.  He's a big fan of water.  Sometimes he crawls in to the bathroom, pulls himself up at the tub and then just stands there looking in.  He often has his tongue out during baths and kicks non-stop.  The bathroom is very wet after he's done and ready to get out.

He crawls under close-to-collapsing bridges with no fear.  He has been crawling for nearly a month now.  He figured out how to roll at 3 months, sit at 5 months, crawl at 7 months, and pull himself up at 7 1/2 months.  He's into everything and is just a non-stop kid.  He can't even hang around long enough for a complete diaper change and usually takes off as soon as the diaper is off.  Good thing he's usually in such a pleasant mood or he'd be serious trouble.

This is just a cute picture, no explanation behind it.  He did like sucking on the sparkly ribbon, though, which left him with a sparkly (albeit toothless) smile.  Actually, all of him ended up pretty sparkly after some present tasting.

 He has excellent pointing skills.  He points and pokes at everything with his tiny little pointer fingers.  He's up for a little E.T. pointing whenever, as is demonstrated in the above photograph.

Here he is hanging out with Addie during her last dental appointment with Bapa.  He has very big and very blue eyes.  He usually looks surprised.  Or maybe he actually is surprised all the time.  It's hard to see, but he has fuzzy blond-white hair all over his head.  Or maybe just in a few patches...like I said, it's hard to see.  But you can feel it, so we know it's there.

This is a living, breathing Jack-in-the-Box.  He even pops out like the fake ones. 

 Okay, maybe he's just like a lot of other babies, but we sure think he's one-of-a-kind.  We love this little boy so much and can't even remember what life was like without him.  Or maybe we just don't want to. 

Oh, and it occurred to me that some of you might be thinking that we've planned for all the girls in our family to have A names and all the boys to have J names.  We are actually not doing that, but it seemed wise to pick names that would work with that plan just in case we decide we want to at some future point.  Smart, eh? 

Christmas Bliss(ter)

Christmas was spent at home this year, so we were pretty relaxed and glad we didn't have to try cramming everything into our dinky car and take the fam on a long drive.  Also, we could live in our pajamas amongst piles of discarded wrapping paper and bows for several days afterward with very little shame.  I'm not saying we did, just that we, um,  could...if we wanted to, that is.  In short, it was a deliciously lazy Christmas this year, with the exception of an Instacare visit.  I'll get to that later.  First, some elvish fun!

I finally acquired an advent calendar this year and got to work filling up all the little drawers with various goodies and slips of paper with Christmas activities on them.  We made ornaments, read Christmas books, watched holiday movies, built a snowman, etc., but the most enjoyed one was: dress up like elves and dance to Christmas music. I took pictures of it, of course.

 Okay, I'll admit we look more like homeless elves than North Pole elves, but I believe an elf is an elf despite itself.

 On Christmas Eve Addie put out treats for Santa (egg nog, a clementine, and a small handful of popcorn) and his reindeer (carrots).    For some reason, Santa failed to eat the popcorn.  My theory is that he peeled the clementine and ate it first, and then forgot about the few popcorn puffs because they were hidden under the peels.  Just a theory...

Christmas morning was fun, as it should be.  Jack was carried out of his room and placed in front of his stocking, an event that left him stunned.

Despite his stunned state, he was still able to place the contents of his stocking in his mouth without even looking.  He doesn't let much get in the way of his research.  In fact, he researched things all day.  See the following three photos.

Addie's most exciting present from Santa was "a whole tea set."  She tells everyone who asks what Santa brought her that she got a "whole tea set."  That's right, people.  Santa didn't skimp and give her just a tea cup or a sugar bowl, he gave her an entire tea set.  I'm not sure if she's including the tablecloth, table, chairs, and donuts, but she was pretty impressed by it anyhow.  We tea-partied all morning.

Jack got a rocking horse from Nana, which opened his eyes to new experiences.  Literally.  If I'm being truthful though, Jack always looks a bit surprised, Christmas or not.

We went to my parents' home for more Christmasing later that day.  Addie received the above track set from Uncle Stevie, which, and I quote from the box, "brings experiences of ultimate joy".  Quite a claim, I know.  We were spoiled rotten, as we usually are from both our families each year.  The best part of Christmas though, and maybe its because I'm getting old now that I feel this way, is family.  We did video phone calls with Jason's family even, so its like we saw everyone this year.  That's the biggest and best gift of all!

Sadly, Addie's Christmas fun was temporarily put on hold due to injury.  She was leaning down to pick up a present from under the tree when she fell forward a little and bumped her arm on the fireplace glass, which was incredibly hot at the time since the fire was on.  I grabbed her and somehow magically teleported ( I must have tapped into my super mom powers) into the bathroom where I immediately began running her arm under cold water.  After several minutes, we switched to icing it.  It just looked like a huge gray spot on her arm, kind of weird but not too bad.  About an hour later it began to get little blisters.  And then the little blisters started joining forces until it was one huge blister.

We put her in the car and headed to Instacare at around 7, just two hours after the initial burn.  Instacare, however, was closed for the holiday.  I made phone calls to Primary Children's and a nearby ER and talked with various staff about what we should do.  We eventually decided to take her home, keep it covered, and take her in in the morning.   Later that night we gave her a blessing which made us all feel better. 

We took her in the next morning to get it checked out.  When the nurse asked her what happened, Addie began telling her how she was reaching for a present, bumped the glass, had to run it under cold water, etc.  But then she kept going with her story, " And we tried to go see the doctor, but it was closed, so we went back to grandma's house.  Then I ate a turkey sandwich (it was actually ham) and some chips and soda, then we played a game..." and on it continued, outlining the entire evening.  She cracks us up, this one.  Then they asked if she had any allergies, to which Addie answered, "No, but my mom does.  She's allergic to cats.  She used to looooove cats, but then one day she was petting one and then her eyes started to look like she was going to sleep.  Her face got all swolled up and now she can't pet them unless she washes her hands right after."  Very informative for the staff, I'm sure.  (And for the record, I have never looooooved cats.)  This experience has made me wonder what other things she has babbled off to people...  Anyway, we received instructions to put on an antibacterial prescription cream on it two times a day and keep it covered with gauze and co-flex (the cool bandage stuff you get after donating blood) for a week.  As the nurse was wrapping up her arm she said, "Sorry, I'm trying not to hurt you." To which Addie replied, "Actually, ( long and thoughtful pause) it's not hurting me at all!"  She really was a pleasant patient and wasn't bothered by any of it.

It has healed up pretty nicely, although it looked bad for the first week.  It's too early to tell if it will scar, but she does have a large pink oval on her forearm still.  She has been brave about the whole thing and never once complained about it hurting, which I attribute to the blessing she received.  The cream looks just like vanilla frosting, so twice a day we played a game where we "frosted" her arm, pretended to put sprinkles on it, and then "packaged" it up for delivery.  Heck, it was almost fun.

You can see her spiffy arm bandage in this picture.  She's busy doing a science experiment (which she takes very seriously) with a science lab set she got for Christmas.  She is making a volcano, which is pretty dangerous stuff and requires large safety goggles.

In all, it was a pretty memorable and overall enjoyable Christmas.  Now, on to the New Year!