Miracle of Survival

Remember how tenderly you held your first child, how carefully you dressed her and kept her out of harm's way?

DO YOU EVER WONDER HOW THE SECOND CHILD SURVIVES?

Disclaimer: the Dad took these pictures :)

The Growl

Jane, our cute little six-month-old baby, who should be cooing and giggling and charming the world, prefers rather to growl.  I am not exaggerating, she growls like a lion.  When she is happy she growls, when she is excited she growls, when she wants something she growls.  It is not a typical baby sound and can be rather embarrasing in public places, especially quite places like church, but we get a kick out of it.  Here is the proof.  See what you think.

Marshmallow Assault

My mom always gives us a toy on Christmas morning, something to shoot at each other or bring out the mature side of her children.  This year the toy was marshmallow blow guns.  After the initial Christmas day battles, we settled into the more serious business of planning an assault on our older brother when he arrived the next day.  Check out our clever disguises prepared for the ambush.

You should have heard the group of us, all over thirty years old, giddily planning our attack.  The best part was choosing which phrase from The Lord of the Rings would be our signal to begin firing.  We finally chose the two tone horn from Helm's Deep performed by Mom with a duck call.

The ambush went down quite well.  The climactic moment was when Carrie dumped a bread bowl of marshmallows down on Greg's head from the top of the stairs--the pot of boiling oil essential to any good fight.  It only took about a minute and thirty seconds to get Greg to surrender.  Most of that time he was completely bewildered as to what on earth was going on.  The 10 hours of preparation was definitely the highlight.  And, of course, the memories!

Christmas Through the Eyes of a Two-Year-Old

For the first time Kate is truly excited about Christmas.  We had fun stringing popcorn and decorating our tree with gingerbread boys, oranges, and candy canes, all of which Kate has tasted at some point during the season.  She bit one of the arms off a gingerbread man the first morning after we decorated.  We put that poor maimed gingerbread boy right in the front and center of the tree.  When I asked her at the beginning of December what she wanted for Christmas she said, "A beautiful fly."  In Kate language that means a butterfly.  She knows that Santa wears red and has a white beard and brings us "treats" on Christmas morning.  When we watched selected scenes from The Polar Express she was mesmerized by the images of Santa, the sleigh, and the reindeer.  It was fun to watch her face as all the stories and songs about Santa came together with an actual image.  Taking a page out my sister's book, we took her to IKEA and let her pick out anything she wanted for her grandparents.  She chose an ice cream scoop for Grandpa Larry, some colorful scissors for Grandma Shelly, an alarm clock for Grandpa Woodford, and some little containers for Grandma Woodford.  Rather appropriate gifts, I think.  She will tell anyone who will listen that her "favorite Christmas song is Silver Bells" and she knows every word.  She also loves to sing Rudolph and Up on the Housetop and Away in a Manger.  Her Woodford grandparents gave us a beautiful illustrated song book of Christmas carols.  We sing songs every night before bed and sometimes for hours during the day.  During the ward choir's christmas program she kept asking me when they would sing Up on the Housetop.  She knows that Jesus was born on Christmas day and that lots of animals were there.  I can't believe how fun it is to see Christmas through the eyes of a two-year-old.  It truly is a magical season.

He Needs His Mommy

Just when I thought we had gone through every possible form of sickness this year Kate came down with the worst bug yet.  Just in time for Christmas she developed a lovely stomach bug.  I spent a lot of time holding her, bathing her when she had chills, reading her stories...you know, the things moms do for sick children.  Yesterday, we watched the part of the Polar Express.  When we got to the part where the little boy losses his bell and is sad, Kate looked over at me with a look of genuine concern and said, "He needs his Mommy."  Payday for the mom of the house!

Taste

Kate loves to go on adventures with her Grandpa Larry.  Every once in a while Grandpa will come pick Kate up and they will spend the afternoon together.  The other day they were walking around downtown when they passed the windows of OC Tanner, the nicest jewler in the city.  She looked in the windows and said, "Grandpa, this is a nice store.  Let's go in there."  So they went inside and looked at the beautiful Christmas decorations, jewelry, etc.  This story means even more when you consider that a few weeks ago they went on an outing to Grandpa's favorite tool store.  As they entered the building Kate wrikled up her nose and said, "Grandpa, it's a mess in here."

Emerging

We have been under the shadow of sickness for over a month now.  We are finally emerging only to discover that Christmas is upon us, Jane has teeth and can crawl, Kate turned into a big girl who sings carols by herself, and Josh is still working on his first application.  Some things change so quickly and others never seem to change.  I have several blog entries to catch up on, but for now I just wanted to let you know that we are alive and have not completely given up on blogging.  Don't give up on us yet.