Good Night Owl

Tired of early morning wake-up calls, I finally broke down and bought Amelia a "toddler alarm clock."  They have a built-in clock that you can set to turn green when it is ok for the child to get up. They are a bit pricey, so I had put off buying one for a long time. However I found the owl clock on sale, so I bought it. At the set time, the owl will light up in a green color. If the child wakes up, he or she can squeeze the belly and it will say "It's not time to get up yet, go back to sleep" and play soothing music - well not so soothing when you here it go off over and over again at 6 am.  I thought that might be a good feature for Amelia.

Amelia was very excited to get a new toy, which is the problem.  To her, it is a toy just like her glow sea horse; she could care less about staying in bed until it turns green.  We have some days she will proudly come into our room and show us the owl turned green, but most days she still arrives in our room at 6:30 am with all her "friends" in tow (she brings in about five stuffed animals and blankets.). Part of the problem is that we didn't think this through before we gave it to her and have not been strict about having her go back to her bed until it is time to get up. I think we are going to incorporate a sticker chart along with the owl. She seemed excited about that.

Outtakes 2011

Crazy demon child

After listening to Allison's excessive whining, Amelia's head is about to explode.

Why taking pictures after getting back from swiming and before I have had time
to change them and brush their hair is not a good idea.



Nothing like a sugar crash.

 

Amelia, I told you before, stay out of my room. You can't come through this door.  

Unintended shot.

Monkey See, Monkey Do.

Happy New Year

 

We started off our New Year's Eve party with a trip to the community center to go swimming. Allison and Amelia love it there and always have a great time playing in the pool. We came home afterward to make some of our favorite munchies and appetizers for dinner. While we prepped dinner, the girls decorated the toothbrushes they received in their stockings. They received a kit with an electronic toothbrush and several sheets of stickers. I was amazed at how long this kept them busy. We concluded the evening's festivities (around 8 pm) with the annual throwing of confetti (ripped up newspaper) and blowing noise makers. 

 

Even More Christmas Celebration

The day after Christmas we celebrated with Brian's side of the family. His brother is a police officer and had to work both Christmas Eve and Christmas, so we postponed our celebration a day. 

The girls had fun playing with their cousin, Faith, and opening even more presents. The girls were hyper from all the activity, so we drove around to look at Christmas lights so they could settle down before bedtime. We had to look at Clark Griswold's house, a house we had discovered earlier that week while driving around, one more time.