Fun Times

Just a few pics of fun stuff we've done.

Harper went to a classmate's party.

She really enjoyed the bounce houses AND the cupcakes.

Harper is always putting on my girly shoes and saying "I'm cute!" or "I'm going to work!" This time she looked so proud to be putting on my tennis shoes and it cracked me up.

For Superbowl Sunday we had some fun and ate a bunch of snack foods for dinner. One of her absolute favorite treats is chips and salsa, but sometimes I worry it's too spicy for her. I found some extra mild salsa at the store and she was thrilled to pile it on.

We finally got the doubles attachment for our stroller, so now we can put both kids in it at the same time. Up until now, I would wear Jasper in the sling or let Harper walk and put him in the stroller. But now that the weather is turning warmer and we get out and about more often, this will be perfect! They both have always been great stroller riders, and Jasper doesn't seem to care at all that he only has a side to side view.

My Funny Valentines

Monday was Harper's Valentine's Day party at her school. We hadn't initially planned on going, however we found out it would also be Harper's first day in her new class. She was getting moved up to her Jr. Pre-K 1 class! I thought she would be really surprised and happy if we came, so I left work early and I was right -- she was thrilled! Just like when she moved up to PreSchool, she already knew all the kids in this class which is a huge help in her transition. Since all her favorite friends are in there, she just had to get adjusted to a new teacher, a new class, and new routine. So far so good!

The first change I noticed is that in this class the kids sit boys and girls together, where as before they were separated to keep the messy, wild boys at one table, and the talkative, silly girls at another table. I brought her a mini balloon on a stick as a present and she loved it. I also brought her some heart antenna to wear, but she was not so thrilled to try those on.

Here are a few pics from the party.

Here she is with her table mates. You might notice Jasper in his carrier in the background!

Here's one of the other table of friends.

Once we got home, she was very hyped up on sugar and the excitement of the day. She got tons of great Valentines from her friends and over half of them gave candy too. Daddy and I also each got her a few gifts for the day, which also included sugary sweets. So much candy! She rarely gets to eat it, so it's a huge treat for her.

One of the things she got from one of her friends was a little sheet of princess stickers. One of the things I love about Harper is her willingness to always share. Whether it's food or toys, or whatever, if I ask her to share, she always does. She was looking at the sheet of stickers, put one on her hand, then asked Daddy for his hand and put one on it. Then his other hand. Then on both of mine. Then back on hers until they were all gone. Stickers are her favorite, so it made me very proud that we didn't tell her to do anything with them. And since they were a gift, we certainly wouldn't have asked her to share them. Eventually they all landed on Daddy's face as she decorate him to make him pretty. Daddy also returned the favor.

Right before bathtime, I put the heart antenna on Jasper. This is one of my favorite all-time pictures of him. He's just so cute!!

As per usual, once Jasper does something, Harper usually wants to too. So once I put the heart antenna on him, she was very willing to as well.

It was a very long, exhausting day, but we had a great time. Daddy sent me a beautiful bouquet of roses and calalilies -- they were beautiful!! He also made a wonderful dinner and some cookies rolled in pink sugar. He worked so hard to make his two favorite Valentine girls feel so special!

Iced Over

We were home again today, and the cabin fever definitely set in. By this afternoon the kids were feeling a bit testy and I was totally going stir crazy. I have really loved spending so much time with the kids and I have surprised myself with how relaxed I've been about it. If we could actually leave the house, things would be a million times better. The roads are still completely iced over absolutely everywhere and are expected to be this way for two more days!

I finally ventured out of the house long enough to get the mail and take some pics. Jon said the drive home last night was the worst drive he's ever had. It's crazy out there! I don't know yet if Harper's school will be open tomorrow. I'm thinking even if it's not, I'll try to go to work in the morning. If the drive is bad, I have no problem turning around and coming home. But we'll see.

Some of our pipes have frozen, and we are praying and hoping with all we have that they don't burst. The kids' bathtub barely runs any water, and the cold water in our tub and Jon's sink doesn't run at all. We also noticed we had frost on the INSIDE of our bathroom window this morning, leading us to believe we have a serious insulation problem. Fabulous.

I decided to cook an early dinner because bathtime is always a favorite around here, so I figured it was a good way to kill some time and keep them happy. I had forgotten we only had one bathtub, so I had to quickly clean ours up (it never gets used), and turned on the steaming hot water. I began taking large cup fulls of cold water from my sink and pouring it in, but realized that was going to take a while and the kids were getting antsy. An inspired idea hit me, and I grabbed the entire ice cube container from the freezer and dumped them all in. Harper was watching me and said "whoooa!" once I was done, but she seemed to enjoy seeing ice cubes floating all around the bathtub. It worked great!

Today Harper needed an early nap, which is not a good start to the day. I tried starting to play a game of hide and seek with her stuff animals, but she had a meltdown as we found the very first one, so it was off to bed she went. Things improved a little after that, but she really seemed like she needs a change of scenery. Me too, girl.

Jasper is getting more interested in pulling himself up and crusing these days (finally!), so we worked with him on that today and made a lot of progress. I got him to start using his walker, which was very exciting. And this morning as I was vacuuming, he seemed very interested in the vacuum, so I decided to see if he would enjoy riding it as much as his sister did. While he didn't crack much of a smile, he didn't whine or cry which says a lot. And once I pulled him off, he kept reaching back over to grab at the vacuum until I moved away. It was pretty cute and we all got a good laugh out of continuing the tradition of our vacuum-riding children.

The frost on the inside.

Our street.

Jasper on the vacuum.

Look at me!

Ice cubes in the bath.

Having a blast in the tub.

Ice, Ice, Baby

Texas has been hit by a major ice storm. It's the one time I feel like the results actually lived up to the media hype. I had my doubts, even when almost all area schools declared last night they would be closed in the morning, before we had even had a drop of precipitation. Well, it turned out to be really bad with the roads all frozen solid and no hopes of temps above freezing until Friday. Harper's school closed so I stayed home and the kids, Jon and I lounged around all morning. It was great! Daddy made a big breakfast and we played in Harper's room for a while. Then Daddy had to go to work. I was so nervous about him driving on the roads, but he doesn't have the luxury of not going in like I do. He made it in safely, and we're praying he makes it home okay tonight.

The kids took great naps and I really had an enjoyable day with them with no pressure to feel like I had to get a million things done. We didn't go out and play in the white stuff because with the wind chill, it was 0 degrees today -- not enjoyable at all! I did manage to vacuum today and the kitchen and dining room are clean, but there are toys all over the living room and Harper's room and I just don't care. Harper's school is closed again tomorrow so I'll be home with them again and figure their toys are all ready for them to be played with again!

Jasper's got a monkey on his back. Notice the balloon? It has managed to survive since we saw Yo Gabba Gabba, and has become Jasper's favorite toy. Notice his fingernails digging in? I can't believe it hasn't popped yet.

Harper wanted to pose with the monkey too. And yes, this face was on purpose. It is somehow her new "picture smile" with the almost-closed eyes and all. Lovely, isn't it?

Fun with balloons.

Playing Superman with Daddy.

This afternoon Harper started pulling things out of her dress up box so we decided to try and see how many things we could pile on to her at once. We ended up with 1 dress, 3 skirts, 1 boa, 4 bracelets, 1 headband, 2 tiaras, 1 halo and 1 set of wings. Lookin' pretty good!

Good Eats

Seemingly overnight Jasper has turned into a self feeder. The transition to self feeding is a tricky one for me. On one hand it's harder because pureed food is easier to freeze and store and keep on hand. Plus I can also keep plenty of store bought jarred foods on hand for short notice and being out and about. On the other hand, self feeding provides a lot more variety for him to try and I can usually feed he and Harper the same things, just with his cut up into much smaller pieces.

As I've stated a thousand times before, I do not cook, though I am really trying to enjoy it more. Being a working mommy of two little ones and having Daddy gone 5 nights of the week, dinner is typically throwing together something quick. Though quick does not always have to mean unhealthy. The other day I found some all natural chicken breast on sale, so I chopped it up. I had cooked some sweet potatoes to have on hand, so I cubed half of it. I've been finding great deals on blueberries lately, so I've been giving the kids some with almost every meal. I quartered up some of those for a little dessert (though he ate those first of course).

Harper had the exact same thing, except I sliced the other half of the sweet potato into "fries" and left the chicken in bigger chunks. I typically would have given her some ranch to dip things in, but she we was still getting over a tummy bug so I wanted things bland. I also didn't give her any blueberries, but she wasn't too hungry and didn't mind anyway.

As you can see from the pictures below, he ate every last bit of his dinner. Among some of his other faves are veggie patties, carrots, corn, bananas, and cereal bars. He also likes the Gerber toddler meals which Harper always refused to eat. He is still a little iffy about peas sometimes, and he doesn't love pasta yet but I haven't found too many other things he doesn't like. I hope it stays this way!