New Year's Eve Dinner with Family

On New Year's Eve day, we ventured to Sierra Madre to visit my Grandmother and my cousins for the day. We don't get to see my cousins too often, and this was their first time meeting Kaitlyn.

Zachary's New Tricycle

Zachary just loves his new tricycle. Here are just a few fun photos of him.

Christmas Morning

This was a fun morning for Zachary. He just was thrilled with what Santa brought him. He had asked Santa for a black truck and presents. Actually, the black truck was the last thing he noticed under the tree. His favorite was his new kitchen and tricycle. Kaitlyn, not being a morning person, slept in and enjoyed her gifts a little later in the day.

Here are just some fun pictures from the morning -

His kitchen was the first stop

The fire truck was a big hit too

A little ride around the house on his new tricycle

Kaitlyn finall woke up and joined us for some fun

Zachary thought Kaitlyn might enjoy his new glasses

Time to see what is in the stockings

Chistmas Eve

Christmas Eve was a quiet one for us. We started the evening at home having a wonderful dinner and opening a few gifts. I want to start the tradition of giving pj's at this time, but that wasn't to happen this year. I ended up having the kids open the one gifts they were giving to each other.

As always, bedtime gets very hectic around here, so I actually forgot about leaving Santa any cookies and milk. To my horor, I had to get everyone out of bed, but I am so glad I did. Zachary just loved doing this, even though he was kind of upset the next morning that Santa actually ate his cookies.

Zachary enjoying his dinner, especially the olives

Kaitlyn all dolled up for the festivities

Zachary enjoying a ride on his Great Grandma's walker

Getting all the goodies ready for Santa

Kaitlyn getting the carrot ready for Rudolph

Our tree after Santa came to visit

Family Christmas Photos

As I posted sometime earlier, I bought this great new camera primarily because I was having issues with photographers. I promised myself that if I bought this camera, I would not go and pay for photos to be taken. So, the day has arrived that I am put to the test - taking the perfect family Chistmas photo with just the two kids and then including me. Have I mention that I'm a perfectionist? Well............to cut to the chase, it did not go smoothly. There was some terrible kicking and screaming tantrums along the way, and they were mostly mine. But in the end, I think they turned out pretty good for an armature. I'm not sure if I will attempt this again any time soon for the sake of my sanity, but it was a lesson learned on my part.

These pictures didn't make the Christmas card but I thought were still very cute.

Crafts and Home Made Decorations

I had lofty ideas this year that Zachary and I would make tons and tons of crafts to decorate the house with. Yeah,well......that just didn't happen. I found that I really need to plan months in advance for these kind of activities. The holiday season started off this a bang and didn't seem to let up until it was all over. We did a few things things. But thanks to his teachers at school and a friend that invited us over for a craft play date, Zachary did get to make some holiday crafts.

Busy concentrating on his Santa

Our wall of crafts

The is the little bit of craft decorating we did together

My Baby Girl Turns 7 Months Today

I am having a hard time believing that my baby is already 7 months old. This past month has just flown by with all the holiday activities that seem to fill our days. But my little Miss Kaitlyn has been busy with her own agenda. In this past month she has mastered sitting on her own along getting into that sitting position all by herself. She is also doing a fine job at crawling now too. She does more of the army crawl at the moment, but it surely gets her to where she wants to go. WOW, this is 4 months earlier than when Zachary accomplished these milestone. I can tell she is already constantly trying to keep up with her big brother. Kaitlyn has also cut two teeth and is diligently working on some more. Zachary likes to remind me that "Kaitlyn is growing teeth and hair." And she truely is!!!! But the hair is slower in coming in than the teeth.

I took some time out to have some fun and take some "Santa Baby" pictures of my sweet sweet girl.

A Rainy Day

Since we live in Southern California and it doesn't rain that often, I must say I love a rainy day. Especially when I can stay at home and watch it from within my warm home. And adding the good smells of fresh baked gingerbread cookies didn't hurt either.


I also have some very fond memories from childhood when I stole the opportunity to walk home from school in the rain. I just loved those days. And of course, I ended up at my front door just soaking wet. My mom would be there at home, after missing me at school, with hot coco and a warm fire to warm by.


So when my son looked out at the rain and instantly announced he wanted to go outside, how could I say no?!?!?! I told him he could go, but not to get too wet. Haha, who was I kidding? But that's what makes it all the more fun, right? I almost had as much fun as he did reliving those enjoyable moments of jumping in puddles.

Oh what a happy face!!!

Jumping in the puddles are the best

stuck in the mud

Finally, time to come inside and warm up

Window Decorations

A big hit in the decorating arena were the window decals. I had no idea this would be so much fun, plus so easy. Zachary had just a blast peeling and placing the decals. And then of course, through the weeks ahead, they were always peeled up again and moved around.

Gingerbread Men

Nothing says Christmas to me like Gingerbread men. I just love gingerbread as does Zachary. I was a little hesitant in making them again, as we had done so earlier in the year when we were working on leaning the letter "G". For us, the project turns out to be an all day event and is a major test on my patience. But for the sake of creating holiday traditions and warm fuzzy memories, I embarked on this project with gusto. And thankfully, it turned out to be fun for us both.

He is now in charge of the mixed and shifter. In no way am allowed to help

He loved rolling out the dough and using the cookie cutter.

He gets into his cooking as much as I do.

I always love cooking with Zachary, though I know he would much prefer to taste test everything versus cook. But that is okay. Cooking help him to try new things I know he would never touch if I just put them on his plate at the dinner table. Thank you Zachary for creating some wonderful Holiday memories for me!