My Little Love Bugs

 Aren't these two little loves just precious?? I love these smiles and sibling side hugs!

 And look how much they've changed in just one year? Amazing!

 So, we made Valentines for each other and we also mailed a few to some church and family members.

 Two weeks after our Winter Storm 2013 that I blogged about, we got an actual real snowfall of 5-7 inches. Riley went out sledding in this outfit above and had a great time! And school was closed Wednesday-Friday. Friday happened to be Valentine's Day, so we celebrated with some small gifts (see pictures below) and by the 3rd day of being "snowed in", the kids and I were ready for some fun. So I found a few cute ideas online and we invited Callie over to join us. We "painted" cotton balls and then baked and smashed them. Then we played tossed pom poms through heart-shaped holes hanging from the doorways, hopped along with Heart Hop Scotch, did a heart/cup relay game, rolled the dice for a heart candy trading game, stacked the heart candies into tall towers, and danced around and followed crazy directions while we played Musical Hearts.

 I added some "heart"-felt love and craziness to our lunch plates today.

 Here are the boys shoveling the snow off the steps. Or as Riley put it, he was "getting the snow on the road". Always the big helper!!

 Maggie is double-fisting it here with one of our favorite snacks--"yogurt and crunchy things". She also really loves applesauce too!

And here are the latest highlights in our family this month:

• Riley is super sensitive to smells, especially for foods he doesn't like. We often hear him ask, "What I can smell?" To which is followed by, "I don't want to smell that." And then he'll try to get us to move our plates or eat somewhere else!
• For those times when the food is acceptable to his nose and his taste buds, Riley will give me the highest compliment of all time--"Mom, this is the best food I 'never' had!" At least, I think it's a compliment! 
• Some of us (I won't name names) have gotten a little too comfortable with each other and sadly flatulence has become more common place in our home. Upon hearing one of these sounds, Riley remarked, "That was a serious toot!" 
• Signing up for the Dolly Parton Library and having a book mailed to our home each month is really an awesome way to add to our home collection.  Riley fell in love with this month's book Night House, Bright House by Monica Wellington. It uses some rebus pictures to complete each rhyming line and one phrase in particular tickled Riley's funny bone. "Poppycock, said the block." Not sure why, maybe because it's such an obscure, random word, but Riley could not stop giggling the other night. He requests this book often and will then go around shouting "poppycock" to you for the next several minutes and then burst out laughing. It makes us all smile.
• Riley has a remarkable memory. The other day, he was telling Grandmama that he wanted to go to the park with the big ship where you feed the ducks. This is the park in Union that we've visited only 1 or 2 times with Mommaw and Poppaw. Riley pays attention to things like this and in fact knows the names and playground equipment of various parks in town as well for Cherry Park, Manchester Park, and Cedar Crest. 
• Our little Mags continues to amaze us with her sweet manners and thoughtfulness. Chris handed Maggie her juice cup the other day and without prompting, she responded, "Thank you, Daddy." She is quick to tell anyone "bless you" each and every time you cough, hiccup, or sneeze. 
• The other funny Maggie-ism lately that we have fallen in love with is when she is watching something she likes and responds with "Whoa....Cool!" 
• It is quite evident that Maggie gives Irving the most attention of anyone in our family. Besides constantly bringing him his bone and sitting beside him while he lies in dog bed, she also loves to greet him in the morning with a cheerful, "Hey-ee, Dog-gie!" We love the inflection in her voice when she does this! 

 And this just about sums it all up! All you need is LOVE!!

The Great Winter Storm of 2014

Last week, we experienced Winter Storm 2014 which brought us less than an inch of snow. It barely covered the ground, but schools shut down early on Tuesday, closed on Wednesday, and had a 3 hour delay on Thursday (Rock Hill schools closed completely). Gotta love the South! The kids had a great time playing in it. This was Maggie's first real experience with it and while she wasn't too thrilled with the actual snow, she did enjoy the sled rides (despite what the picture below shows).

 Our little snow angels! Riley and Callie had liked leaving their mark in the snow.

Now for some more cute kid antics:

• We listen to a lot of music on the local Christian radio when we're in the car together and Maggie has picked up on the call station jingle and always chimes in on the last number..."New Life, 91 point 9". I love it!
• Maggie is picking up on a lot of things lately. While playing hide-n-seek (Riley's new favorite game), Maggie will try and count. She fills in just about every other number. Riley has been working on his counting skills too. I helped him the other night try and count to one hundred. My favorite part was when we got to the 70s and he said "seventeen one, seventeen two," etc. Pretty cute!
• Another favorite game lately that the kids have been playing and Maggie helped invent is to sit on the toy box together and then run and tackle Dad. Then Maggie will rush back, climb up on top of the padded leather toy box and pat her hand on the spot next to her to signal for Riley to join her. The game goes on and on for quite some time. 
• I love how sweet these two are to each other. Maggie is starting to talk in longer phrases/sentences now and just last week she said as she was heading to bed, "Night, night Ra-Ra, wuv you." It sure melts our hearts! The other day, it was past Maggie's usual nap time and she was rather grumpy on the car ride home. Riley decided to sing her a lullaby to help calm her down and sure enough--it worked beautifully! 
• Riley and Daddy have been working on projects around the house lately (cutting and sanding dowels for ribbon sticks that I use when I teach music and fixing the gate upstairs).  Riley talks non-stop to Chris and really loves the idea that he's helping. Chris is so patient with his little helper.  Every so often, Maggie will wander over and Riley will declare, "Stay back and stay calm, Maggie!" 
• Maggie has been coined her own saying as well. About 2 weeks ago, she started saying "I gotch you" to everybody she sees.  We think it may come from when we try and tickle her and say, "We're going to get you." Wherever she got it from though, she loves to say it and it brings a smile to our faces to hear it. 

"I've Got To Blog About That"

So it never fails, the kids will be doing something funny or crazy one night and I'll turn to Chris and say, "I've got to blog about that." Then the next day or few days later, I'll forget what it was.  I've started writing it down on a piece of paper and keeping a list going until I have time to sit down and actually blog. And inevitably, I'll lose the list! Well I managed to find a partial list the other day and before I forget anymore...I'm going to forever record them in the blog-osphere!

• As I mentioned in the previous post, Maggie has really become quite adept at spotting Santa around town or in homes or stores or on the front of a card. For the entire Christmas season, she would excitedly say, "See Santa!".  The funny thing is, I think she may think his name is "SeeSanta". We may have mistakenly trained her to do this because we'd always say, "Hey Maggie, do you see Santa?" Whoops! Makes for a cute memory though. 
• Riley has picked up on some more of our sayings at home. We'll catch him sneaking out of bed at night or tell him not to jump on the couch and he'll respond, "Oh, Man!" To which, Maggie will then try to parrot as well!
• Since we got rid of cable TV to cut down on our bill, we supplemented with the much cheaper option of streaming Netflix videos.  Whenever the logo displays on the TV as we log on to access some shows, Riley always points his finger and spells out N-E-T-F-L-I-X    K-I-D-S and without fail will say, "Hey I'm a Netflix Kid!" Maggie, not to be outdone, now says "I-E-I-E...Yay!" which means the same thing in her language!
• Driving down the road the other day, Riley saw a machine on the back of the truck and asked me what it was. I said I couldn't think of the name. He responded by saying, "I think it's a fork lift, Mom." And you know what? He was right!! It's crazy what this kid knows!
• Several of my music lessons that did in the fall featured books by Eric Carle and Riley would listen to me read them aloud and before I begin I always introduce the title and author/illustrator. Shortly after these lessons, I'd pick up a book and read the title and before I could get any further Riley would interject..."By Eric Car-rul" (two syllable last name). 
• We have one book that Riley likes to read that talks about the first day of Kindergarten. One of the first times reading it, Riley got very excited and wanted to know when he was going to go to "Candy-garden!"
• Maggie sure has been working on developing her personality more and more everyday! She is quick to please big brother and give up whatever toy she has so that he can play with it. She can easily get upset when you don't want give her what she wants and will pitch a full-on fit complete with a face-plant on the floor and dramatic cries and tears. She loves to mimic everyone and is talking up a storm! She understands so much now. The other day, I accidentally burped and she looked at me and said, "Cuse me, Momma". She's an excellent helper and loves to sing the "Clean Up" song while she picks up toys. Her version is more like "me-muh, me-mup".  We'll ask her if a certain food is cold or if it's cold outside and she'll ball up her little fists and pretend to shiver as she repeats the word "cold." She is a snack-aholic and will eat everything on her plate that is fried or carb-heavy.  She still loves her crackers, O's (Cheerios), and pretzels (I can't figure out to type how she pronounces these, but it's really cute). She loves to brush her teeth and is extremely interested in watching people go "potty". She is a teaser too! I'll be reading her a book and she'll close it on purpose, so I can't see the words anymore and then open and close it about 6 more times. She'll pretend that she's going to give you a piece of food and then snatch it back.  On our long road trip to and from Indiana, she'd put her pacifier in backwards and look at Riley with a silly smile to make him laugh.  She has such a cute sense of humor--we love it! I had the hiccups the other night as I was rocking and singing "Mockingbird" to her and she kept making the hiccup sound right after me and laughing about it. I love her little dimples and how easy she smiles and laughs.  I hope she never loses any of that joy!

Glad Tidings of Comfort and Joy

 We had an amazing Christmas season together with lots of fun events and family time. Riley enjoyed helping decorate this gingerbread house and when we mentioned the idea of making a cake for Jesus' birthday--he jumped right on the idea! We asked him what kind of cake he thought we should make (expecting him to say something like chocolate or vanilla), and he adamantly stated he wanted to to make him a dinosaur cake. It just so happens that Riley also would like a dinosaur cake for his next birthday. :) Aunt Penny happened to have a dinosaur pan to lend us and though it turned out looking a little more like a scary zombie, I think Jesus still appreciated our effort. It the sweetest thing was listening to Riley sing "Happy Birthday" to Jesus on Christmas Day.

 I "Mustache" You A Question....Do we look funny or what???

 We began our Christmas journey on Thursday, Dec. 19th (Chris was able to leave school a little early to give us a head start on traffic). We made it to Charleston, WV and stayed the night before continuing on to Tim and Jen's house in Toledo, Ohio. We arrived around 2 and the rest of the gang trickled in later that same day. The kids had a great time playing together. Pap read them a cute Christmas story.

 Riley loved having his cousin AC to pal around with!

 We celebrated Tim and Lucy's birthday that weekend as well. The kids loved the cake and the adults loved going out that night to a local pub "just 800 feet away" while Nan and Pap held down the fort.

 On Saturday, we had our big Christmas gift-opening and various exchanges (local beers, homemade gifts, White Elephant).  We added a few new games to the mix--like the paper plate drawing on your head and Left-Right-Center. Despite Tim's best attempts to play the "Lucky Chicken" song each time he rolled the dice, Chris was the winner of the game and took home all the moo-lah! It was exciting to have Aunt Charla, Chelsea, Aunt Penny, and Emily join us for the evening festivities as well. Tim cooked up a scrumptious dinner of beef tenderloin, green beans, hashbrown casserole, salad, and rolls.

 This is the best I could do for getting a group shot. It was like trying to herd cats to get all the kids to stay near the tree much less look and smile in the same direction!

 On Sunday we packed up and road on down to Greenfield to visit Grandpa and Grandma Condra. Riley was ecstatic to get a Hot Wheels stunt loop and toy car and Maggie really liked taking care of her baby doll.

We had to make the long trek home on Monday and the kids truly did a wonderful job in the car for the 11 hours.  Tuesday was Christmas Eve and we were able to enjoy a special kid-friendly service at 4 pm that day at our church. Grandmama, Papa, Kelly, Joel, Mommaw, Poppaw, and Connie were able to join us for this as well.  Then we headed off to our traditional Asian meal at a nearby restaurant (Red Bowl this year, but Chris says it has to be Wan Fu next year because it's so much better). And afterwards, we drove around to look at the lights. This time both kiddos were awake enough to know what was going on. Maggie's favorite houses were anything with "Santa" on them (as that is the one item she figured out how to recognize this year). Riley liked anything with lots of colors! 

 This house in Stafford Park has won 1st place for several years in a row. We love going through this neighborhood and seeing all the many displays.

 Christmas morning Riley and Maggie woke about 6:30 and were delighted with the toys that Santa brought them. Riley has put his imagination to work as he rescues people in his "city" as he calls it. Maggie loves pushing her grocery cart and stroller around and playing with anything that makes music.

 Ready to go shopping? --Maggie is!

I'm the biggest sucker for traditions. We have a sausage and egg casserole and this candy cane pastry every year. Many thanks to my mom for making the pastry for us this year---it was delicious as always and brings back many childhood memories! 

 We headed over to Grandma and Papa's house for Christmas lunch with Kelly, Joel, and Connie. It was delicious medley of Beef Bourguignon, ham, mac and cheese, rolls, collards, 7 layer coconut cake (both vanilla AND chocolate), and lots of other tasty sweets and treats. We came back 2 days later to celebrate Christmas again with Edward and his family. We drew names this year and Chris was thrilled to receive his GPS running watch from his Secret Santa (Joel) and some help from the merry elves (Bonnie and Ed). I had a great time making traveling memory notebooks for both Joel and Edward and my Secret Santa (Amanda) surprised me with a beautiful turquoise Infinity scarf and ceramic coffee mug, several bottles of Bath & Body Works lotions and shower gels, and some exotic Chai-flavored marshmallows. We had a good time playing Reverse Charades together that evening and sitting out by the fire pit together.

 Kelly loved her Secret Santa's (Edward) gift to her of art supplies so that she can keep on creating!

 Amanda received some homemade clay family ornaments courtesy of Kelly.

The gifts were all wonderful, but the time spent laughing and being in each other's presence this holiday season is what I am glad about the most. It is of much comfort to me to be surrounded by so many loving people in our families and hear the house fill with sounds of joy!