Interview with Holly... New Year!

Last year I started a small tradition of interviewing Holly at the beginning of the year to see how she may have changed in her likes and dislikes. She had fun answering all of the questions, some of her answers are the same and some are new.

Interview with Holly at four and a half:

What is your favorite color?
Silver & Gold.

What is your favorite animal?
Giraffe *same*.

What is your favorite vegetable?
Watermelon *same*.

What is your favorite fruit?
Cantaloupe.

Where do you want to go on vacation this year?
Leavenworth in the snow and Tinkerbell's house, I think it is 'Dismey'?

Where is your favorite place to play?
Olympia Children's Museum with the little river and toy table.

What is your favorite toy?
Tinkerbell toys and Dinosaur toys because my friend Drew really likes them too.

What is your favorite game?
Hide & Seek *same*.

What is your favorite drink?
Slurpee at Target.

If you could change your name, what would you choose?
Kristin

What is your restaurant?
Old 'MacDonalds' *same*, but I love Chinese food better.

What is your favorite thing?
Blankie *same*.

What is your favorite TV show?
Tinkerbell movies.

What do you love about each person in your family?
Daddy: because he is my parent, he always plays with me and he always snuggles with me.

Mommy: because I see you every day, you always snuggle with me and you have the baby in you, who I love!

Kitties: I love them too!

What is your wish for this year?
I wish the baby was here right now.

Year In Review...

Christmas 2009

Bryan and Holly enjoying the tradition of reading 'Twas the Night Before Christmas'.

Cookies for Santa & carrots for the reindeer.

The tree all filled out.... Santa has arrived!

Look... Santa enjoyed all of his treats - the reindeer too!

Emptying her stocking... many treats!

A gift from Santa... the water zoo from Playmobil!

Learning her Ipod with Daddy and the surrounding aftermath!

A sample of the paper mess....

Riley scouting out the paper...

Riley taking a rest!

Merry Christmas!!!

A Wonderful Weekend

Our weekend was filled with several wonderful holiday activities, fun family moments and a relaxing weekend - which was just perfect for a full holiday season! Saturday we spent some time around town, headed for coffees, visited with friends and had company over for dinner and a game night.

Sunday we enjoyed a nice morning browsing shops up in the Proctor District, went to the train store for Bryan and Holly to stock up on needed train supplies, had coffees & cocoa and played at the local toy store for some time. We also headed out for lunch and then we were off to see the new movie The Princess and the Frog with Grandma and a cousin. The movie was wonderfully done - amazing animation, upbeat musical tunes and a neat story. We wrapped up the evening with dinner at Grandma's house and visiting with some family.

Monday we spent the day being a bit lazy around the house... but still having fun! Bryan and Holly worked on setting up their holiday electric train set (one Bryan had as a child) and they repaired another electric train that Grandma & Grandpa passed on the night before. As well, we enjoyed painting various holiday ornaments and doing some holiday crafting. It was a good day!

I know not every weekend is like this... but, we really cherish when they are so filled with amazing holiday moments, family time and incredible memories! Life doesn't get much better...

Aquarium Family Fun

Bryan is taking an extended weekend to spend some family time and enjoy some fun holiday activities. We started Friday off with a trip to the Seattle Aquarium. He had never been and Holly could not wait to take him. The Seattle Aquarium is such a wonderful experience, very interactive, great for kids and simply beautifully done!

We enjoyed the hands on tide pools with touchable creatures, a feeding of the tide pool creatures (which was amazing) and a special feeding of the seals (very fun). Played with some various kids stuff and stayed very busy.

After the aquarium we headed over to Bellevue Square for a fun afternoon and evening of mall browsing, lunch, the Lego store, coffee and Cinnabon, Build A Bear, dinner and a fun little outdoor celebration they call Snowflake Lane. Snowflake Lane comes alive with festive Tin Soldiers who perform with drums to several holiday tunes as the sky is filled with a snow flurry made from bubbles. We also enjoy a snow princess, frosty the snow man, a penguin and Rudolph the red nosed reindeer! A very fun day!!!

Nursery Photos

Believe it or not, we have been working on the baby's room throughout this busy season. We have slowly painted it out in a nice creamy light brown, set the up the crib and changing table, added the wall stickies and put on the bedding. A little early for bedding... but I just had to see how it all goes together. So far, so good!

Our theme is based off of a wonderful baby bedding set that Annette & Tex bought for us, Carter's Forest Friends. Thank You again Annette & Tex -- we love it! The little animals are just darling, the colors are perfect and it suits our outdoorsy family perfectly! We are planning to add a chocolate rug, a couple of shelves, a new door and the trim work then we should be pretty much done with the room. It is definitely adding to our excitement of meeting the newest addition very soon!

Snowflake Night

Each year we gather up with the Ross family and enjoy an evening of good food, hot cocoa, sweet treats, holiday music and snowflakes!!! After dinner, which this year was amazing (dutch oven cooking from the men), we clean up and partake in the creativity of making snowflakes. This was Holly's first year really participating and creating her own lovely lacy flakes and she did a wonderful job! We iron the flakes out, spray them with adhesive and glitter them all up too. This tradition is a simple, yet fun one we look forward to each year.

Holly & Auntie Sue holding up some of the evenings creations!

Holly's first ever snowflake!!! She was so very proud of it!

You'll find that the photos include our cat Riley -- who has a special knack for plopping down in

the center on the table while anyone is doing any kind of crafty item! If you are ever over to scrapbook or card craft... chances are Riley will also be participating. Luckily the Ross family is sweet enough to tolerate her, which I am sure Riley is thankful for as it is so fun to hang with the family and be the center of attention! Yes, we love our cats!

Gingerbread Jamboree

Last weekend we enjoyed a local holiday activity called the Gingerbread Jamboree. This activity is a fun fundraiser for the Tacoma Children's Museum, a favorite place of ours. So, what better way to spend a Sunday morning... than making a gingerbread house and supporting a favorite children's museum.

Holly had pretty much full control over the house ---- which I will admit was really hard to do. Next year I am seriously contemplating getting my own house and one for her, LOL! She did a wonderful job though, in fact I am rather proud of her handy work. Of course the morning was also spent enjoying a ton of sugary sweetness too... I mean how can you build a gingerbread house that has two full unlimited candy bars without eating some, right???

The morning was a fun one - we had the Ross family there and some friends too! A good time had by all for sure!

Santa Letter

This weekend was our annual kick off for the Christmas Holiday season - starting with decorating our home, visiting the Spanaway Lake Holiday Light walk through night and ending with our final letter to Santa Claus! It has been a fun few days, filled with busyness and memories.

Holly's letter this year is in her own words and of course written by her as well. Here is what is says:

Dear Santa,

Merry Christmas!

I have been good.

May I please have:

Dinosaur toys

Water zoo

Tinkerbell game

Three Musketeer Barbie

A volcano

Love, Holly

How Time Flies...

The past couple of weeks have flown by, busy with one thing or another. An indication the holidays are upon us. As well, I was down for a week or so with the H1N1 influenza - not fun! Bryan was able to get some good bonding time with Holly though as I was banned to the back bedroom in hopes to not pass it on to the family and I was also able to sleep a lot and get better. Holly & Bryan enjoyed a few local outings, play areas, special meals, camping in the living room with a real tent and movie nights. Pretty nice time for them actually, which I am very happy about.

We have also been working on the babies room - it is painted out now in a light chocolate brown. I am still working on some final painting touches and then I'll take some photos to share soon. But, it is coming together nicely and timely. Our goal was to have a majority of that done before the Christmas season as we tend to fill our time up with holiday celebrations and activities. I think we are on a pretty good track to balancing the babies room and the season.

The next few weeks are also pretty full with festivities already. Starting with this weekend, we are attending an extended family Thanksgiving and taking in a local holiday light show. We are decorating the house up for Christmas this weekend too... Holly is overjoyed about that too! Next week is Thanksgiving (crazy!), some holiday shopping the day after and then we are going to participate in a local children's museum fundraiser called Gingerbread Jamboree... where we will make a nice gingerbread house. I am sure we'll have a lot of photos to share and a fun time too! So, stay tuned....

Halloween Fun

This year we had a wonderful Halloween week! Holly had many opportunities to enjoy her Tinkerbell costume including with her friends at preschool, at a children's Halloween party, at a local school harvest carnival and of course on Halloween. She was thrilled to dress up each time too.

On Halloween night we went down to trick or treat with Aunt Blayne. They have never spent this holiday together so it was fun for both of them to get that chance before Blayne is a bit too old. The girls trick or treated their little hearts out - in fact Holly finally asked to head back to the house as she was tired and done. We kept a majority of her candy in a separate bag so that her bucket would not be too heavy. When we got back to the house and dumped it all out I couldn't believe how much she actually collected... it overflowed her little pumpkin bucket. She'll be stocked for a long time to come!

Happy Halloween!

Her Best Bud