December

"Ho, Ho, Ho!"

Meet Sugar Plum (Sierra gets name credit).  Jesse slept on the floor for most of the first night because she wouldn't stop crying.

Jaxon is warming up to this little bundle pretty quickly.  When she gets tired she stops whatever she is doing and looks for someone warm to lay on.

My sweet babies who really aren't babies anymore. Sigh.

Tree decorating time!

Jaxon is having a hard time believing that the picture on the ornament is his sissy.

"Look how high I can reach mommy!"

New quilts for Christmas from Grandma Shelly (she makes them)!

Sierra made this at school (her own opinion of course)

Christmas morning!

I wish I could say that we stayed healthy for the month of December, but we didn't.  In fact there was not one day of the month that there wasn't at least one sick person in our house.  The kids had 3 different cold viruses in 4 weeks.  It was awesome.  In fact while celebrating with my family on Christmas Eve, Jaxon started acting really odd, and I realized he was running a fever.  We headed home and by the time we got there he was around 103 (Sierra had been sick the week before).  He ended up waking up Christmas morning and puking right before he opened his presents.  He's the kind of kid that has a sensitive gag reflex, and a stuffy nose can make him puke.

Jesse also decided that in the middle of winter it would be a good idea to get a new puppy.  A tiny puppy.  A four week old puppy.  It was a wonderful idea because guess who goes to work ALL day?  You know what that means, I get to train and care for a new baby, I mean puppy.  She's cute, and cuddly, but she also poops and pees A LOT.  She is like a baby and wants held most of the time and we don't have any safe place to keep her kenneled yet, so she has been going absolutely everywhere with me.  To drop Sierra off at school, to the grocery store, to get coffee.  Yes.  Coffee.  I had to break down and start drinking the stuff because I am more sleep deprived than ever.  With sick kiddos all month and a new pup, I feel like we have an infant again.  I guess we do, just a canine one.

Despite the sickness and the insanity of having a pup, we did have a lovely Christmas morning.  Christmas break was super low key.  I loved the slow paced mornings and really do love having Sierra at home.  We spent Christmas Eve with my family and it was cut short because Jaxon wasn't feeling well, but it was nice to see everyone.  Christmas morning was pretty awesome at our house.  The kids slowly opened gifts, were very thankful, and played for a little bit with each toy before they opened the next.  Sierra would open a present and then go find one of Jaxon's and wait for him to open it before she went to find another one of hers.  Jess and I just sat back and watched and were so grateful for our kiddos.  We spent Christmas evening at Jesse's parents house.  Sierra had a blast visiting with her cousins but Jaxon and I stayed in the back on the bed most of the evening because I didn't want him to puke on anybody.  Ha!  No, really.  I had debated just staying home, but we ended up taking him and I spent the whole evening thinking I probably should have just stayed home with him.  But family Christmas is family Christmas and it just happened that this year I was the one with the pukey kid.

I hope that your Christmas was merry too.  We've all got stuff to overcome and sometimes around the holidays it just seems harder to handle.  So I hope that despite whatever struggles you or your family are up against, that you enjoyed Christmas and that the new year brings just that: a new year and a new start.

November

Bye, bye Pooh Bear.  Sierra was ready for a change to pink.  Boo :(

Enjoying the giant tub during our trip to Sunriver!

Auntie Amy let Sierra use her makeup.  Yikes.

Sunshine in Sunriver with my three favorite peeps.

Sierra's collection after our nature walk.

A Thanksgiving family picture

We managed to stay healthy for the whole month of November.  It was a miracle!  Every week that Sierra makes through of school without getting sick, we feel lucky.  She's slowly getting to the point that some days when I pick her up she's in a good mood and doesn't have a meltdown by the time we've made it home.  Those are good days!  She's getting more confident about sounding out words, and is also trying to spell out words on her own without such a worry that they are right or not.  At first, she was so concerned about them being right that she wouldn't try on her own.  It's also fun to see her working on her math skills.  We didn't do a lot of math before she went to school so it's nice to see her picking it up quickly.

We took a trip to Sunriver over the weekend prior to Veteran's day.  We don't travel very long distances because it's just really not a whole lot of fun with two little kiddos.  They don't enjoy being in the car and that makes the ride VERY long.  My parents ended up taking Sierra and so on the way, Jaxon was our only passenger.  He fell asleep for a majority of the trip so it went surprisingly well.  There was also no snow on the pass which made things go much faster.  We met my parents there as well as Kevin's family and Amy and her husband.  The kids had a blast.  They enjoyed the game room at the resort, loved the giant tub, loved being in rooms close to their Aunties and Uncles, and slept better than at home because they had a parent to snuggle up to.  There were only studio rooms available so Jess and Jaxon bunked together, and Sierra in I in another room.  The kids were in seventh heaven.  The ride home went well too.  We tried to leave close to nap time and Jaxon slept quite a bit again, and Sierra was awake most of the way but stayed very quiet.  A successful trip!

I loved the long weekend over Thanksgiving break.  It's so nice to have slow paced mornings! We got to enjoy meals with both sets of parents on Thanksgiving day and Jesse and I did a little black Friday shopping.  It was a great weekend and we were all sad when it was over. We've been cranking up the Christmas music though and next up is decorating!  I sure hope we can stay healthy in December!