Little House In The Desert

The year in review.

2012-01-04T15:14:00.000-08:00

Well its officially 2012! So it's only proper to have a 2011 year in review post.

Little Miss A. That girl went through many changes last year. Her vocab blew up!! She says things that you would expect an adult to say, she is polite and usually uses her manners. Get her around her aunts and uncles though and she can be the loudest grossest kid ever! She mastered the art of the wet willie and uses phrases like "You wanna go?!" "Turd head" and "Oh by gosh". She has learned the art of pretend crying to get what she wants, she would make quite the little actress. What I found most intriguing about that girl is her mothering sympathetic side. When your sick or have a headache she is the first person to run and rub your head telling you it will be alright. She can be downright mean and nice all at the same time. She is independent and less needy of her mommy, which has probably been something I have had to learn to deal with. All in all I am so proud of what she is turning into. So with all that said, here are a few pics of A from 2011.

The lunch lady.

The rock wall master!

And her dad's mini me.

As for Little Miss E. Boy oh boy. This sweetie is my handful. She has officially made the transition from baby to toddlerhood. She has developed a love for lots of food, art, and vocal self expression. If she doesn't get fed as soon as she wakes up then consider your day ruined with vocal self expression aka loud screaming jags. She is very hands on and would prefer to sit and "colo"r all day. She has mastered drawing circles on everything from paper, books, walls, cabinets, and counter tops. Thank you Sharpie for her permanent artwork. Her talking was also a new thing in 2011. She says random words like phone, garage, waterly (water please), molly (her dog), and many many others. I'm truly excited to see what 2012 has in store for her.

E still learning how to walk.

Diggin in the dirt with a screwdriver while dad puts up our greenhouse.

4th of July at Aunt Linda's house!

A little morning Popsicle anyone?

First beach trip.

The usual face she makes..

E and Aunt "Chell-she" at the family christmas dinner.

Speaking of Christmas, it was a busy fun one! We woke up at 8 did our little family thing at home. Then went down the road to Bepa's for Christmas breakfast, then headed to Aunt Ashley's/Aunt Linda's house for a couple hours, and finally back to Grams for Christmas dinner. It was the busiest family filled Christmas we've ever had.

As for the rest of things in and around our house.. Dad started building our entertainment center last May, he's hoping to have that finished soon. If your a working parent, then i'm sure you know how hard it is to find time for these things. We're also hoping to have our front yard re-landscaped and our backyard leveled. Once that happens I will get a picture up of said little house in the desert, till then I will openly admit, I am embarrassed of it. The garden went alright last year. It was my first year attempting things so I had alot of problems that I was able to learn from. Hoping to have many more posts and goals for this years garden on the blog. Not much else to post about at the moment. Except I hope everyone reading this has a great 2012!!

'Tis the season to be Jolly!

2011-12-04T14:47:00.000-08:00

Not sure if I have said this before but my favorite time of year is September through December. From the crisp autumn air to the yellowing leaves on the trees. There is something about it that just makes me giddy! As soon as September hits I bust out all the apple, pumpkin, and cinnamon scents. As well as what few harvesty decorations I have gathered and usually leave them up till mid December. Except last year. This time last year we were just barely moved into our house, and was so tired of unpacking that we didn't bother getting out a single decoration. It was the most depressing Christmas ever, I vowed we would always decorate regardless of what was going!! So this year decorating was in full swing the day after Thanksgiving! WOO!

After getting all the decorations out A begged us to put Christmas lights up in her room. Which reminded me of her nursery in Texas, we had the walls lined with pretty white twinkling lights. This time we decided it would be cooler looking to have it on the ceiling.

A's face after eating a Hot Tamale candy! Ha!

The girls bedroom has the most amazing ambience to it now. We haven't had to use their ceiling fan lights since we hung them.

On to the fun Christmas decorating. Thanks to Pinterest and Jenni at Craft-O-Maniac we were able to make our own Christmas ornaments. I highly recommend it!

Just finished kneading the dough, on to the boring part, flattening it. I ended up doing it twice. Thankfully A is a patient kid.

While waiting, A made herself useful and played the piano for me <3

My cookie cutters and I are ready!!

A few hours later we took our baked ornaments to Grams house for the fun part..

Painting!!!

Need directions on how to makes these easy ornaments, go to http://tinyurl.com/8x4z792. Or go to craft0maniac.blogspot.com

Oh Christmas tree, Oh Christmas tree!

Time to talk about you and your tiny partially decorated self. Unfortunately Dad is allergic to the real deal, so we are stuck with a fake tree. No biggie.. Pun intended ha. Our 6 ft fake tree has seen 5 years worth of Christmas's (actually 4 since it didn't see the light of day last year). Our once perfect for our tiny apartment of a tree is now well.. A bit small for our house. I'm thinkin next year we'll step it up a little.

The almost finished product. Note the mass of ornaments at the bottom of the tree. The kids sure know how to decorate ;) Lucky for them i'm not one of those crazed moms who needs the tree to look amazing and the ornaments distributed evenly. I think it gives the tree character, or makes it want to tip to one side. Haha!

My first attempt at painting a snowman. Not bad eh?

Hmm.. I wonder who was using the camera even though she knows better :)

Halloween!!

2011-11-06T16:24:00.000-08:00

Halloween Morning:

A bit late on the posting but.. Better late then never. So the day started off with a little bit of fishing with the Bepa aka grandpa to you people who don't speak my kid's baby language. It was pretty fun! E cant sit still for the life of her, so she pretty much ran her dad around the dock and camping grounds of the lake we were at. A on the other hand had a blast! She even caught her first fish!!

Bepa and E. She couldn't help but get into everything in his tackle box!! At one point I found myself scooping up night crawlers bc she dumped them everywhere.

A and her daddy.

Bepa showing A how to hook a worm.

Me and A being bored.. hamming it up for the camera.

Kinda hard to see but A and Bepa reeling in her first fish. Which is the small thing to left of the pic against the blue boat.

A very proud Miss A holding up her first fish!

As for Halloween night:

So i'm sure your going to look at these pictures and be like wow they suck. And I don't blame you.. they do suck. My kids are the most impossible kids to get pictures of! Especially E. Let me just begin by saying she was in the worst mood, as usual. I had to wake her up from her late nap to get her dressed in her Bumble Bee costume, which she decided she would NOT be wearing her wings. As for A.. She was a pretty pretty princess. She was decked out in her light up dress with her tiara and wand and what seemed to be ballet slippers haha! I let her choose her entire costume. On with the terrible pictures....

E emptying Grams candy bowl.

2nd house on the block (grams house) and she already attacked her candy.

Like my get up? Haha! The only day its acceptable to go out in public in my crocs!

Miss Pissy Pants.

The only thing keeping this girl happy... Chips and candy. Figures.

A enjoying the fruits or should I say candy of her labor!

Random Cute Pictures!

2011-10-21T20:41:00.000-07:00

Hmm, maybe if I fill it up with water i'll get it to spray..

Nope, back to washing my feet.

You know those moments where you find yourself wondering why the kids are so quiet... And missing from the breakfast table. Well this is where you find them. Outside. In underwear. On the picnic table. Attempting to share their cereal. While the dog patiently waits bc she knows food is near. I LOVE these girls!!!

The Pumpkin Patches...

2011-10-21T20:29:00.000-07:00

Yup I said patches. We went to 2 different places on 2 different days for pumpkins bc i'm a freak. E didn't really enjoy herself the day we went to the pumpkin farm. No shocker there. She had about a 10 mile nap from the house to the farm which ruined her day. We kinda ended up dragging her around.. or carrying her.

E and her daddy!

A on the other hand had quite the hay day!

A and E in the giant pumpkin.

Dad and the girls they found the "daddy" of all pumpkins!

Note to self do not wear sandals to any farm function.

Woo! Hip pop!

As for the other pumpkin patch... Not as cool as the farm but it has a giant slide!!!

Thanks to Auntie Helcia for the pics, you are officially the family photographer ;)

Let me tell you, it is soooo hard to get yourself and a 18m old up a rope latter. But we did!! And it was soooo worth it!!

You know when I said I was a freak? Yeah, I wasn't kidding. I love decorating with this stuff!! We went for eccentric pumpkins this year. Like the black ones? They have glow in the dark paint on them.. One with spider webs and the other clearly stating Happy Halloween :P

A's first haircut 10/4 and a bit of the past.

2011-10-08T18:25:00.000-07:00

Yes I waited 3 years and some months to get my kids haircut. The reason why..

I couldn't part with her beautiful blonde little ringlets!

A on halloween of 2009. She was a flower.

On to the good stuff.. the first haircut!

Excuse my exhausted mom look, I think i'm starting to really master it! Haha!

Obviously her beautiful blonde little ringlets turned into this not so pretty mess, feeling like what seems to be the worlds finest hair. No joke.

All we really did was have her hair trimmed.. Nothing too spectacular. This pic above isn't the final pic. I asked that about another inch get cut off. But as usual, i'm lacking something in a blog post ;) Final picture to come...

All about my nephew..

2011-09-18T12:22:00.000-07:00

I decided that this next post is going to be all about "Scooter". This is mainly for the family who hasn't got to meet the little Scooter yet. Just in case your wondering.. This kids main mode of transportation is scooting everywhere on his butt! Scooter was born 6 weeks early and is a bit behind in a few things, but is quickly catching up. So.. here are some of the pictures I have collected of the kid.

First Christmas!

My brother and Scooter.

Scooter and E watching a movie. Random.. But just realized their clothes match the chairs they're sitting in. Ha.

Playing in the rain.

2011-09-18T12:02:00.000-07:00

On this day.. We played in the rain. It. Was. Awesome! We had absolutely no wind which was unusual. The sun was shining and the thunder was going off all while it was lightly raining.

E hates getting sprayed or splashed with water. We were expecting her to start screaming.

But...

She enjoyed it!! Molly had a part in it i'm sure. She loves that dog!

E, A, and Molly...

The Garden.

2011-09-06T20:55:00.000-07:00

Just another day in the garden :) These pictures are actually pretty old. I need to take new ones. But you have an idea of what my garden looks like.

The back row from left to right is Bell Peppers, Better Boy tomato, Cherry tomato, and Jalapeno pepper. The front row is Beefsteak tomato, another Beefsteak tomato, and Yellow squash.

A just after picking her first tomato!

A bit of an update.

2011-09-06T20:27:00.000-07:00

I have decided that if I have nothing to post about I will just post pictures. I need to keep up on this for all the family members spread across this continent.

So on this day. We went to the farmers market.. and I locked us out of my car. Again. Yes I said again. I have done this about 5 times in the past year now. I swear one day I will be SOL! Thank goodness BePa was with us and had AAA!

Baby Boot Camp

2011-08-02T12:50:00.000-07:00

Well its been 2 weeks now since starting said Baby Boot Camp. And im proud to announce that A is doing amazingly well!! Our bedtime routine (yes I said routine!) is so simple now!! I go in put E in her crib with binky in hand. Give A hugs and kisses turn on a movie (bad mom I know) and walk out of the room! I usually only have to go in once to put her back in bed. I think she is getting the hint that mom will no longer buy into her game. YAY!! As for the middle of the night both girls have been doing well! They wake up about once each. Which is the best they have done since moving into our house 11 months ago! So despite all my freaking out about dads new graveyard shift the girls are doing really good at night!

Here's to firsts!

2011-07-19T15:08:00.000-07:00

Its official. I have finally decided to hop on the blog wagon, and boy do I feel cool! Haha! So what is it im going to write about you ask? UH.. My kids of coarse. So to give a quick or not so quick run down of our current issue with our little miss "A". About 3 nights ago the other half and I decided thats it!! BABY BOOT CAMP is in full swing as of the next day of coarse. We love our dear daughter to death and would never go back and change our decision to co-sleep. BUT.. The girl just turned 3 and for the life of her will not sleep alone in her big girl bed (aka a twin bed). We are literally up every hour trying to get that girl to pass back out, of coarse we have to lay with her all night or else our hourly wake up call lasts till the morning! So for the run down of the nights..

Baby Boot Camp Day 1:
NAPTIME- Put A and E down. E as usual passes out quickly while A argues a bit and while watching a movie. A falls asleep after putting her back in bed several times without too many problems. Only took her about 30 mins to calm down enough. I of coarse jinx myself when the thoughts "Wow can it really be this easy?!" popped into my head! HAHA! Jokes on me!

BEDTIME- A and E head to bed at about 9. E passes out nicely. A lays there saying she watching a movie. Not even 2 mins later she is yelling everything from "I dont wanna watch Toy Story", "I want daddy", "I want to swim in my pool", and "I need water mom, mom, mom I need water, MOM". The tears running like crazy and the fight to keep her in bed starts. Dad and I are taking turns every minute putting her calmy back in bed without exchanging any words. Which pisses her off even more! This goes on for about 2 long hours. Through this all I decided to let her scream (at least shes staying in bed, right?) because im too busy starting my new blog :) Finally Dad goes in and calms her down... I continue on with setting up my new blog and let dad do his calming magic.. Turns out calming magic in dads book is laying with her till she falls asleep! I couldn't believe he caved, actually who am I kidding I could believe it. He is and always will be wrapped around our daughters tiny little fingers! I decided then and there that if this girl was going to be sleep trained it'd have to be done when dad was at work. About an hr into our slumber A wakes up screaming for daddy. Daddy goes in and tries to calm her. Argues with her a little on why she needs to stay in her own bed and tries the big girl speech yet again. None of it worked. SO.. guess where dad slept.. On the floor in between the girls beds. It worked!! She fell asleep after 20 mins of screaming and yelling! The pattern of waking up continued a few more times in the night..but was overall better then all the other nights. I may even say that we got about 30 more mins of sleep that night haha!

Baby Boot Camp Day 2:
NAPTIME- It went fairly well. A put up a fight for about 10 mins. and I had to put her back in bed about 5 times which wasnt bad compared to usual 100x ! I'll take that as a victory thanks!

BEDTIME- Let me start off saying Dad was at work, and I knew that if I wanted this girl to go to bed on her own that tonight was the night! A and E were put to bed a bit earlier then usual. E was super tired from missing her 2nd nap and I was hoping that if I started bedtime a bit earlier then usual maybe, just maybe, A would be asleep by her normal bedtime. My perfect sleeper quickly passed out while A laid there watching a movie. At about 10 o'clock and after about 20 times of putting her back in her bed A fell fast asleep, and stayed that way until 2. At which point she started in for dad again. So the awesome dad he is went in made a rather uncomfortable looking bed on the floor and passed out. Apparently that was enough for A and she quickly fell asleep too!

Baby Boot Camp Day 3:
NAPTIME- Im happy to say that A went to bed after getting out of her bed once.. ONCE!!! OMG I think were making huge headway with this kid!! Lets just hope I didnt jinx myself yet again...

BEDTIME- To be announced! Fingers crossed that tonight goes smoothly!!