Funny Fellas

I forgot to write about Cason dance-tormenting Paige yesterday. I made her a sandwich for lunch, and let her eat it while watching a movie in the living room. So she set her plate on the floor. A minute later I heard her yell, so I ran over just in time to see Cason dancing over her, and then he lifted his foot up and stomped her sandwich twice. He'd probably already done it once since she was yelling. Ha. He looked happy too, like he wasn't even doing it to be mean. Although he sure didn't stop when she got upset.

Jess made me laugh last night too. It took me like a decade to start liking having curly hair, and then it started getting less curly. So now it's just slightly wavy. People ask me all the time where Paige gets hers. It's weird. I finally found somebody who's supposed to be good with curly and wavy hair, so I have an appointment to get a cut in a week or so. The guy is in Scottsdale, so I told Jess I'm nervous to go in and feel like a lowly peasant with all the richies. I get all scared about weird things like that, so he of course makes fun of me. He told me the guy will probably take one look at me, laugh at me in disgust, and then purposely give me a terrible haircut. Then he and the other stylists will get in a circle around me and shove me back and forth while I stumble around with my new ugly haircut. I couldn't stop laughing at the thought. Maybe just because we'd barely finished our final coat of drywall and it was 2 am, so we were delirious, but still I thought it was hilarious.

Song of the Day

Time for an almost 2am post from Jess. Today Paige, while jumping to and fro on a series of toy bins we have on the floor, burst into song and it went a little something like this......"It's our world today! Puppet show in my heart today!". She is very musical and Cason often gets into the act. Here's a pic of the songbird.

Love Notes and Pirate Ships

I bought a little mini mailbox last year around Valentine's Day. It was bright red with hearts, so I figured I could paint it or do something with paper to make it less Valentinesy. Then we could use it around the house for LOVE notes and stuff. Well, it's been almost a year and I haven't done it. But Skye's blog inspired me to finally do it, especially since Jess is home and it's a good time for projects. So behold our cute little mailbox.
Today Paige put a pillow case over her head and tried to RUN out of the living room. She's normally our cautious one and doesn't fall or get hurt very often. But she did this time. Of course she tripped and fell by her toy baskets, and when I pulled the pillow case off of her she had a deep little cut on her forehead. Poor girl. I don't know if she hit it on a sharp toy or what. But she asked for her daddy, which I think made him happy(as happy as you can be when your baby is bleeding anyway) and he cuddled with her on the couch for a bit. Then he gave Hoppy to her and she cuddled HIM.
We have a Christmas tradition, and we each pick out a new ornament every year. We couldn't find one Paige would LOVE, but anthropologie had pirate ship ornaments, and Paige is very into pirates. So I waited until Christmas was almost here and they went on sale, and got her one. It was delivered today RIGHT about the time she got hurt, so that made her feel better too. She was much happier than she looks here.
On a happier note, our kids both took it upon themselves to work on the drywall for us today.
A couple of times.
Paige told me to be careful and not to step on any pokies or touch any "shark" things. That's another funny one, she says "shark" when she means "sharp".

Now then, Skye asked to see my swan painting. Here you are. I can't seem to get it the way I picture it in my head, but that's how it goes every time I paint. So for now I'm settling for this:

Stargazers

First, I've been terrible about birthdays. I probably missed a few people before this, so I'm sorry if I did. But Christmas Eve was my dad's, yesterday was Matthew's birthday, and today is Michael's. Not to mention Jesus. :) Actually it's 1:44 am, so Matt and Michael were yesterday and the day before. But either way, happy birthday guys. I love you all.

Now then, like I said, it's 1:44 am, so I'll make this brief. Jess and I just finished up our second coat of compound on the drywall, and it's coming along nicely. For beginners anyway. I think. :)
Also related to that room, I found my little beloveds like this in there today:

Ladder Love

We did some more drywall yesterday. With Cason's help.
And Matt's help.
Paige and Cason stood on opposite sides of the ladder and tried to kiss from that far away. It wasn't working.
Cason gave in and ran over to her side.
Still not quite, she was a couple of inches too high.

Finally she moved down a rung, and planted one on him.

Dollhouse

Skye, you requested more dollhouse pictures, and you shall have them. We still have to paint the exterior some more, we ran out of spray paint in the middle of the job. Now we need to get furniture for the kitchen and baby nursery, and I plan to make some for the living room and boy's bedroom.

Balla

Our boy made his daddy play A LOT of ball with him tonight. He's such a boy. But he's also not afraid to put on his fancy shoes and bust a move. Haha.
I noticed while cleaning out some of our picture folders tonight, that our babies bond with Skifter at weddings.
That's all.

Christmas

We had a WONDERFUL Christmas! We're so tired we can barely keep our eyes open, probably from staying up 'til at least 2 am just about EVERY night for the last week, working on that dollhouse. But it was well worth it.

First we had our Dad's birthday ping pong tournament/Christmas Eve gift opening at Dad and Trudi's. Here's a picture that is completely unrelated to ping pong, but IS cute and WAS taken during the tournament.
I believe Dad and Skifter were the ping pong champs. But barely. Dad also received a cow patty clock, but unfortunately I never got a picture of it. I did, however, dry-heave when I got too close to it.

There were naps.
There was also this awesome picture of the lovebirds looking like they're trying to act normal while feeling slightly alarmed.
Cason and Paige scored lots of awesome gifts from their aunts and uncles. LOTS.
We got this picture of the family, which is especially cute in that bottom row.
Today we got the babies up at 8 am, which was apparently way too early. They WERE up pretty late. Cason just kept right on sleeping while Jess held him. Jess kept changing his position, trying to wake him up, but he'd just slump back over. Paige kept sleeping when we put her on the couch. I was videotaping and Jess said "LOOK Paige! Santa brought you presents!" She didn't even open her eyes and said "NO! I'm STILL SLEEPING."

So we decided to just open our gifts to each other, like my cute little egg holder thing Jess got me...
...so they'd hear the unwrapping and get excited. It did work, actually. They each had just a few gifts. Cason's big one was a remote control Land Rover, and he's a fan. Paige's was of course her dollhouse. We first had her open the little mama and Paige dolls we bought for it. She was so happy when we brought the dollhouse out. Especially when she realized I sewed a little bedspread and pillows for the bed so she could tuck the dolls in. She didn't want to leave because she wanted to play with it, she said. Success!

We had lots of fun with our families all day long.
I was so excited to finally give Dan and Veronica these pictures we took of Lily WEEKS ago. I had Dan's mom kidnap Lily and meet us for a secret photo shoot, where we dressed her up and got these cute ones of her. Lily's tough to get genuinely happy smiles from, so I was pumped that Jess was off that day and got these out of her:

And my favorite:
Finally one of all three for the grandparents:
Now then, we decided to start a tradition and read the sweetest book about the birth of baby Jesus, but our babies fell asleep on the drive home. We're not gonna let it stop us though, so we're off to read to our sleeping offspring. Merry CHRISTmas!

Diving and Dollhouses

Tonight was our annual Little Women night. We always watch it close to Christmas. First we made some tasty chocolate almond caramel candies. I piled TONS of pillows and blankets so the kids could do some jumping.
I'm sure it scares some of you, and if so sorry, but that was one THICK landing pad, and we wanna LIVE!

Our third attempt at a dollhouse has been much more successful. I even painted lots of the furniture while we watched Little Women, and after everybody left I sewed a little blanket and pillows for the bed...
...in the girl's room.
Then Jess printed out a tiny family picture for the little mini-living room.
I have oh so many plans for it. Little rugs, more furniture, etc. I think Paige will love it.

Drywallin'

Jess decided his 2 week break for Christmas would be a good time for us to take down the ugly fake wood paneling that was in the playroom.
So for the last 3 days he worked on that, and then insulating and drywalling, with his parents, Dan, and my brother Matt.
It got tough keeping the little ones occupied and away from the construction zone. Luckily aunt Cassie was exciting enough to keep their attention for a while. We also rented some Christmas movies and bought fake mustaches. Of course.
Lily also was there while her daddy did some electrical stuff for us. She played Santa, and Paige and Cason took turns on her lap to ask for gifts. Paige played Santa once or twice too.
The room's not done, but it already looks so much better, and feels noticeably warmer now that we actually have insulation. Paige and Cason were so happy this afternoon when we finally let them step foot in there. They did this for several minutes.