2009: Year in Review in Pictures

Oh my, she has grown so much this year!  Oh my sweet girl is not officially a baby anymore, but she'll always be my baby.

January 2009:

February 2009:

March 2009:

April 2009:

May 2009:

June 2009:

July 2009:

August 2009:

September 2009:

October 2009:

November 2009:

December 2009:

Well, 2009 has come and gone!  2010 here we come!

Lauren stories

1.  Lauren bit a plain M&M in half and looked at the inside and said, "Mama, what's that?"  I told her it was chocolate.  She said, "I like chocolate! Mama likes chocolate too!"
Yes, baby, Mama likes chocolate too.  :)

2.  Because a Puppy likes to wear shoes too.

3.  Lately Lauren likes to pretend she is putting something in her mouth and chewing on it.  I asked her what she was doing the other day and she said, "That's gum Mama.  I chewing gum."  She told me that Mama and Daddy like gum... and she likes it too.  :)

4.  Potty training is in full swing.  So far she is doing great!  Yesterday was her first day to wear panties to school.  She had 3 accidents, which the teacher told me was pretty good considering it was her first full day in panties.  Today she only had one accident.  Yay!  She might not have had that accident if the teacher had understood what she said, poor thing.  Lauren told her, "I need to go tee tee." and the teacher said she thought Lauren said, "Aiden bite me."  So, she was trying to figure out where Lauren got bit.

So far the best incentive for Lauren to use the potty is her Elmo underwear.  That girl loves some Elmo panties!  We are still wearing night time Pull Ups, but not having anything to drink after 6:30 pm.  Yesterday morning she woke up dry!

5.  One problem - still we are having small bedtime battles.  She is the worst at dilly dallying around!  I put her in the bed and try to cover her up and she says she doesn't want to cover up.  So then I tell her nite nite and then turn around and she immediately says she wants me to cover her up.  She's toying and testing me and she knows it.  I finally get out of the room and 2 minutes later she is hollering for me.  I go in there trying to be all stern and she says, "I need to tee tee, Mama."  And I KNOW she doesn't have to go because she already went.  But we are potty training, so I cave and put her little butt on the toilet and of course she doesn't have to go.  So at this point I'm irrated because she baited me and won.  I have got to start just telling her No, right?  I mean... otherwise she is going to really start trying to get away with things.  She doesn't understand the concept of "telling the truth", but she is being deceitful and I think she knows it.  She knows she doesn't have to potty but she says it anyway just to get out of the bed for a few more minutes.  I hope it's just a phase... but I guess I'm going to have to start getting tougher.  Not mean, but a very calm and tougher Mommy.  Say a prayer.  :)

I'm not nosey... just curious, seriously

Does anyone know what happened to Jennifer Knapp?  Does anyone else remember her?  She had a few CDs.  I'm thinking about her because I got a new iPod for Christmas (my first MP3 player, I know I'm a technically challenged almost 30 year old - I can't believe that.  Not about the MP3 player thing, but about the 30 thing!!!)  My sweet, generous sister - who totally broke the rules of the Secret Santa exchange and bought me a gift - gave it to me.  I love it.  I love my sister more than she knows.

ANYWAY.

I'm listening to Jennifer Knapp's song Refine Me and I just remembered how much I love this song.  How much it applies to me.  How much it applies to my sinful nature.  How greatful I am that His mercies are new each morning.

I think I've hit the Repeat button (three clicks on the shuffle) three times now.  I won't copy all the lyrics here, but I'll leave you with the chorus.

Lord, come with Your fire,
burn my desires; refine me
Lord, my will has deceived me
Please come and free me
Come rescue this child
For I long to be reconciled to You

Updated: Oh the power of the Google!  Jennifer Knapp is releasing an album in 2010!  YAY!  She has a great unique sound to me and I just love it.

Christmas 2009 - a recap

Christmas 2009 was great.  I think we had a great time with our families.

1.  Christmas Eve service at Nina and Papa's church.  Lauren and I missed communion because she had to potty, which ended in stage fright, but at least she tried.

After the service we went back to Nina and Papa's house for dinner (Crawfish Fettuccine!) and to decorate cookies for Santa.

After all the kids went to bed we went to work finishing up wrapping Christmas presents and assembling them.  I didn't get any pictures of Trey putting together Lauren's tricycle because I was busy wrapping presents, but I did get a picture of all the men putting together a toy for Brady.

How many men does it take to put together a plastic big wheel?

All the Christmas loot.  These are all the presents for all the grandkids.

2.  Christmas morning!  Lauren slept in until about 9:00 am so we had to get some breakfast in her before we opened presents.  She is the slowest eater in the morning (who am I kidding?  She eats slow unless its macaroni and cheese), so I was just itching to get her in front of the tree so she could see her tricycle!

She loved it!

More presents from Mama and Daddy.

After Christmas lunch, playing with PlayDoh in Papa's lap.

Riding her tricycle in the COLD!  It was freezing and very windy so we didn't stay outside too long.

3.  Christmas afternoon - While the kids were napping, the grown ups played with the Wii.  It was so much fun!  But the boxing game was exhausting.

We came home on Sunday.  Lauren was worn out from all the Christmas fun.

It was a great Christmas and I have a TON more pictures!  I'll probably have more specific posts at a later time.

Tomorrow I'll be all stow up, I'm sure of it

So, I fell down the stairs this morning.  It sounds so dramatic.  It was quite scary, but I think I only fell down 2 or 3 stairs.  I really don't know where I was in terms of how many were left.  I'm guessing that's why I fell.  I was carrying Lauren, her blankets, her jacket, and my big 'ole purse.  We have about 6 or 7 stairs that lead to the garage from the entry to the house into the kitchen. 

It's really a blessing that my car wasn't parked in the garage this morning.  I was a little irritated that it got left out in the cold, but honestly, if my car had been parked in that spot we would have landed on top of the hood.  And THAT could have been bad.  We would have dent the hood for sure, or rolled off the top and then hit the concrete.  Hitting the concrete from where we fell was bad enough. 

Thankfully I was carrying Lauren instead of holding her hand down the stairs.  I think it would have been worse I had been holding her hand.  I'm guessing I would have drug her down with me; a much worse fate.  I'm just so glad she wasn't hurt at alll!

I don't think Lauren knew what to think.  To be honest, I didn't either.  One minute we are heading to the car coming down the stairs and the next minute we are sitting on the floor of the garage.  I was pretty stunned, so I just sat there a minute, assessing the situation.  I looked at Lauren and she looked at me, with a very surprised look on her face.  I asked her if she was okay, and she said Yes.  I think she said, "What happened, Mama?"  I'm pretty sure I said, "I don't know!  Mama fell down the stairs!"  So, I just stood her up and then I got up slowly and dusted myself off.  Then we just slowly walked to the car and off we went.

But I can tell I'm going to be hurting tomorrow.  My whole left side from my lower back, down through my hip, leg, and ankle are hurting already.  And my right leg is a little sore too, I'm guessing from the way I fell.

Oh well, it could have been a lot worse!  But what a way to start a Monday!

Let's just say she's not a fan

Lauren got to see Santa Claus last weekend at the Bass Pro Shop Winterland in Bossier.  On the way to the Santa line we stopped to see the fish.  They were HUGE!

We had to wait about 30 minutes.  Santa had just gone on a break when we got in the line.  At least we got to first when he came back!  He was a GREAT Santa.  Although he didn't say much, he really looked the part.  Real beard and great smile!

Here we are waiting in the front of the line.  Brady had fun playing by Santa's big rocking chair.

Kennedy and Brady did great. 

Lauren, not so much.

I hope I haven't scarred her for life.  Everytime we read The Night Before Christmas book, she says, "I don't like Santa.  I don't like it."  And she wants to turn the page quickly.  Hopefully by next year she will have forgotten all about it.

Bless her heart.

After we saw Santa and gathered some composure, we went to make candy cane reindeer.  They were pretty cute!

All in all, we had a pretty good time.  As long as you leave out the part where I peeled Lauren off of me to sit on Santa's lap.

Potty Training Woes

Disclaimer: The following post contains the words Tee Tee and poop.

Help... please help.  We are in the throws of potty training and here is how the conversation goes EVERY DAY:

Me: Lauren, do you need to go potty? (first thing in the morning, I KNOW she has to go)

Lauren: No, Mama... I don't want it! (She says 'it' instead of 'to')

Me: Okay, well if you Tee Tee in the potty you can have an M&M.

Lauren: No, I don't want it Mama (VERY whiney voice)

Me: Okay, let's get dressed then.

Lauren: I wanna Tee Tee, I wanna Tee Tee Mama!!!

Sometimes she Tee Tees, sometimes she just sits on the potty and whines about wanting to get down.

It's the exact same conversation when we are getting ready to get in the bathtub.  She has a FIT and does not want to cooperate.  I don't know what to do.  The daycare teachers tell me that she's ready to start wearing underwear to school.  I have a hard time believing that.  Every time I ask her if she has to go potty she says no.  Every time.

The strange thing is that she poops in the potty.  I know, that seems backwards.  She doesn't do it everytime, but when she's with us as home I can usually get her to the potty before she poops in the Pull-Up.

But I'm stumped on what to do about the tee teeing part.  Do we just stop asking her?  Do we keep asking her and let her say no all the time?  Do we try to keep bribing her with m&ms?  Do we force her to sit on the potty? 

Advice, please.

Our Christmas Tree

It's hard to get good pictures of a Christmas tree... here's my best effort.

It's not perfect, but I love it!

Nothing says Christmas decorations...

like a bowlful of Brach's Christmas Peppermint Chewies.

I could make myself sick on these...

Thanksgiving 2009

We had a great time with our families at Thanksgiving this year!  Great food and great fun!  Here's some pictures...

Aunt Jen and cousin Brady!

The sun was blinding her and Papa.

Lauren loves her Nina!

Sitting outside with Grandma Faye

Papa Steiner sang Frosty the Snowman to her, all the verses!  Then he started on Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer and got a little hung up... :)

Pancakes and sausage for breakfast, yum!

It's been way too long since I posted Lauren pics

Lauren is just getting so big these days.  Some days she's gets too big for her britches, if you catch what I'm saying.  She is funny and laughing one minute and then one thing goes "wrong" and she's hollering.  Sometimes I laugh and other times it just not that funny.

But she is a joy and we can't imagine life without this smile.

She is loving her baby doll these days.  I think it's her favorite toy of the moment.  I pulled some old bottles down from a storage box and she is having a blast feeding her baby from a bottle.  Playing pretend is one of her favorite things, at home and at school. 

She is also still loving to ride in the wagons.  We go up and down the street a lot on the weekends.  It's just too dark when we get home from work to ride during the week.

Last weekend Daddy took her for a ride behind the lawn mower.  It was great!  She didn't know what to think at first.  Then when I got in the wagon with her (I was scared I was going to break the weight limit, but we did just fine) she started smiling and loving it.  We rode all over the yard and went behind the house too.  Daddy even spotted some deer tracks behind the house!

(i wish this picture wasn't grainy, but i think i had the setting on something funny and i didn't know it!!!)

I am really looking forward to Thanksgiving and getting some days off work.  Can't wait to eat!