Christmas in Houston after all....

After spending all night in the airport in Seattle we didn't give up after all....we were able to get a flight out of Seattle in between snow storms so we did arrive in Houston in time to spend Christmas with my family! We're enjoying our time here catching up with family and friends. We will be back in Seattle next weekend so look forward to stories and pictures from our trip then.

Snowed In

I was so prepared for our trip to Houston. I've put my time as a stay-at-home mom to good use! I planned our meals down to the last breakfast so that we wouldn't have food go to waste in the fridge while we were out of town. I carefully packed suitcases for everyone. I had the ultimate supply of dollar store toys and craft projects for Olivia to play with on the airplane. The diaper bag was fully stocked and perfectly organized. We've had quite a bit of snow here lately so we wanted to leave plenty of time to get to the airport, get parked, and checked in. I checked the status of our flight constantly all the way to the airport. I'll save the details for another day but we were snowed in. Our flight was due to leave at 6pm and then got delayed and delayed again, then we got on the plane only to sit there for a few hours and get off again so that it could be canceled. We then tried to go standby this morning on a couple other flights out of Seattle but those flights were canceled as well. We spent the night on the airport. It was terrible! We won't be able to get home for Christmas. Thanks to all that careful packing we arrived back home to a completely empty fridge. But then to end on a positive note, thanks to the fantastic diaper bag and dollar store toys! You absolutely do need 3 changes of clothes for each child under 3, you never know when you'll be sleeping in an airport or running a mini-daycare for other stranded holiday travelers.

Home for the Holidays

We've spent enough time as an Army family to know not to ever take being home for the holidays for granted. Mike is due to deploy during the first half of 2009 so we're being sure to treasure every moment. My heart goes out to our friends who are not blessed to be together this year for the holidays. You are in our thoughts and prayers.

All the snow we've had here lately means that Mike has been getting home from work early! How could I get mad at my husband for tracking snow in and taking off his wet boots in the middle of the living room when I saw him having this adorable moment with Olivia.

Merry Christmas

Since we're leaving tomorrow we had a mini-Christmas celebration here. My favorite and most useful gift so far is our new gorillapod tripod for the camera. We used it to get some great pictures of the whole family!

So proud

I am determined not to even begin potty training until I am positive that Olivia is ready. She's been interested for a while but I have been hesitating for one reason or another.....I wanted to make sure she was able to get her pants on and off before we started, I wanted to make sure that she's able to tell me when she needs to go, etc. Well I am reminded again that parenting has absolutely nothing to do with what I want! While I was doing dishes in the kitchen Olivia went into the bathroom and took off her pants and her diaper, then I heard her ask for help. I went into the bathroom to help her and she said potty so I put her on the potty where she proceeded to do her business (number 2) then she said all done, wiped herself, asked for help down, asked for help flushing the toilet, and then told me she needed to wash her hands! ARE YOU KIDDING ME!!!! I wasn't ready for her to begin potty training, but I guess she is. And just to prove that this entire episode wasn't a fluke, she did the entire routine again later in the evening with Mike.

Christmas Cookies

We're leaving to spend Christmas in Houston on Sunday so Santa is visiting our house here tonight. Mike, Olivia and I all decorated Christmas cookies tonight to leave out for Santa. Yummy!

Snow Day

We've had quite a bit of snow here in Washington over the last couple of days. I am so glad that I don't have to drive anywhere! Here are a few pictures of the fun we've had in the snow....

I just love those little footprints in the snow!

Gingerbread House

I am absolutely loving staying home with Olivia. for the last year she has been in day care while I've been at work so I feel like I'm getting to know her all over again. This past weekend we built a gingerbread house from a little kit I picked up at Costco. It was the best $9 I've spent in a long time! We had an absolute blast. I put the house together and Olivia snacked and decorated. Olivia also enjoyed picking the candy decorations off the house and licking them then putting them back on. Sure our house is far from perfect but we did it together and that's what counts

Tummy Time

Tummy time is a joint activity in our house now, it's not just for Peter and Olivia but for Olivia's doll too!

The Greatest Gift

I truly believe that the greatest gift that Mike and I could have possibly given Olivia this Christmas is her brother. Mike and I were prepared for how much we would love and adore the newest member of our family but we were not at all prepared to see how much Olivia would absolutely adore her little brother. She gets so excited when we let her hold him that she starts trembling. The smile on her face is absolutely priceless. I feel so blessed that she seems to have made the transition from being the only child to the older child so easily! I am sure that later on there will be plenty of occasions and situations in which she is not so happy to have a little brother and I can't wait to show her this picture, maybe it will remind her how much she loves her brother after all....

Good Morning

I love mornings with Olivia! She's always been a morning person. As someone who is not a morning person I admire the way she wakes up instantly and is ready to face the day! She doesn't lay around in bed trying wishing for an extra 5 minutes of sleep, she doesn't stumble groggily around as she tries to get dressed. Here's a brief run down of how my day started this morning.....

7:55 am--I hear Olivia shouting in her room (we still use the baby monitor so she's not actually shouting but since the baby monitor is on my nightstand it sounds like she is). It's absolutely the best alarm clock ever! Olivia is becoming more and more verbal and she's taken to using all the words she knows at once just because she can so I hear something like: "morning, thank you, baby, cheese, morning, mama, baby, hi, dadda, morning, bye, thank you". I treasure hearing these words all one right after another. She knows what each of them means, I think she's just practicing.

8:15 am--I've gotten dressed and gotten Peter dressed and I head in to see Olivia. She's sitting in her bed and as soon as I round the corner into her room she greats me with the biggest smile!

8:20 am--After the best good morning hugs and kisses I discover that Olivia has managed to unzip her pj's and take off half her diaper. Who knows when she did this because I realize that her diaper has leaked all over. We head for the bathtub.

8:25 am--During her impromptu bath Olivia jabbers away, telling me morning repeatedly. Peter starts to fuss as we finish her bath and Olivia announces that she's "all done" with her bath and "wants baby".

8:30 am--We get dressed and off we go to find the baby and start the day. Here's the picture I took of Olivia telling Peter good morning.

What a great quote!

I have always been a reader. I had plenty of favorite books when I was growing up and I realized the other day that these classics were so much better than the trash that I read now. I loved Little Women, the Anne of Green Gables series, Caddie Woodlawn, and the Little House on the Prairie books. I read this quote the other day from Caddie Woodlawn and I loved it so much I just had to share. Oh and by the way Caddie Woodlawn was written by a Gamma Phi Beta....


"It is the sisters and wives and mothers, you know, Caddie, who keep the world sweet and beautiful...A woman's task is to teach...gentleness and courtesy and love and kindness. It's a big task, too, Caddie-harder than cutting trees or building mills or damming rivers. It takes nerve and courage and patience, but good women have those things...A woman's work is something fine and noble to grow up to..."

Guilty Pleasures

So those of you who know me well know that I am completely obsessed with reality tv shows. I'm not at all selective, in fact, the trashier the better. Give me a reality show and I'm happy!

Since Mike has been in the field I've discovered my newest favorite guilty pleasure--reality tv online! Peter is a pretty good sleeper and at this point he is usually waking up once a night for me to nurse him. I feel slightly guilty that I'm not using this time to bond with my adorable son but really, how much bonding goes on at 4 am when I'm half asleep. Instead I've taken to bringing the laptop to bed and when Peter wakes up for his feeding I log on and catch up on my reality tv. So far this week I've watched the entire season of MTV's Real World/Road Rules Challenge "The Island". I don't know what I'm going to do when Mike gets back from the field, something tells me that he won't enjoy being woken up in the middle of the night by the drama of reality tv, but then there are always headphones :)....

Family Date Night

We finished dinner a little early the other night and we decided to have a mini-Family Date Night and go for ice cream. We drove to the nearest Cold Stone and got some ice cream. It was the best way to end a weekend! The three of us shared some ice cream (Peter was there too but of course he couldn't share in the ice cream fun). Olivia helped me pick and we settled on chocolate ice cream with peanut butter and fudge in a waffle bowl. But the best part was that Olivia ate most of the ice cream by herself. It's amazing how much her spoon using skills improve when it's ice cream as opposed to soup or something less exciting.

Church Behavior-To use childcare or not

When Olivia was younger we we were careful to arrive at mass a little early each Sunday so that we could be sure and get "good seats". Seats appropriate for a young couple with a young child. We were sure to sit in at the end of a row, preferably close to the cry room so that we could easily get up and leave if Olivia started fussing. This past Sunday, I found myself kneeling after Communion, discreetly trying to pick up bright orange goldfish from all over the floor. We have become one of those obnoxious families. Our child brings a bag full of toys and snacks to church, she crawls all over the pew and kneelers, the list goes on. When it was just Mike, Olivia, and I it didn't seem to be such a big deal. Between the two of us we could keep her entertained and still pay attention and actively participate in mass. Somehow that's not the case anymore.

Each Sunday as we walk into church we see the sign advertising childcare down the hall and I'm torn. Part of me really appreciates that we go to church together as a family. How will Olivia learn to behave in mass if she doesn't ever attend mass. But then at the same time I am embarrassed that I have to pick up goldfish from all over the floor. Mike and I aren't able to devote all our attention to what is going on in mass because we're taking turns trying to keep Olivia occupied. There isn't a cry room in the church we attend now so that's not an option. So we struggle, to use child care or not to use child care........

What a Week!

TGIF!!!! So my first official week with both Olivia and Peter is over. When Mike came home from work today he said that he hadn't seen me look so joyful to see him in a while. I was joyful, I was relieved, I was ecstatic! I was prepared for being busy but it's not the endless list of things to do that is exhausting, it's the pressure of caring for two human beings that is exhausting. The little things.....the diapers, fixing meals, cleaning up, are becoming routine but knowing that I am the only adult around, the only one in charge of these two little beings that are depending on me completely is emotionally draining!



This has been a week of highs and lows but am so blessed to have this time to spend with Olivia and Peter. Here are just a few highlights (and some lowlights) from the week

• Olivia decided to help me make her dinner and she added dried cranberries to her bowl of spaghetti noodles. She LOVED it (see picture below)
• While I was feeding Peter the other day Olivia managed to climb into the washing machine and proceeded to get stuck. She then freaked out when she realized that she was stuck which made things worse. The only way I was able to calm her down enough so that I could help her out of the washing machine was by promising to let her hold Peter.
• The house is a mess. Around Wednesday I completely gave up, there are toys everywhere, crumbs all over the place and the kitchen is a disaster.
• Olivia decided to help me sweep the floor, as I was positively reinforcing her good behavior she then decided to stab me in the behind with a fork. I would have disciplined her for this inappropriate behavior but then I caught myself telling her that she was going to the corner because forks are for eating not stabbing people. As I realized what I was saying I started giggling and couldn't keep a straight face.
• Peter now officially weighs more than he did at birth. He lost almost a pound from his birthweight but he's now gained that back and then some!
  

So in love

Peter will be 4 weeks old on Tuesday and I can't believe how much has changed in just a few weeks. Every member of the Leiva family is completely in love! I have started to treasure the time that I spend alone with Peter in the middle of the night when I feed him. The first thing Olivia says every morning when she gets up is "baby" and then off she goes running to find him. She gets so excited when we let her hold, hug, and kiss him that she can barley stand it. Mike can't wait to snuggle with Peter when he gets home from work and I've never seen two people more relaxed with each other than when Peter and Mike fall asleep together on the couch.

Happy Thanksgiving

Olivia has perfect timing and she decided to add "thank you" to her vocabulary on Thanksgiving Day. She'd technically said thank you before but on Thanksgiving she started to say it spontaneously all on her own. She definately has saying thank you down after receiving something but she still gets a little confused about what to say when someone gives her something. It's so nice to hear her say thank you when I give her dinner or change her diaper! It's so unexpected, it's such a nice surprise!

We had some friends and their 3 year old son and newborn daughter over for Thanksgiving Dinner. We co-cooked this year which made the turkey day prep much easier. I cooked the turkey, dressing, gravy, cranberries, and a corn casserole while our friends brought over all the sides and dessert. We had a low key thanksgiving but it was nice and we're most thankful that we were all together (even though this is a horrible picture).

You can check out more pictures on Shutterfly: share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=1AcNWTRm5ZsWH9

Fun with the Family

My parents were able to come up for the weekend after Peter was born. We had a great weekend and it was their first time to Washington state. Mike arranged for my dad to ride in one of his Stryker vehicles on Friday then we all went to the Olympia Farmer's Market on Saturday. Sunday everyone went to Cabella's (ultimate sporting goods store) while I got to stay home and rest with Peter. We had a great time and here are a few pictures of Dad and the Stryker.

At the Farmer's Market Olivia didn't want to ride in her stroller but she loved pushing it around. I think it'll be a while before we let her push Peter in the stroller but she had a blast!