It's Starting to look a lot like Christmas!

 Happy 40 Days till Christmas!!

Our week has been fun. First Rudolph Rosie came to see us.

I started getting the Christmas decorations out at the beginning of the week. I wanted to spread it out instead of trying to do it all at once.

Rosie thought it was great fun when she discovered the Christmas hats in one of the boxes and went and found her fake nose. She puts them on and laughs and laughs.


She really loves it when Nana puts on the nose and hat... but you won't see a picture of that.

 We also went to a Christmas craft fair at the local Catholic Church and got some wonderful had made decorations. We also picked up some extra lights at the store on the way home.

I've been buying lights since before Halloween so I think we MIGHT have enough this year. We'll see.

Then today after Church William and my mom put the lights on the Christmas tree.  After nap time we had dinner and made cookies and home made hot chocolate and then put all the ornaments on the tree.  

Rosie was such a good little decorator.

William decided that Christmas was way more fun with kids. I think he might be right.

It was so much fun to see Rosie excited about every little thing we took out of the boxes. About the lights. About the Tree in the HOUSE. About putting things on the tree and even about the Santa figurine that my mom put out. She now has all her toys around Santa... who she calls "Daddy" and she likes give him kisses.

Yep. Christmas is pretty dang fun with a little one. 

Halloween in Shanghai (The Ghost of Halloweens Past)

Thinking about our fun American Halloween season made me think of last Halloween. It was our Halloweens in Shanghai.

In 2008 we went to an art gallery Halloween party and then to a bar with some friends. 

William was a Lumber Jack.

I was a Chinese Gymnast. It was the year of the Beijing Olympics so it made sense that year. (That's my fake Chinese Passport that says I'm 16... in crayon.)

In 2009 Rosie was only a week and some days old, so we didn't go any where. Rosie was Tigger.

In 2010 we were Mummies.

We were just about to move back to the States so most of our stuff was packed and on the slow boat to the US. So William bought a bunch of medical gauze and we just wrapped out selves up. 

It was SO hard to get a taxi that night. People looked quite nervously at us. I think they thought we were actually hurt or sick or something. When we were walking down the street we got some pretty funny and scared looks.

Rosie was a cute little mummy.

So serious.

Halloween is NOT celebrated in China and few people have even heard of it. I learned the Chinese name for the holiday but most people just looked at me funny when I told them why we were dressed up.

 Some of our younger friends had heard about it on TV or online and thought it sounded very strange. But they were also interested in celebrating with us and having a new American experience.

A friend of ours hosted a Halloween "Cultural Exchange" Party. She gave a presentation about Halloween and the Celtic history of it as well as modern traditions, like costumes, trick or treating and pumpkin carving. Then we all carved pumpkins.

These are the pumpkins carved. I think they turned out really well for being the first time they had ever done it.

It was a great Halloween. It was fun to share the child like fun that Halloween can be with people who were excited to do the things for for the first time.  It was also a really fun way to say good bye to some old friends.

Our Happy Halloween

As I mentioned before, we started our Halloween celebrations in September at Disney World when we attended "Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party"
Which mean our Halloween season lasted extra long and we got lots of use out of our costumes. It was a magical life changing experience.

We got 3 uses out of our costumes this year. Once at Disney World, once at the Nashville zoo's Halloween Party, and then on Halloween night. So we got lots of use out of our costumes.

On Halloween night we had planned on going to a local church carnival to play games and eat hot dogs. But Rosie woke up with a runny nose and not feeling too great so we were a little apprehensive about taking her out in the cold.  We didn't want her sniffles to turn into a full cold.

So instead, we put our costumes on and went took Halloween treats to Uncle Joe and Aunt Janna's house. (Reverse trick or treating is much more fun).

Rosie was happy to get a bag of Reeses bits and to play with Joe. He always makes her laugh and smile... even when she's feeling under the weather and shy.

Then we took Apple Butter to Aunt Mae. Rosie and William enjoyed Aunt Mae's stash of children's books. Aren't they so cute?!

After our fun visits we went back home and dressed the dog up in Rosie's fairy wings and played chase around the kitchen. While William got carry out dinner from the Mexican restaurant and we watched some sci-fi.

Rosie wanted Andy to stay close to her. She love bossing him around.

So even though Halloween night didn't turn out how we'd planned it was ok, because we'd gotten lots of use out of our costumes already and done alot of fun Halloween things.

The next day, when Rosie was feeling better, Nana carved a Pumpkin with her.

She thinks it great fun and giggles every time she sees it and says "Pumpkeee! eyes. Mouth. Teeth. hehe"

So that was our Happy Halloween.

By Special Request

We are LOVE the cooler Fall weather.

Sometimes we just like to be silly outside.

On this day she is 22 months and 4 weeks old. She weighs 24.6 pounds and she's 34 inches tall. I can't believe how big my little baby is. When did she get so big? She was such a little baby just last month.

"Fezzes are Cool" 141/365

 Baby Girl loves hats. She likes to wear them and she likes other people to wear them. Her current favorite hat is actually my Giant Cupcake pan. She likes to wear it and dance around the kitchen and help with the dishes. We call it her Fez. Fezzes are Cool.

Rosie talks to the goats 128/365

Baby Girl is growing and learning so fast. I can hardly believe it's been just a few months that she's been walking. Now she RUNS everywhere and is talking. Here's a little video of her talking to the goats (it starts with her baaing at them) and telling me what the other animals say.

Sweet Birthday Fun 115/365

I am very loved and very spoiled. I got lots of wonderful gifts today...

A giant cupcake pan, a cupcake making book, a tea pot from England with my favorite rose pattern on it with matching sugar bowl and creamer, my favorite movie and little gold plated tea spoons to match my tea set.  The handles on the spoons are little roses!

I spent most of the day working on my giant cupcake birthday cake. I like baking and I would really like to get better at decorating cakes so I was really looking forward to making my own cake.

It had two layers, the top one yellow and the bottom one rich chocolate with chocolate chips and I made Boston Cream custard for the filling.

It was a very heavy cake and since it was Gluten Free it wasn't as strong... and it kind of didn't make it...

At least my normal sized cup cakes turned out pretty well. I had fun playing with my frosting bag.

Well the cake didn't turn out looking the way I wanted it to, but it was still fun to make and to eat. I learned something about what not to do and now I just need to practice a few more times. Any one want to come over and eat all the cakes and cupcakes I'd like to try out?

Thank you every one for all the love and phone calls. It was a wonderful birthday.

Cribs 92/365

Baby Girl doesn't sleep in a crib. She never has. From the day she was born she slept in our bed, and often in my arms. It works great for night nursing. She gets to nurse and I get to sleep.

When we decided to move back to the US my mom bought a crib and put it in our room. I think she's slept in it 3 times during nap time.  She's not a huge fan of it. Sometimes I can get to play in it for a few minutes while I brush my teeth or something, but for the most part she really doesn't like being in.  I've been trying to figure out different ways to help her like it.

Tonight I tried something a little different, and maybe a bit unorthodox...

I thought if we spent time together in the crib that maybe she would like it a little better. We cuddled and nursed and kissed the lama and I even gave her a little foot rub.

I'm not sure if this will help her like it any better, but at least she seemed to think it was fun. She even asked William to get in with us. Of course he did not and then baby wanted out. But at least we had a fun time together.

And now we know that I fit in the crib.  Even if Baby doesn't like it maybe I can use it if I want my own sleeping space when my two lovely red heads are taking up the whole bed.

Imagination moments 65/365

The yellow daffodils that you have seen pictures of on this blog grow wild in Tennessee. It's so beautiful. We have a whole hill that just blooms yellow. A sure sign that it's spring.

Yesterday, as we were driving to the store, we came across this field and it made us laugh...

Some one had taken the time to dig up all their yellow wild daffodils and painstakingly re-plant them. That's so much work!

Later that night, while we were making dinner, Baby Girl crawled into one of the cabinets we let her play in and pulled out a pot.  She proceeded to pretend she was making dinner. It was the first time she imagined something all by herself.

She is growing up so fast!

Fun in the Grocery Store31/365

We're on a road trip. I'm writing this from a hotel room while William watches bad TV and Baby Girl walks in circles and sings. We have sitting-in-a-car-too-long tiredness.

We drove for about 4 hours tonight. It may have been longer actually. We had to drive pretty slowly since it starting snowing just as we left Nashville. For a while it was a little difficult to see the road but luckily William grew up in the mountians so it was no problem. Plus there were really cool big trucks that were spray a salt like substance on the road.

Like Father like Daughter

Since it was cold and snowing we decided to make our dinner and restroom stop at a Kroger's instead of a rest stop. It was warmer and we could let baby walk around.

This was our first time going to a store with Baby girl since she's started walking on her own. It was SO much fun!





Baby was so cute walking around the store that people actually stopped to watch her. She brought a smile to everyone's face.

She had so much fun pushing the cart.

We walked up and down almost every isle, hoping to wear her out, and when we got to the Valentine's isle she squealed with delight and then ran to kiss all the stuffed animals.

We had such a hard time getting to come away from there. Every time William would walk her away she would turn and look for the isle again. At one point she ran from three isles away and found the stuffed animals again. She gave them all kisses again before we left.

It was the most fun I've ever had in a grocery store before. She's the cutest thing in the world.