Merry Christmas!

Today we celebrate the birth of our Savior! We have had a nice morning, which began blessedly late (for us). The kids woke up at 7:00 and Ashlyn was pleasantly surprised to see Grandma Wenny who flew in last night (Greg flies in today). We all came downstairs and Grandma played with the kids while Mark and I whipped up some waffles and bacon for breakfast. Real bacon, too. Hey, it's Christmas!

So then it was time for presents...I suppose in the future I will have to make muffins or something the night before because I know the kids may not have patience for making breakfast...hmmm. Ashlyn was not very excited about opening up gifts and got rather bored. She went into the kitchen and sat at the table saying, "I want to do crafts." Then we busted out her easel. When she saw the picture on the box, she immediately wanted to paint and was very eager to put it together (see picture). She had a very good time painting and drawing with chalk on the other side. I am going to wish we had bought the drop cloth, eventhough it will be used only in the kitchen under supervision!

Matthew likes his rattle socks (from Auntie Meredith) and had a nice morning nap. Mark is already halfway through his first James Bond movie...I bought him a box set of the old ones for Christmas. Mark tutored me on how to use my new Ipod; he also tutored Grandma Wenny on how to use her new digital camera...he's the tech guy around here! Anyway, we are grateful we could do our share in bolstering the economy :-) I keep reminding myself of why we exchange gifts: to remember the greatest gift we could ever receive. Salvation through the blood of Jesus! We hope to spend the rest of the day relaxing and making room in our heads to meditate on what was done for us when God sent his son Jesus to earth. Merry Christmas, everyone!

"'Fraid That Thing!"

Ashlyn cracks me up all the time. Lately, it is the two-year-old fears that have me in stitches...although I try not to laugh at her because she is serious. It's hard! I think it began with the carbon monoxide detector. She became afraid of it when she leaned up against it one day and it sounded off. It was in the hallway, but after this incident, she would not walk past it without being held. She would whimper, "That thing beeps! Fraid that thing! Nuggle..." with arms outstretched. So now it is in the guest bedroom (a room she doesn't visit frequently).

Now she is afraid of her changing table and will only submit to a diaper change on the floor. So while I was changing her into her jammies this evening, she observed the smoke detector on the ceiling and said, "That thing beeps! Nuggle, nuggle." I really hope she doesn't notice all the things on the ceiling in this house...there are a lot. There are the regular smoke detectors and then the ones for the security system. And there are the glass break detectors for the security system. She would never go in the hallways!

She has even pointed at her little brother and said, "Fraid Matthew." I know that it is common for 2-year-olds to develop fears, but I never thought it would be so funny to me. I will try not to laugh the next time she points at her toy barn and says, "Fraid that thing!"

Bunny's Bum

I was nursing Matthew in his room this afternoon and Ashlyn was playing with her bunny in there with us. She began to lay bunny down very carefully and she was patting him and stroking him. I asked her what she was doing. Here is how the conversation went:

Me: What are you doing, Ashlyn?
Ashlyn: Changin' bunny's diaper.
Me: Oh, did bunny make poo-poo?
Ashlyn: Yeah, I need a wipe.
Me: Well, go ahead and get one.

Ashlyn left the room and re-entered wiping her hands with a pretend wipe. "I got one," she said. She proceeded to clean bunny up, saying, "I wiping bunny's bum."

All day long she proceeded to change her stuffed animals' diapers.

Gearing Up

We are getting ready for Christmas and all I can say is: Thank God for online shopping!! We have gotten some great deals and haven't paid shipping yet. With two little ones, it is such a time-saver, too. Ashlyn is getting an easel to further develop her artistic talents :-)

Matthew might get one toy but he really isn't into playing with stuff right now and has a ton of hand-me-downs anyway. We're too practical. We are not going overboard buying things for Ashlyn, either...she has enough already! Here are some pictures from around the house...some ducks came right up to the porch the other day and we fed them bread. Ashlyn had fun with them until they started pecking the storm door and then she was afraid of them. They left us some nice presents on the porch. :-)

We put up our tree last weekend...Ashlyn enjoyed helping. She piled all the ornaments on one branch. It was a pretty branch until we redistributed the ornaments. We had to, though. There weren't enough!

As you can see, she enjoys piling stuff on her brother, too.

Miss Know-It-All

Sorry there have been no posts lately...I've been trying to get some sleep! I will share a quick story about Ashlyn though. We were on our way to Annapolis for Thanksgiving and she was reading a book. She pointed to a parrot in her book and asked what it was. Here is how the conversation went:

ASHLYN: What is that, Daddy?
DADDY: It's a parrot, sweetie.
ASHLYN: Actually, it's a chicken.

Well, la-dee-da-da! The video below is a demo of some of her repertoire. She's a funny girl.