So Long, 2010

Now is the time to look back on 2010 and look forward to 2011. This year has been CRAZY, for lack of a better word. It has had some really great moments and some really not so great moments. I won't dwell on those low points but I will tell some of my favorite memories of 2010.

I started the year off by going back to work after my very long maternity leave. I had a super hard time with it but when I look back on it, it was a great opportunity for Paul to spend some time taking care of Liam without me. This is the only picture we have of Liam taking the bottle and it was such a miracle at the time that I recieved this picture in my inbox at work. Quitting my job in March to stay at home was the best decision I made this year.

Liam learning how to crawl (and all of the other milestones).



All of our Disneyland trips. There were many!

Liam's first Easter,

First St. Patrick's Day,

First 4th of July,

And every other crazy hair day!

Our summer in the pool.

Fully equiped with Liam's first swim lessons and first beach trip.

First steps.

First Birthday.

Our trips! To the zoo,

the museum,

Oak Glen,

and the pumpkin patch/ petting zoo.

First haircut. (and the second one as well).

Teaching Liam animal sounds and watching him identify them. (Elephant pictured below).

Playing in the backyard in a diaper.

Dressing up for Halloween.

And, most recently, celebrating the holidays as a family and enjoying a vacation with Paul!

I have also enjoyed growing closer to Paul (as difficult as growth can be) as we have learned how to be parents together. I love that we have reverted back to practices we had cast aside like writing letters to each other and making time alone a priority.

Looking forward to 2011, my goals are to be the best wife and mother I can be, to worry less and trust God more, to have fun with the day to day tasks, to teach Liam how to pray, to set a good example, to read, to take tons of pictures, to excersize more, and to laugh A LOT!

These aren't really resolutions and they don't have a December 31, 2011 expiration date. They are more of a guideline to stay focused on in the coming year.

Have a HAPPY New Year!

Our Christmas

Our Chirstmas was INCREDIBLE!! Liam was so much fun this year and he was in a really good mood both days despite the fact that his first molars broke through on the bottom on Christmas day!

  

 

Paul and I both thoroughly enjoyed spending the day together since he has had to work on Christmas for the past 2 years. (We are definitely shooting for another December vacation for next year!) We also loved playing the part of Santa!

It was a very good day spent with our amazing and generous families and delicious food!

Now we are playing with our new toys, taking decorations down (which isn't nearly as fun as putting them up), pondering new years resolutions, and sulking because this is the last week of our vacation.

Rainy Day Schedule

As I'm sure you've heard IT'S RAINING! A LOT! It makes me very thankful that Liam's new favorite thing to do is color. If it wasn't keeping him distracted from going outside, I might be a bit tired of following him around telling him that crayons are, "for paper only." Which I'm not.

To cope, we've been building fires while camping out in the living room watching Christmas Vacation, slammin Tim Tams, wrapping presents, and playing with (and kissing) a musical Santa that I cannot wait to pack away when Christmas is over!

Enjoy your Christmas week! I hope you all are able to barricade yourselves in your homes against the wetness and the last minute shoppers! That's our plan!

Vacation

The night before we left for Disneyland we took Liam to look at Christmas lights. The houses were amazing and it was pretty fun but also very chaotic. Lots of people around and lots of cars attempting to drive through crowds made it a very dangerous place for a toddler to be running around. So our family took turns carrying Liam and he was not thrilled that his feet weren't on the ground most of the time.

But he was thrilled to see lots of Santas or, as he calls him, "ho ho ho!"



The next morning we left for our vacation. We checked into our hotel and relaxed there for a couple of hours before heading to Disneyland. Liam seemed to enjoy his hotel stay. He spent most of the time walking around the room with the complimentary pen and notepad jotting down notes. I suppose he was inspecting the room to make sure it was safe for us to stay. We left Liam with Paul's parents that evening so we could go out on a date. It was AMAZING! We really took our time together for granted before we had Liam. Shoot, we took eating a slow meal for granted! We thoroughly enjoyed every bite and every laugh!

The next day we spent the entire day at Disneyland minus our lunch/ nap time. Having a hotel down the street was very helpful. Liam started to get tired and we started to get hungry so we just left! He got to sleep in peace and quiet and we got to eat 39 cents tacos instead of a $10 hamburger. We watched World of Color at night which was really cool but to be honest I don't really think it was all that it was cracked up to be.

Then we left the following day feeling exhausted and as if we never wanted to go to Disneyland ever again, which, I believe, is exactly the way you should feel after a vacation. When your own home sounds like the only place you want to be, you have had enough fun!

We topped off the weekend with Papa Johns and chocolate cheescake at home for my 26th birthday! Now, is it Christmas yet?



Sorting

Our vacation is going great! We had really big ideas of things we wanted to do over this break but we've decided to play it a little more low key and just enjoy our time together while getting some things done that we've been putting off. How adult of us! Well our initial plan was to take a cruise but we decided not to until Liam was either old enough to enjoy it or old enough to be left behind for a few days. Neither of those is this year so we put it off. Instead, we are taking advantage of the last 2 days of our Disneyland passes. They expire on my birthday (Dec. 15) and they are a FORTUNE now so we plan on putting off purchasing new ones as long as possible. I really love Disneyland so I'm not sure how long I can last without them!

Up until now we've been wrapping Christmas presents, eating gingerbread men, drinking hot cocoa, and watching holiday specials. We also cleaned out the garage and sorted through Liam's toys. Well, Paul actually did both of those things while I watched. Sorting through his toys was so hard for me to do. I'm a big believer in getting every last drop out of... anything! It just doesn't feel right to pack away baby toys that have barely been played with. And it most definitely doesn't feel right to donate items that I stared so longingly at while I awaited Liam's arrival. Paul, on the other hand, says, "it's like a band-aid. You just gotta rip it off!" So he charged through Liam's toy buckets and cubbies throwing rattles, chimes, baby mirrors, and teethers into a big box to be stored away for the next one. Of course, Liam wanted to play with everything that went into the box which encouraged me even more to beg for their release. But, it's done and it was needed. With Christmas only a couple weeks away we really needed to make room for more age appropriate toys.

Plus it encouraged me to get in on the action. I raided Liam's cabinet in the kitchen. Yes, if you don't have kids and you ever wonder how much space you need, Liam has his own cabinet. I filled another box with bottles, pacifiers, milk storage containers, and everything else we don't use anymore. To be perfectly honest, Liam never took to the bottle or a pacifier so they could have been packed up long ago.

Now, we are busy packing for our short getaway. That, and getting over this nasty cold. It should go away just in time for DISNEYLAND!!

Knott's Berry Farm... and other stuff

We spent a very fun day at Knott's yesterday. The highlight of the day had to be the carriage ride. We wanted to ride it because Liam LOVES horses and he would get so excited whenever they would trot by with other riders. What I wasn't expecting was to see my life flash before my eyes. I seriously thought we were going to die. These horses were not trotting. They were full on running. And they were trying to run off in different directions and kept bumping into each other. They were foaming at the mouth and shaking their heads flinging saliva everywhere. We were sitting on the top of the carriage right behind the drivers with nothing between us and death except for an old seatbelt that we all shared. We survived, obviously, but it was quite wild. Needless to say, Liam loved it.

He also loved his new gun belt his Grandpa and Grandma bought him. He's been wearing it all day today.

The tree we bought Liam has been decorated and relocated due to being knocked over and spilling water all over the carpet. I won't name any names but let's just say it's a certain someone who enjoys drinking a pretend cup of morning coffee.



We took our Christmas pictures on Sunday and we got a couple of good poses out of it for our cards but it wasn't my favorite session. They were super crowded. (Note to self: next year's pictures should be taken on a weekday in November). So they were running very behind and then they rushed us through our sitting. A sitting which, by the way, began with Liam in tears due to the photographer grabbing and tickling him when we first walked into the room. Seriously? Why would you do that? I understand that she was trying to make him smile but I, personally, don't smile when strangers run up to me and grab my stomach while making high pitched tickling noises. We weren't even posing yet! Ok, enough on that. Let's move on to the fact that we told them we only wanted Christmas pictures taken with a festive background, not with a neutral one. I was so busy consoling Liam that I didn't even turn around until we had already taken about 5 pictures and noticed we were taking pictures in front of a grey background that looks like the one they use for yearbook pictures! Grrr! But, they eventually took some Christmas pictures, Liam eventually calmed down and gave a couple of shy smiles, and we, luckily, used a coupon that made our session super cheap! I'll have to post some of the pictures on here that we didn't purchase because they are pretty funny.