Christmas Day, 2009

Here's what Santa brought Paisley this year: A new dollhouse, art easel and art table.

She's already played with or gotten use out of all items - they keep her pretty busy when she's at home!

Christmas Eve with Papa, Aunt Jessica & Grandma Edith

Christmas Eve was spent with Aunt Jessica, her new puppy Murphy and Papa Mike. When I was looking through my pictures, I realized I had no pictures of any of them. How did that happen?? Well, we had a little crisis with Jessica's puppy that involved some Mucinex & an allergic reaction to the Mucinex, we had lunch somewhere in there, and opened gifts. It was also snowing like crazy outside & we ended up having to forego church because of the weather & take lots of extra time to drive out to Mesquite to Mike's Grandma Edith's house.

Even though she refused to look at the camera, I did manage to get this picture of her in her cute Christmas outfit. Her hair just gets more and more curly :)

Upstairs, playing with her Christmas tree while watching it snow outside. She's growing fast, and I know in the near future I am going to look back at this picture and miss that little body - so cute!

I think this may actually by mommy or daddy's gift, Paisley's helping us open.

Paisley got a great outdoor playhouse from Papa Mike for Christmas. This picture above is the documentation of her seeing it in the box in the garage. It was way too cold to get it put together and ready for her that day. I know she is going to really enjoy it though, once the weather warms up just a little teeny bit.

Chrismas with Grandma, Grandma Fay & Aunt Jessica

The many faces of Paisley... above is the "I don't really like taking pictures mom, but I'll humor you and give you a weird face."

"What's that? You didn't like that face? Well, how 'bout if I strain every muscle in my face and smile real pretty like this?"

We had a great evening with the Grandmas and Aunt Jessica on the 23rd. Paisley had so much fun with all of her gifts - she got a new Clifford stuffed animal - Clifford the big red dog is currently her favorite book/cartoon. She got some new dress up shoes from Aunt Jessica, a great new winter hat from Grandma Fay (pictured below) and lots of other really fun stuff! Mike and I had a great time & got lots of great stuff as well.

Paisley's new hat from Grandma Fay

She's really excited about whatever this is she's opening!

Here she is trying to walk in her new dress up shoes - in socks. Not a good idea :)

Here's daddy, the princess. Modeling some of the new digs Paisley got for Christmas.

Where has the time gone?

What in the world have I been doing since late November? I am really bummed that I didn't keep up Paisley's blog better during the month of December. Christmas was great. Paisley didn't see Santa, so no pictures of that. We waited in line for about 15 minutes & it became clear to Mike and I that the actual meeting with Santa was not going to go well. And since the line was about an hour long, the decision was made not to push the issue this year. We'll ask Paisley again next year & see what she wants to do.

We had lots of Christmases:

• December 23rd was spent with Grandma, Grandma Fay & Aunt Jessica.
• Christmas Eve was spent with Aunt Jessica, Papa and the entire Gibson clan at Grandma Edith's. The travel to Mesquite was complicated by the snow and ice. And while I am certainly delighted by a white Christmas, I was not delighted by the 2 hour, very dangerous drive home from Mesquite on Christmas Eve. Ugh. We made it home safely, praise God!
• Christmas Day was spent with the Harbords after a nice quite Christmas morning at home, just the three of us.
• Then, on Saturday, the day after Christmas, we traveled to Birmingham to visit with my dear friend McKenzie, her daughter Elizabeth, and the Graham's. That trip will require it's own separate entry, it was one to remember. I want to be sure and document the details so I can tell Paisley about it some day. Wow.

I'll post pictures next...

Christmas Tree Farm 2009

Paisley's waiting to get on the hay ride and get out to the trees
Paisley and Daddy

and Mommy

she's seeing how much touching she can get away with

we all finally decided on this one for Paisley's tree to go upstairs

Enjoying the free reign to run around like a crazy girl

the pretty, quaint red barn at the Wall Family Tree Farm - Terrell, Texas


The three of us had a great time - for sure an experience worthy of making time for every year. Merry Christmas!

November Wrap Up

The month of November has really gotten away from us. We had a great Thanksgiving with all of our family at various times during the last week. Paisley had a rough weekend of being sick last weekend, but is now feeling much better. Here's what Paisley is up to day-to-day (mostly things that mommy and daddy want to remember at this stage):
-Pais just turned 28 months this week and still only weighs 26 pounds. She's just as tall as ever.
-She has started using phrases like "you know what" and then proceeds to tell you a story. Or "actually, ...".
-She frequently will suggest an alternative when you offer her something she doesn't really want or you ask her to do something she doesn't want to do. She'll say "how 'bout..." and then give you her most superior suggestion.
-She loves school and is very excited to go every time.
-She is still not interested in potty training. Mentally, she is very aware of all the details, but has not one single desire to actually do it. I've even prepared "treat" jars with play-doh, markers, stickers, new crayons, and other "crafty" things and she won't even consider it. Ah, it'll come in good time.
-She loves crafts. And, for some reason, she thinks "crafts" is "craps". So, that's worth a good laugh from us every time she says it. I have been trying to correct her, but the f-t sound is very tough for her right now.
-Her favorite song to have us sing before she goes to bed at night is Jesus Loves Me.
-She is sleeping like a champ in her big girl bed now & we have absolutely no problems. Her "set up" includes a turtle that projects stars onto the ceiling, and the light has to be orange. She also has to have the radio on and the fan on. She needs her 'froggy' and her purple blankie.

We spent Thanksgiving morning at the Ft. Worth turkey trot & she had a blast. We had the Harbords and Papa Mike over for the rest of the day. It was a blast - a lot of cooking, but a lot of fun. Today, we took Paisley to the Christmas Tree Farm in Terrell and it was just perfect. Paisey had a great time picking out her own little tree and we ran around and had fun for an hour or 2 before we headed back home. Pictures to follow in seperate post...

Great night!!