No Worries

Those 2 words describe how I feel right now.  No worries.  And it is so very nice.  The Christmas shopping has been done for months now.  Well until Virginia just recently became obsessed with Tinkerbell and The Great Fairy Rescue.  A few things that were originally on the "list" have now been moved to the birthday "list."  Which is okay.  I can't wait to see her face Christmas morning when she sees all the fairies and even Lizzy, the little English girl from the movie, the doll.  She's not into dolls per se as little people you feed and rock but into character dolls that she can act out things with.  I can't tell you how much I've "been" Tinkerbell over the past week.  She comes to me and hands me the doll and says, "Talk to me."  And I become Tinkerbell.  Don't worry she is still obsessed with her cars too.  Those are her 2 main interests right now.  Cars and Tinkerbell! 
Oh back to no worries.  That's it.  We have nothing going on and nothing that has to be done.  Whatever is done is all "extra" and very special.  There isn't anything that has to be done so we are just going along and enjoying the joy of the season.  Virginia and I made special treats for her teachers and the extras we handed out to random people at the church yesterday.  Today we are making some more treats to take to the valet guys at the hospital tomorrow after the early children's Christmas Eve service.  It is so nice to not have to worry about a big dinner or last minute gifts or any of the other things people stress over at Christmas.  Don't worry I do miss being with family and the big dinner and all the stresses but with Chris gone it is nice to just be here with Virginia and have my biggest worry being capturing all the special moments on camera for Chris to see.  This is the right year to have a no worry Christmas and I am excited.  So don't worry about us, we'll be watching Tinkerbell I'm sure and eating all the extra yummies we make!

Also please excuse Virginia's dirty face again!

Merry Christmas!

Packages have been arriving almost daily for a while now.  Chris kept telling me that once they all got there I should go ahead and open them.  I don't like to open my presents BEFORE Christmas but he kept insisting.  So yesterday morning before Virginia got up I opened our Christmas present.  I say "ours" because it's really for both of us.  It's a new digital SLR camera.  Chris loves to take pictures as much as I do and he even said yesterday that he can't wait to get home and use our new camera at the ZOO! 
So you will definitely be getting an overload of pictures now!!  I have only just taken it out of the box and put 1 of the 2 lenses on it that Chris got us.  I haven't even opened the manual yet to begin learning all about this camera.  I've been using the Auto mode but I am excited about learning how to shoot in manual mode too! 
I took a bunch of pictures last night of Virginia but she isn't a very "still" subject and well if I hold Bootsie's ball she is so you'll have to bear with me as I take a gazzillion pictures of Bootsie because she sits still. 

The top one was straight out of the camera and the bottom one was the same one only edited in photo shop. 

Sorry for only putting up 2.  I have several more but Virginia is wanting me to play downstairs!  I promise more later! 

Insta Snow!

So far this winter in Colorado has been lacking snow.  I know we will get plenty in the new year.  It has been odd to hear about all the winter weather the east coast is getting and we are averaging upper 60's here and running around in short sleeves!  The warm weather has been nice. 

Since MOPS is on break until January I've been able to spend lots of quality time with Virginia and pull out some things that we didn't have time to when we were on the go every day.  Back in the fall at the fall festival at the nearby elementary school I bought something that I thought was so COOL!  INSTA SNOW!
I knew this would fascinate Virginia and help to pass the time inside if the weather outside was less than appealing. 

So since we haven't had alot going on Virginia has been sleeping late in the morning and not taking a nap and going to bed early.  She still has a "rest time" in the afternoon (more for me than her) where she watches a show either in her crib or my bed.  So Wednesday after Moms Morning Out I had the idea to head over to our Goodwill store and see what cheap Christmasy things they had that Virginia could use.  She was all excited about going.  I knew I had the Insta Snow at home and I thought some of those Christmas village houses would look nice in the "snow" and Virginia could have a little imaginary village.  Sure enough there were plenty of the little houses and Virginia was very excited about getting them.  She also found this little porcelain dog with a santa hat that she insisted we get.  We picked out several things for our village and then headed over to the book section.  They have a great book area and the books are almost all $0.29!  Virginia sat on the floor reading while I looked through the books.  Then we went and sat at the little cafe they have and Virginia had a cookie (they have free coffee and cookies, well donations welcome).  We left the Goodwill and came home to set up our village.

I did my research on the Insta Snow to make sure it was what it said it was.  It is environmentally safe, non-toxic, and it is actually used (maybe on a larger scale) for irrigation in drought regions.  Alot of indoor snowboarding parks are using it as their fake snow.    I won't bore you with all the scientific details.  It comes as a powder and you simply add water and it expands into "snow."  Over time the water will evaporate and it will return to it's powder form where you can simply add water again and it will return to snow!  I know neat huh.  I will say that I wouldn't use this with a child who tends to put things in their mouth.  The age listed starts at 4 but Virginia is not one that puts things in her mouth and I stayed with her while she played to make sure she wasn't tempted. 
Virginia had a great time driving her cars through the snow.  Then when it was time to put the snow up she asked if she could have the houses in her room so I dusted the snow off them and she lined them up.  Then the horse and eagle had an argument over whose house was whose. 
We both have a little cold (nothing major) and are staying in our jammies today snuggling.  Our 70 degree temps have disappeared and it's cold outside! 

*A funny virginia saying.  I've discovered that threatening to take away Virginia's cars is a motivator for her.  I don't have to use it often.  The other night she looked at me and asked me, "Do you want me to take your cars away?"  **not sure what I had done that she thought I needed my cars taken away!

Dance Party

Last night Virginia wanted to dance!

My friend Valerie (who owns a dance studio and teaches dance in Sylva, NC) gave Virginia this costume when she came and sang at June's funeral.  The music is from Sandra Boynton, a children's author and she has also published several books with music CD's. 
I also got some pretty funny still pictures of Virginia dancing that I'll try and post later today.  I'm still having trouble figuring out how to best post videos here.  I'm not sure that posting this way will give you the option of making it full screen which I know some of you would like.  I'll keep working on it.

Read More Carefully

Grandma and Grandpa sent a box of Christmas presents last week.  Inside the box was this really cool plush Christmas tree shaped advent calendar.  Virginia was so excited!  Thank you Grandma and Grandpa for including something that wasn't wrapped and she could have right then.  Her little face was all sad when she saw that everything was wrapped and I had to tell her we couldn't open them yet.  So when she got to the tree she was so excited!  And she wanted to have her picture made.  The problem this time though was at first she would cover her face with the calendar.  Then she would "force" a smile and it would look all weird.  So I was trying to convince a 2 year old to, "No just smile naturally Virginia."  She looked more like she was in pain than smiling.  But I was able to get some cute ones and some with Bootsie in front of the tree.  Again I couldn't get Virginia to understand to come and sit next to Bootsie, she kept scootching in behind her.

So the "read more carefully" title.  I was all proud of myself the other night.  I was actually going to "fix" supper and not just "heat" something up.  I had found a recipe for cider glazed chicken with brown buttered pecan rice.  yummy right?  I had forgotten the cold apple cider at the store so we just had some of that pre-cooked chicken from the store.  I was most excited about the rice!  I had left over pecans from thanksgiving and who wouldn't love brown buttered rice?  I had bought the super fast 90 second cooking rice in a bag in the microwave so this meal was going to come together super fast!  I was excited.  And virginia normally likes chicken and rice.  So I read the recipe, several times in fact, and i thought it called for 5 tablespoons of butter to be melted and browned then add the pecans for a minute then toss with the rice.  I thought that was alot of butter especially since i was using more rice than the recipe called for.  so i made it and BOY WAS IT BUTTERY.  It was really good but really buttery and I felt like i was just eating a stick of butter with some pecans in it.  very rich.

well it just kept bothering me that it was so buttery.  a few days later I was re-reading the recipe and realized it called for 5 TEASPOONS of butter NOT 5 tablespoons.  I was so mad!  Not necessarily as myself but at the magazine who published the recipe.  I've never thought of butter in terms of teaspoons in recipes.  it's always been tablespoons or the cup equivalent or ounces even NOT TEASPOONS.  It was a popular cooking magazine I got the recipe from.  I should have read more carefully!  I think someone said that 3 teaspoons make 1 tablespoon so i used alot more butter than it called for!  I'm gonna try it again this coming week with the correct amount of butter!