Laura's 2nd Birthday

Our sweet baby girl has turned 2. As always, can't believe it! Her birthday literally gets so blended with Christmas that it's hard to know when one day ends to when her day begins. Especially this year for some reason it just blended so quickly. We can get away with it for now, but I think next year we are going to have to create a new birthday date. We were singing happy birthday to Jesus one minute and turned around and sang it to her. The Ratz's and Gramma and Grandpa were here so we sort of did more celebrating of her birthday on Christmas night and Gramma gave her her present on her actual birthday.

Laura is such a blended personality it's hard to say which way she'll be. Probably because she's 2 and I guess you see it all at that age more times than not. She can be so sweet and mild and sensitive one day to being a bull in a china shop the next living her little life with a purpose and on a constant mission. Sometimes she likes to be toddling around all by herself and sometimes she wants to follow me everywhere and do everything I'm doing. She has learned from her big sister how to be a part of the kitchen action. Alayna loves helping me in the kitchen and anytime she hears a pot or bowl being taken out I hear her yell "momma, what are you doing?...are you going to make something?" and in she runs and pulls the chair over and now little sister does the same thing so I usually have one on each side. I remember being the same way when I was little while I would sit and usually drool and wait for mom to hand the beater over to me so I could lick the batter or add the next ingredient. I remember learning to cook at such a young age and I can see Alayna being the same way and now Laura. I love having them by my side and being so interested. Although sometimes the space is tight and little fingers may go places they shouldn't I remind myself that they are little people in training in all ways. They watch everything you do and everything you say and they just want to be like you and do what you do. Laura is now at the point where she is adding words daily and making those connections of forming 2-3 words. It's always so fascinating to me when things really start to click at this age and to watch their world of lauguage come together. Bayee and Naya are at her beck and call and she is constantly trying to mimic what they do and say what what they say. She has daddy wrapped around her little finger just like Alayna did at this age. She crys when daddy goes to work and is always asking "where daddy go?" It's cute and a little sad at the same time. She gives out more kisses and hugs than anyone and is always saying "ki ki" "hu hu"to whoever will give her one. She's such a little love bug. We thank God for this precious girl who brings so much joy to our lives.

Giving her a birthday kiss

Blizzard of 2010...Unbelieveable!!

How cool is this? The most snow we've had in 18 years of living here. We were in a serious competion with our home state of Wisconsin. My family gets a good laugh when schools are canceled here with the thought that it might snow and up there school stays on through the blizzards and all. We believe we could officially say we had a blizzard here that left us with around 14 inches of snow and everything shut down. It all started Christmas night and carried on all the next day and it was just way too exciting. The kids went right out in it first thing in the morning. With our mish mosh of snow gear we were able to make it work. They at least had rubber boots and decent gloves. We were able to get a couple of snow saucers in between the two snows so we didn't have to use rubber maid tub tops and laundry baskets this year. We were prepared and in the real time sledding business this year! Gramma was right out there pulling them through the snow. We headed right to the sledding hill and tried hard to pave a trail, but it was so cold and not packed down enough so we had to wait until the next day. It was so beautiful while it lasted, but it barely stayed the week with the temps rising to 60 by the end of the week it was gone before you knew it. After all was said and done and the excitement was over we're offically ready for spring and we're already planning our camping trips. We're sort of crazy like that. Don't strangle me family I know you have to weather through 6 months of it sometimes. We just get a little spoiled here I guess. I'm thinking we may be in for a white winter ourselves this year with how early the snow came.

Gone sledding

Oh how this brings back childhood memories! Having grown up with sometimes having 6 months of the white stuff it sure is neat being able to share the same experience with our kids even if it is on a smaller scale. The kids had a blast one night when we took them sledding. Laura wasn't quite sure about the whole thing and only enjoyed half the experience. Bradley and Alayna didn't want to leave. We tried to build up a little ramp that was already there for a little adrenaline rush. HA!

I'm not sure I like sledding mommy!

The next few days were such pretty and sunny days and the kids enjoyed more snow time. Bradley was still off of school and work was canceled for Craig which made it even better. Alayna and Ki Ki made a mommy and baby snowman with an oreo cookie eyes and a peppermint stick mouth. Laura just wanted to eat as much snow as she could so we ended up making snow icecream. Bradley and the boys just wanted to have snowball fights. Daddy was determined to compete with the awesome igloo that he made last year, but didn't quite get it finished. And mommy had fun pulling the kids on the sleds until I just couldn't pull anymore.

Christmas Eve

We went to the Christmas Eve service at church and came home for a dinner of our favorite thing...pizza. That's what everyone wanted so that worked for me and seems to be a tradition along with coming home to opening our presents to each other. It's always such a sweet time to each take the kids shopping individually to let them pick out gifts for mom and dad and for each other and the thought and time that they put into it and how many times they change their little minds to get just the right thing makes me smile.

Here is a little mini cat fight of big sister attacking little sister because Laura had gotten ahold of Alayna's new pack of gum that Bradley had gotten her and chewed through the whole pack. Good thing 4 packs came in one. Wow, it was even caught on tape. I don't even think daddy caught on at first to what was happening.

Bradley was so cute...he picked out a glass christmas tree dish and a christmas towel for me at the santa shop at school. It was so sweet! He was hiding behind the pillow as I opened it. I think he was too excited to look. I could tell he was proud of himself. He's got such a sweet heart for giving.

Look Laura, it's a new book.

Bradley had picked out a hair piece for Alayna for dressup and nothing could have made her world any happier. I'm so thankful for the $ store!