First Christmas as a family of 4!

My favorite parts about this Christmas:
1. Gianna loves to cook with me (and so does the boy, although he will never admit it...and he'll never know I blew his cover with this picture, mwah ha ha), and we made chocolate covered chocolate pattern cookies with sprinkles. I wanted the moose shaped cookie cutter...you know, for Christmas?? (Now that I write that, I don't really know how moose are Christmasy. ??) But the boy wanted the BAT cookie cutter, and then we ended up with BATS, FROGS and BUTTERFLIES for cookies. Oh well, they tasted amazing though!

2. Lefsa arrived in the mail from Gramma!!! Every year she sends up a stack of homemade lefsa around Christmas time. I remember making it in her kitchen every year when I was a kid, and the taste of fresh hot lefsa with butter and sugar is like no other treat on earth. Everyone knows not to touch my lefsa...but when I'm feeling generous I'll share just a bit with the kids and they say "mmm!!" and roll their eyes in pure pleasure with the taste.

3. Being off work for two weeks. Hubby and I have gotten through another season of "Heroes"...just cuz we can stay up super late. It's like date night every night after kiddo bedtime, it's wonderful. I actually have had time to READ a couple of books too, what a treat! I slept til 10:30 today, and so did the kiddos. Awesome! And a lovely side effect as well: bonding time with Gianna. She is talking more and more, and since we've been spending most of our time together while daddy catches up on sleep and goes to the gym, we are getting closer and she talks to me a lot more. She actually told daddy that she wanted me to help her get ready for bed and not him when he offered to help. She reached out and put her hands on his shoulders and said "i love you, but not you today. I want mommy, maybe you tomorrow". Sorry honey, but that was fabulous!

4. SNOW! We had a rare white Christmas this year! I thought I just had to have memories of our awesome snowy mountain vacation in Colorado, but we actually got some here. I actually like shoveling snow, and Gianna actually likes to sweep snow off the steps, so we had a fabulous time together out in the cold.

5. Bath crayons. Santa really hit it out of the park this year with this stocking stuffer. How many hours of entertainment can a few colored pieces of soap offer? At our house, at least 6 for each kid, so far and still counting. This was only the beginning...we kept this superhero scene going for several days and they kept adding on when it was their turn to take a bath.  Yeah, we have squirt guns in the tub too, to squirt the fish of course.

6. Suspense. Santa came and dropped off a couple of presents and filled the stockings...but we have a rule that we have to all be awake and finish breakfast first before opening presents...and daddy has to read the Christmas story from the bible and we sing Happy Birthday to Jesus. THEN we can open presents one at a time. So while I was making breakfast the kids just sat in front of the Santa gifts and stared at them...and touched them gingerly...and looked at each other and giggled...then stared again. For a good 15 minutes, it was priceless.

7. Traditions. We hide the Pickle ornament in the tree, and the first one to find it gets to open the first present. We read a bunch of Christmas books that I keep collecting. We watch A Christmas Story on Christmas Eve, and the Grinch, after we go to church. Then Christmas day we order Chinese and bring it home, eating it while we watch The Nativity. We have several Advent calendars that involve chocolate (yes, I'm breeding chocolate addicts like me). And the rest of the day Christmas day we spend putting Legos together and playing with all the toys together. No chores or school, the best part!

8. Another addition to my obsession with A Christmas Story...Gramma sent cool hats (that are actually really neat, and the kids love them), but Gianna's is strangely similar to the "deranged Easter Bunny" suit from the movie. Cracked me up. Yes, the boy is still smitten with his little sister, as you can see from the side-eye grin.

9. The Sugies (our Sugar Glider pets) discovered Pecans, and can't get enough of them. Strangely, I can't get enough of the sugies, I'm crazy for the little things. I could go on for a while about why they are so cute and how much I love them...but I'm fully aware of the fact that no one else understands this creepy fetish of mine, so I'll just let the picture speak for itself.

10. So thankful for all the Grammas and Grampas that the kids have, they all are such a blessing in our life.  From the stacks of packages they sent, the cookies they baked or lefsa they sent, the cards reminding us how much they care, and everything else they bless us with. Christmas would not be the same without them. Here's a 'squdge' from great gramma on Christmas Eve, the kind that only great grammas can give, along with the pinch on the cheek when they say "oh, you're getting so big!"

Overall Gianna has been so excited and happy about Christmas, and just in awe that she had so many presents from grammas and grampas. She still says she misses her 'old home' and some of her old toys..and after she got a Hello Kitty scrapbook for a gift, we sat and put her old baby pictures in it, so she could have her own personalized life book. It ends with the first family picture we got together on "Gotcha Day". She looks at it every day, with a small tinge of sadness, but also a sense of pride that she has a past she can be proud of and that we are happy to talk with her about. She is also excited about all the new memories we are making as a new family. We are so happy to have her in our family, and we make progress bonding every day!

First real family vacation

Yeah, we spent 6 weeks in Hungary to finalize the adoption....which was like a European vacation in itself except that we didn't quite feel like a family yet. But now that we've been home since July and have had a chance to bond together and get into the routine of real life, we are on our first REAL family vacation. We came to Colorado for the week to try out skiing and play in the snow, and feel like we have a White Christmas.

First I hear some of you asking how in the world we afforded this, being too poor to be able to afford our adoption in the first place. Well we paid for this trip a few years ago, and we had to use it up by the end of the year or we lost it. So we are using it....and cooking in our room most of the time to save money on food. All the ski gear we had to buy is going up on ebay when we get back!

The fun began when we planned to fly here using our flight benefits, you know, the whole airline employee thing. But since it was bad weather and flights got cancelled we had to drive here...a nine hour drive in only 11.5 hours! Oh well, road trips are fun and you don't have to pack your life into a quart-sized ziplock bag, or get the 'free massage' as I call it, since I always opt out of the laser zapper privacy breaching machine. We actually ended up having a great time, and the kiddos are FANTASTIC travelers, keeping themselves busy with coloring, reading, or watching a movie on the laptop. And our rental car had Sirius radio - and we found the 90's station. Took us straight back to high school. I think my husband turned to me at least 3 times during the trip and said "this is the best...radio....station...ever!" We had the thing cranked up going down I-70 for at least 5 hours of the trip. I mean cranked up, and we were all dancing like dorks to "Tootsie Roll", and "I Like to Move It, Move It". We literally knew the words (all the words) to about 28 out of 30 songs, it was ridiculous. I wish I could have heard some of the other people in the cars we passed as they saw my husband doing the sprinkler in the passenger seat. Lol. Oh....and now the kids know some of the words to songs they probably shouldn't repeat...but oh well. We always have the radio tuned to Christian radio at home, so this was a crazy adventure for us. Ha!

Kansas is a great place to drive across if you want to see the biggest things in the world. World's Largest Ball of Twine. World's Largest Wind Farm. World's Largest Porch Swing (which is actually kind of neat, this old man who lives in an apartment across the street saw me taking pictures last time I stopped and came and brought me a pin with a picture of the swing and told me all about it. Creepy, but cool.) World's Largest Hand Dug Well, World's Largest Tractor "Big Bertha", World's Largest Prairie Dog. There's even a museum with the Smallest versions of the World's Largest Things in Kansas, lol. Now I REALLY actually wanted to stop and see the Prairie Dog on this trip....and we drove right past where it was!! I was so close to checking this off my bucket list!! Hubby just looked over at me and gave me side-eye and enunciated "Its. Not. Real. The fact that they advertise this as a stop is absolutely ridiculous." And on he drove. Sad face. Oh, and random fact I never knew...between Kansas and Colorado there is actually a place called Kanorado? Ha.

All was well until we passed Denver and commenced to drive for an hour and a half on the scariest stretch of interstate imaginable, into the Rocky Mountains. It was dark, and the roads were wet, and a little slippery, and my knuckles were white as speed racer raced around the curves and following too close for my taste. Semi trucks covered the roads, and we saw at least 5 runaway truck ramps...and signs that said things like "Truckers: Don't Be Fooled. 8 More Miles of Steep Grades!", and then signs with a big moose on it...and then after fearing for my life for 45 minutes a sign with a big black skull on it, with snow covering the words. What the heck did that mean!!!??? Time to close my eyes and pray until we got there.


We got here alive. I opened my eyes to evergreen trees all covered with snow and covered with Christmas Lights. Quaint little trendy buildings everywhere covered with Christmas lights, and everything covered with 6 inches of snow, it feels like we are driving around in a magazine. So beautiful! We checked in to our nice little resort that has a Subway onsite, 4 hot tubs, 2 pools, ski rental in the lobby, and within walking distance of tons of cute little restaurants. We snuggled in for the night.

Time for skiing!! Nope. We spent the next day all hopped up on Excedrin and Children's Tylenol because we all had headaches and upset tummies due to the high elevation. Maybe tomorrow.

Time for skiing!! Nope. It's 7 below zero and I'm really not interested in losing digits to frostbite. We spent the day getting all of our cold-gear ready, and getting fitted for skis. Coats, snow pants, wool socks, long underwear, ski goggles, ski masks, gloves, glove liners, hats, sunscreen, chapstick. Rented skis, boots, poles, helmets...well we're broke again. Ramen noodles for the next 3 months. But hey, we get to go skiing!!!

Time for skiing!! Yep! We take the free shuttle that stops right outside of our lobby to Beaver Creek Ski Resort to go buy our tickets. Small snafoo with the skis, the boy got two left boots. An hour later we were dressed like astronauts and waddled our way up to the snow. Snapped the boots on and were ready to go! Except the kids were already annoyed, cold, and whiny and couldn't stand up. Boy, we were in for a fun day. We got on the gondola, which they enjoyed a lot and got up to the beginners area. The boy figured things out pretty fast, and started going down the practice slopes. Gianna was not quite as coordinated and I ended up taking my skis off and walking beside her holding her up. After practicing for a bit, hubby took the boy down the green slope and I took her. We thought we could at least get down the Green slope together! Not so much. The ski rescue team had to guide the boy down, and we ended up having to wait for the rescue sled to get the girl down the rest of the mountain, in tears. Not the ski experience I had dreamed of.         After a break at Starbucks we decided to take them back up to the practice area and just stay there, and not try to get DOWN the mountain again. I went up and down the 'magic carpet' practice area, that had a belt that took you back to the top for the rest of the day with the kiddos. Now we started to have fun...and by the end of the day the boy was zooming down the practice slope without poles like a little expert, and Gianna would go down the same one with me holding her hand and learned to snowplow and turn and not fall at all. We were having a blast finally, and then it was 4:00 and the gondola was closing. We had to catch that thing to get down! We got back and waited for daddy...who had been going down the green slope by himself, and had gotten brave and gone down the blue slopes twice. He said it was a lot steeper than he had imagined, and at one point he was going backward and was on his back! He came back with snow all over his goggles and coat like he had rolled down the hill a few times, lol. Glad he got some adventure in though.

Next day, we had planned to go skiing again. But after this fun day of whining at the practice area and not getting to do anything else, we decided it wouldn't be worth paying for it again. Sad face. But we did get to ski, and the kids did learn how, so it was all good. AND I relished the refund that we got back since we never made it past the green slopes; that was a warm fuzzy feeling. Overall the four of us skied for a day for $98, not too bad!

So...what else to do? We are in snowy paradise, let's make the best of it.
1. Go eat at Loaded Joe's and Montana's Steakhouse
2. Sit in the hot tub
3. Suit up in snow gear and play in the snow behind the resort
4. Do the scavenger hunt around the resort for prizes. We won!
5. Sit in the hot tub
6. Drive around some more on I-70 and stop on the scenic lookouts
7. Drive over to Vail to walk around the amazing shops...but for $25 parking we won't be doing that again. 
8. Watch some movies
9. Play ping pong
10. Sit in the hot tub
11. Ice skating at Beaver Creek Resort!
12. Horse drawn carriage to dinner on the ranch, with smores over the fire afterward - Friday!

Loaded Joe's Cafe for lunch

Warming by the fire by the ice rink

One of the beautiful views of the mountains

Learning how to play Solitaire in our room

Ice skating for the first time

Right before I ran into Chris on the ice rink

"Look mom, I haven't even fallen yet! ....oops, now I did."

We are having fun relaxing together, away from school, work, and chores...and it's fun. Beautiful snowy fun. It's a great time to concentrate on getting Gianna to talk. That's our biggest struggle right now is getting her to talk...and when she does getting her to not just whisper. I know she has a voice because when it's tickle time she can really yell "daddy! tickles!!" and is always laughing loud with the boy. So we play games like 'you are the leader' and make her tell us all what to do, like get us to the hot tub, so she has to think and tell us to get dressed, and get the key, and lead us to the hot tub. She has a hard time thinking for herself, so hopefully games like this and Simon Says will help her be able to think for herself instead of just waiting to be told what to do all the time. We don't accept one word replies anymore...we say "I don't understand" if she gives us one word. She is forced to think of the other words in the sentence and talk, and slowly she is getting better and better. Slowly.

The other thing we are working on is affection. Affection is getting more natural for her at least with daddy. He's a warm cuddle bug so she initiates hugs and 'good morning' and 'hi daddy' when he walks in the door, and always goes and sits by him and cuddles, and gives him kisses. I'm honestly jealous, because any affection I give her is unreciprocated, and she doesn't talk to me hardly at all unless daddy is around and he tells her to ask mommy when she goes to him. We have fun cooking and doing crafts together, and she's comfortable with me, and when I'm gone she tells daddy she misses me. But as of yet we are still working on our attachment...and it's a little painful to try to lavish love on someone who is stiff and doesn't look you in the eye. I'm just making a point to show her I love her, and I pray that someday she loves me back.

Tomorrow we head back to real life! 

Trip to meet the sisters!

In November I took my new little one up to the farm to meet my two sisters for the first time...a trip with just us girls. I haven't seen them in over a year and it was so good to see them and hang out on the farm for a couple days.

New things for Gianna:
     1. Meeting "Aunt Monkey" and "Aunt Froggy" for the first time
     2. Meeting one of her only cousins, whom she had a great time exploring the camper with, coloring a new backpack from gramma, and making balloon animals with.
     3. Exploring a camper :)
     4. Riding the four wheeler with me and then with grampa
     5. Meeting all sorts of other relatives
     6. Seeing a pregnant belly...at least it seemed like she had never seen one before. She didn't quite believe me when I told her there was a baby in there. Soon there will be a new cousin!
     7. Being on a farm, seeing the crops, the grain bins, and machinery. Tried to explain that's where food came from...but the blank stare told me I need to wait until next year to get to that. 

My favorite parts of the trip were seeing my middle sister blessed with new stuff for her new baby, and cooking/cleaning/organizing with my littlest sis (yes, we geek out over stuff like that...and calculus).

Pic of Aunt Froggy, me, Gianna, Aunt Monkey, Gramma Tere, and cousin. Grampa John is making Gianna laugh as he takes this picture, how cute.