Christmas--Photo overload

On Christmas Eve Penelope threw my camera and completly broke it. I was so dissapointed at the idea of not being able to take pics on Christmas morning. The video camera takes pics (see tree below) but they aren't a high enough resolution to print. Imagine my excitement when the first present opened was a Nikon cool pix! So here's photo overload as I tried to figure out my new camera.Penny and daddy playing with her new top

Opening presentsMommy and PennyA Christmas walk. It was in the high 30s so everything was a slushy mess. "I love Christmas!"

Opening presents with Papa John

Such a face!

There's a smile

We went to the Minnesota Children's Museum. What a great place! Penelope LOVED the tot room Only in MN would a museum have toy ice fishing for toddlers
Sorry, darling, you won't see big yellow flowers for a long time

The Grandmama and Papa John

Then we went sledding. Aunt Jennifer and Princess Pea
All bundled up

Clink clink
Our last outing was the zoo. We mainly looked at the indoor exhibits. Penny loved the acquarium. I'll post the video on youtube

Despite the cold air Chris had to have a sno cone. Any time he finds a non-Blue Bunny sno cone he must buy it
Exploring the Russia exhibit
That was a lot of fun Grandmama

A Snowy Christmas Eve and a Special visit

This morning we were supposed to wake up and finish cleaning the house for my parents and sister to arrive at noon. Well, with the Snowmageddon of 2009, they were stranded in Chicago. No worries though because they are staying with my Aunt and Uncle and enjoying the Dinanno family party, which we only attend about every 5 years. Fingers crossed that their flight tomorrow doesn't get cancelled.

So here's our backyard this morning:

Now keeping Penelope happy inside all day is quite difficult. That's why we often do trips to the library, grocery store, the park if it isn't too cold etc. But we didn't want to drive anywhere today. I have started getting daily emails from a site called Productive Parenting which has great ideas for all sorts of activities at every age. I wish I had known about it a year ago. My imagination doesn't go much further than banging wooden spoons on pots. The email today said 1 year olds like to crawl through and sit in boxes. So I set up a box for Penelope and tried to show her how it's done:
Yeah, I got stuck. Here I am laughing "oh my gosh! Why are you taking pictures?" And yet I'm posting them on the blog....ah well, is meant to be a record of all of our adventures.

Here's Penelope very unsure of following Mommy's lead. I could get her to reach in and grab the toy but she was not going in that box. So much for an afternoon of fun!
By noon, I had a very cranky baby on my hands. Chris was shoveling the driveway. He's crazy about shoveling. It is like a competition between him and the neighbors. Anyways, I decided Santa's gift was going to come out of the garage a day early. A toddler sled!!

Let me tell you how much I bundled her up for this. Onesie, long sleeve shirt, cordoroys, snow pants, thick socks, shoes (I tried to put these big boots over her shoes, but it didn't work), snow jacket, cut up tights over her hands, 1 mitten and 1 sock...couldn't find the 2nd mitten. We are in the "I like to pull everything out of my drawers and throw them in a pile every day" stage. Things get lost... She loved it, even if we our time sledding was less than the time it took to get ready. I don't know why I went so crazy. It was 31 degrees.

Of course, a video is required of her first time sledding!

Then here's Penelope in her Christmas pajamas!

Around noon I got an email from a dear friend, Nikki. We were friends for years in Arizona. We grew apart in high school and then I moved. The last time we saw each other was my going away party 12 years ago. Ugh! 12 years?! Anyways, I happend to see her post on another friend's blog and we reconnected. Her grandfather lives in Minnesota and she has lots of relatives here. I wasn't sure if we'd get to see each other when she visited so I was ecstatic when I got her email that they could come over tonight. A big thank you to Mr. Cech for driving in the snow! It was great to reconnect with her and her dad and to meet her husband, and adorable son Collin. Just check out this little guy!

Adorable, huh? Hard to believe Penny was smaller than this last year. He was all smiles and a giggle box.

We had a great time catching up! I wish we still lived 2 streets away now that we are mommies. We'd have a book club and make baby food together and go to the Y swimming class (have I convince you to move here yet?!) Then Penelope could go jump over the fence to go visit Collin like I used to do to see Nikki.

Getting into the spirit

We did some last minute stocking stuffer shopping on Sunday. The $1 Target bins are great for this type of thing. Penelope found 2 toys. How could Chris say no as she wielded the sword and axe with such precision? She is so her father's daughter.This year we moved around the furniture as I was determined to get the tree in the living room. Last year we went to NY for Christmas so it didn't matter so much that the tree was in the dining room, but how would we open presents with a tree in the dining room? Impossible! I was really afraid of Penelope pulling down the tree and ornaments. That's why we waited until December 20th, but she has been great with it and hasn't touched any of them. Just points and says OH! Here's a pic before ornaments:


Do you love the star? It is the Mario Bros star. I bought it for Chris from an etsy shop.
Then this summer Chris fixed the wiring so we could have outside lights. Yay! Aren't they pretty? I love that you can see the Christmas tree through the front window. The other night we had carolers stop by our house. I've never had carolers. It was a little awkward to stand out there barefoot with no coat and listen to them sing, but they were really good. It was 5 high schoolers and they sang Santa Baby. Chris and I are always on the same wavelength because as they were performing we were both thinking "what do we do when their done?!" I was thinking about the Christmas cookies on the dining room table. Right as they finished Chris handed me a baggie of cookies. The singers seemed so surprised. It just seemed right. I mean at Halloween all kids say is Trick or Treat and they get a handful of candy...these kids held great harmonies in 20 degree weather and even had a little dance. After they left Chris grumbled "why did they come to our house. We didn't even have the porch light on." Ummm...no, but we did have our blinds up and christmas lights on.

Christmas cards ordered

This weekend I dressed Penelope up for our Christmas card picture. It turned out really well. Shutterfly says it could take up till the 21st for them to arrive. Not sure if they'll be in everyone's mail box by christmas. Here's just a hint at the theme on our Christmas card :)

Quick photo update

December is going too fast! Can't procrastinate on presents since we have to send them all over the country. Our decorating/Christmas cards are going slow. I think at this rate we'll get our Christmas tree on Christmas Eve. Kind of like the idea. Not sure how I'll keep Penny from pulling the tree down unless I buy a big fence to put around it. Anyways, here's a quick photo update before I head off to more shopping. That would be internet shopping where I am sipping hot cider, eating some yule log (thanks GGMA! It's like a ginormous ho-ho!) and enjoying my new fun slippers Chris gave me today.

So here's miss Penelope's top teeth! She has 3 now.She enjoys the chunky necklace style.Such camera hamsShe filled me in on the finer points of Dr. Zhivago. She thinks it is necessary to rub sweet potato and graham cracker crumbs across her face before settling into a good book. This is probably as close as I'll get to those mommy/daughter outfits. Chris bought me this great handmade hat on Etsy. It came with two crocheted flowers in case some times I don't want to wear the huge flower. Then last week at an art holiday fair we found this matching baby hat. Adorable!

Strand Family Elves

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

BYOB Yoga

That would be Bring Your Own Baby. I scored a 2 classes for the price of 1 deal at Blooma, a local yoga studio. I wish I had known about this place 2 years ago. They have tons of classes for pregnant women and then classes for moms and babies starting at 6 weeks old. Penelope and I had a great time! She smiled and giggled through the whole hour. Since the class is specifically for crawlers with short attention spans the instructor puts a toy box in the middle of the room. The class was a good mix of singing songs and doing fun stuff with baby as well as a real workout for mommy. Plus, for some of the poses we used baby as weight resistance. Phew! I'm going to feel it in my arms tomorrow. By the last few repetitions of raising Penny like an airplane, I was a little envious of the mom with the teeny 11 month old. I mean like 10th percentile teeny. Her mom said she is still wearing 0-3 month clothes. Cute little peanut! Penelope looked huge, and according to my triceps, is pretty big. And here's the crazy thing...that little peanut was walking everywhere. The instructor made me feel better though. Her baby crawled at 12 months and walked close to 17 months. All in their own time. Anyways, back to the class, Penelope went to the toy box for a short while. She found 2 books and crawled over to the instructor and other mom to show them the pictures. (Her teachers at school says she tries to "read" to all the kids and adults. I have this internal heart melting awwww every time I see her do this). After a few minutes with the toys and books she came over and crawled into my lap as I was stretching. This intrigued the other little girl and all of a sudden I was a living jungle gym. So much fun.
The best thing is that they have classes on the weekend. I'm going to try to take Penny to as many Sunday classes as I can. I think this class allows babies up to 18 months. My arms will be pretty amazing!

Penny videos

Here are 2 really cute videos. The first one is Penelope's words. She now says Mama, Dada, Hi and agua. Yes, agua. We handed her a sippy cup and she said "agba" we said "agua?" and she said it again. Now she says it any time she wants water. According to our daycare, she'll figure out pretty quickly that Mommy and Daddy don't speak spanish and speak english fluently at home and spanish at school. I better get working on that rosetta stone. It makes me a little nervous that she'll know a whole other language that I can't understand. What good are those new Mom eyes in the back of my head if my ears can't even translate?!

Here's Penny pushing her wagon. November was 20 degrees above normal so we got to take her outside much more than expected. Temps drop down to normal December weather this weekend so we may be pushing the wagon inside for a few months.

8th floor Macy's

On Friday we went to the 8th floor of Macy's. This has been a Minnesota tradition for years. Chris's dad used to go when he was young and the store was Dayton's. This year the theme was A Day in the Live of an Elf. There were so many things to watch. The animation is kind of like the old Disney Pirates of the Carribean ride or It's a Small World. Penny loved it!
Here she is with Grandma and Grandpa in front of the Elves Kitchen.
Awww...the whole family
We did see Santa. Penelope was fine looking at him...but sitting on his lap? No way! We got a picture of me sitting on Santa's knee with Penny on my lap. I have to download it to the computer.

Penny may not have liked Santa but she really liked this stuffed animal in the gift shop! It matches the cute outfit that Grandma gave her....what can you say? The girl knows how to accesorize!

A lighter brighter kitchen

Since early summer I've mentioned the painting of our kitchen cabinets multiple times. We finally finished! Once again I took on the "big idea, no follow through" role in the relationship. I somehow fooled myself that after work and on weekendsI'd go to the garage and paint. It would be complete in 3 weeks at the most. Didn't happen. By mid-October, Chris decided Thanksgiving was the deadline since his family would be visiting. In the end we probably each did half of the kitchen.
So here it is:

Ha ha! Gotcha! No, I can drool over kitches like that all day long, but it could never happen, and really shouldn't happen in a small bungalow.
This kitchen was my inspiration:


I love everything about the kitchen above from the white cabinets to the open storage areas and even the wallpaper on one wall and the funky chandelier. Plus, it looks to be about the size of our kitchen.

So here is where we started. I wish I had taken more before pics. Basic description: Small galley kitchen with very little cabinet space, pass through window to the dining room, and the extra groovy 1970's style dark cabinets complete with the golden harvest Montgomery Ward fridge and matching linoleum. Like the inspiration kitchen, we have an open area to store things. Can't really tell in this picture, but we stored spices, odds and ends cooking necessities and mis-match glass ware. Not pretty at all. So here's the same area after our project. The cabinets got a coat of primer, 3 coats of white paint and polyurethene. Then we organized all of our dishware in the open storage area and hung our matching mugs. I'm trying to decide if I should paint the inside of the storage area. I like the contrast to the white dishes, and that it matches the pass through window, but it may still be too dark.

I've realized my tastes are completly illogical. I love the original 1925 dark wood surrounding the dining room and living room windows, and I love the bright yellow in the dining room, yet I absolutely hated the dark kitchen cabintets and can't wait for that yellow fridge to die and to replace the floor.

Here's the other side. Now all the spices and glassware are nicely concealed in the cabinets.I heard very different advice when I mentioned our painting project. Multiple people told me they had done it and loved the difference. Others said I should just reface or replace the cabinets. A few reasons why I didn't do that:

1. The cabinets were perfectly fine. Seems silly to put them in a landfill when I can just change the look.

2. Updating a kitchen is like "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie." If we put the money into replacing the cabinets, or even refacing them, I'd like to re-design the room. I'd move the sink under the window to allow more counter space, bring down the wall to make the pass through a bar, move cabinets to the other wall...to make all that happen we'd have to open a new doorway to the living room etc. By the time I was done refacing I'd have a 2nd story and have sunk way too much money into the house! (I didn't visualize this in my mind. A house down the street was the same model as ours in the 1920's and they did all that I mentioned above. I saw the open house last year. They must have run out of money because the newly built 2nd story master bedroom did not have an enclosed bathroom. Literally the bed was about 5 feet away from the 4 ft high wall blocking the toilet. Ewwww.)

3. This was an easy quick fix for little money--okay, it should have been quick! Now I'm happy to step into my kitchen as long as I don't look down at the harvest gold linoluem :)

One last picture...I love that we have the exact same style stool as the inspiration kitchen. Galley kitchens and 4'11'' owners require very sturdy, practical stools.