Christmas

Christmas was amazing this year. It was such a fun year. Ashlyn is getting old enough to enjoy it and Caiden is the perfect age. We really enjoyed our first Christmas in our new house. Christmas eve, Chris had an app or something on his phone that tracked Santa. Caiden was obsessed with this, continually asking where Santa was, and when he got close he actually made us put him to bed LOL. Me and Caiden baked cookies for Santa and cut up carrots for his reindeer. 

Christmas morning I was up and showered by 5:30am just waiting for the kids to wake up. Of course they slept till 8am. Caiden came running in our room yelling "Santa came, Santa came". We went down stairs and opened up all our presents. I loved watching Caiden's face as he opened each gift. Ashlyn opened a couple gifts but was moving to slow for Caiden. So, Caiden helped her open most of her gifts. She wasn't very interested in the opening process she just loved playing with the toys under the paper.

At 10:00am we went to my moms where Santa had brought more presents for the kiddos. We ate snacks opened more presents and spent time as a family.

At 12:00pm we headed over to my Aunt and Uncles for Christmas dinner. We always have my grandma's famous lasagna. It was so yummy I ate way to much and was in so much pain. I swore off food till of course the next day. 

After spending the rest of the day at my Aunt and Uncles we headed home and stopped by the Kujala's for one last Christmas celebration.

It was a busy day and the kids were asleep before we made it home. But it was an amazing day and of course the kids were spoiled. 

The next morning as we were opening all the new toys. Caiden and I stopped and went through all his old toys he had and we donated a huge box of toys. He was the one that made the decision to donate these toys to. These donations were on top of the toys we donated before Christmas when we were moving and found a ton of toys he didn't play with anymore. I was very proud of him. 

Overall i could not be more happy with our holiday season. I was very stressed with the move and getting settled before the holidays. It all worked out for the best. We are amazingly blessed, and couldn't ask for anything more.

New Years was low key for us. All our friends headed to the dunes for New Years. I was looking for something to do that was family and kid friendly. Mill Ave was having a new years celebration from 6-9pm that was kid and family friendly. So we drove out there picked up our friend Terisha, parked and rode  the light rail to Mill Ave. Well it turned out to be a huge bust. The kids area sucked and there was nothing else really going on. We decided to have nice dinner and then call it a night. Dinner was yummy and by the time we left the restaurant at 9:30ish, Mill Ave was BUSY! We hopped back on the light rail and headed home before all the craziness and drunk people got on the road. Caiden was super sad because he wanted to go to the "party"(kid area on Mill). We tried to tell him that we went to the "party" but that there wasn't much going on. He cried till he fell asleep in the car. We lit sparklers the next night to make up for the stupid "party" on  Mill Ave.

Tracking Santa

Santa Came

My Sassy, Silly Girl

Love Her

Ashlyn's First Present

Caiden's Turn

So Excited 

SpongeBob

Ashlyn Checking Out Payson New Car

Both Babies Just Hanging Out

First Light Rail Ride With Terisha

Sparklers!

Ashlyn

Ashlyn had a weight check at 16 month. She weighed in at 17lb & 13oz. She was 30in long. She continues to grow but just can seem to gain weight. She actually dropped in percentile. So this was a bit of a concern for her pediatrician. Ashlyn is still on formula, so to up her calories we are added pedisure. She is still struggling with eating. But she is making progress with eating but it slow going. The Pediatrician is working with the insurance to try and get he some feeding therapy. But we shall see. Ashlyn seems to be on her own schedule and she will eat more when she is ready.

Ashlyn will be 18 months on the 15th of Jan. She has changed SOOO much in the last month. She is a sassy, diva baby.

Ashlyn's Development:

- Words - mama, dada, keykey (blanky), bye bye, brother. 

- Ashlyn points at just about anything she wants. She gets very frustrated at times because communication is hard.

- If you ask her to bring you something she will bring you what you ask her to, except a diaper. If you ask her for a diaper she will run the other way. 

- She can tell you what the doggy says and what the kitty says

- She knows were her nose is, or will usually point at it on my face for her babies face.

- She waves bye bye when we leave and the cutest thing is when i put her in her crib for nap or bed she says bye bye and waves.
- Teeth - She has her 2 top front and bottom teeth and one molar. 5 total.

Ashlyn is a very busy, sassy, strong willed little girl. She is the complete opposite of Caiden at this age. Ashlyn gets into everything. She just figured out she can open all the kitchen cabinets. Something Caiden NEVER did. She throws full blown tantrum, throw-yourself-on-the-floor-kicking-and-screaming-till-you-get-what-you-want tantrums. She HATES the car. I think a lot of the reason is she still has to be rear facing because of her weight. Hopefully once she is forward facing, car rides won't be so miserable. She screams, does not really cry, she screams which makes being in public rough when she decides she wants something or is done being in the cart or highchair. Since she started walking about 3 months ago she doesn't want anything to do with sitting still. She will bring you her shoes if she knows someone is going outside. She absolutely LOVES her brother. She loves running and playing with him. When her brother is around she is the happiest. Caiden is a bit of a bully to her, something we are working on but she has started to give it back to him. She will scream at him and he is not sure what to do when she does it. He looks at me or Chris like "are you going to make her stop" LOL. It is her way of telling him to back off. But for the most part they get along really well and play great together.

And the biggest news in Ashlyn's development is last night she started drinking water from her sippy cup!!! I had backed off on the whole sippy cup thing and figured she was going to be on a bottle a little longer because of her not eating solids. But last night i was like what the heck, I gave her a sippy with water in it and I took out the water flow valve, so when she tipped it, it would drip water. She loved it and this morning I put the spill proof valve back in and she started sucking on it. This is HUGE for her. She got mad when i tried to take it. She gets so excited when she gets water out of it. Just yet another sign Ashlyn is on her own schedule for her development. =)

Ashlyn Loving Her Sippy