We made it!

We’ve been hosting a Christmas Party on New Year’s Day for – I think this is our 7th year.  We picked some of our favorite things and packed them into the party:  Christmas carols, appetizers, desserts (including the chocolate fountain), and friends.  It’s a lot of fun, if we do say so ourselves. 

The kids are always enthralled with the chocolate fountain.  “You mean we can coat anything with chocolate?!?”  It seems too good to be true.  And it is, since we wouldn’t let them coat their sandwiches, their drinks, or themselves in chocolate. 

Simeon felt the pull of the chocolate fountain this year – how does it work?  How does that stuff come pouring forth from it?  What will happen if I put my hand into it?  How do I convince Mom and Dad to leave the room for just five minutes so I can find out the answers to all of my questions?

Hannah and Naomi spent most of their time upstairs, playing with the other kids in attendance.  A couple or three years ago we discovered the wisdom of hiring sitters for the party.  The kids play all kinds of very fun and exciting games and end up completely exhausted by the time the party’s over, and our carols are punctuated by the pitter patter (or loud thudding, let’s be honest) of little feet as well as the screams of laughter of the owners of said feet.  Everyone is happy with this arrangement, since in years before the sitters, the children would usually decide that 3 carols are enough and now’s the time for coating ourselves in chocolate and then wiping it off on the nearest piece of cloth, whatever that cloth might be.

So now we’ve made it through the party and the party cleanup.  The kids are asleep and we’re about to head for bed.  We’ve seen lots of good friends and celebrated Christmas.  It’s a good way to begin the new year. 

In which Michael is again my hero

I have spoken before about Michael’s heroic efforts to make our home safe for toilet-loving babies.  Unfortunately, there were some problems with that particular solution to our toilet-hound’s addiction.  Since the new potty came, we haven’t had as much trouble, since the new potty’s water level is much lower than the old one, making it a far less convenient place to bathe. 

However, Sim will still make a beeline for the potty to check it out and see if the water level is higher today.  Also, there’s a stool in the bathroom so that the girls can reach the sink to wash their hands after they go potty.  Sim has discovered that he can climb stools.  He’s also discovered that the bathroom stool gives him access to things like the sink, the toothbrushes, and the liquid soap – all very desirable for a 15-month-old explorer.

SO…Michael fixed the door again so that it shuts.  This involved eBay – for the parts for the knob to actually speak to the rest of the closing mechanism (without mistakenly locking us in, of course) – and moving of the strike plate so that the new door parts (which were off by about 1/4 inch) could actually keep the door closed. 

It’s working again!  Yea!  And now we can close the door so that Sim won’t be playing with any of the fun toys in the bathroom. 

Endearing

Hannah:  Mama, you have a nice smell that reminds me of something I can’t remember and makes me feel at home.

On the ride home

I gave the local niece and nephew a ride back to their house last night.  Here are some quotes:

Niece:  I’m not crying right now.

Me:  No, that’s good.

Niece:  Yeah, I’m really smart!

****

Nephew:  Watch out, Aunt Monica!  The car’s brain is oozing onto your head.

Me:  ?

Nephew:  If the car’s brain got into your brain, you would be the smartest person in the whole United States of America.

Me:  ?

We tried

with not too much success.  Each person has at least one picture in which he looks okay, but not one with all of us together…

Trauma for girls

I got my hair cut this morning.  It had been well over a year.  It was long overdue.  I was so happy to have it done. 

Hannah:  I don’t recognize you anymore, Mama.

Naomi:  I miss your hair.  I wish you brought it home so I could have it forever and ever amen. 

Simeon didn’t seem to care, and Michael likes it, but the girls don’t seem to.  I guess you can’t please everyone. 

Trauma for Mama

This morning brought a traumatic moment for this Mama of a little boy baby: first haircut. I have been really putting this off, because once little boys have their first haircut, they don’t look like babies so much any more…they look like little boys. While I know that Sim is rapidly moving from baby to little boy, I haven’t been ready for it. I still don’t think I’m ready for it, but his hair was getting in his eyes something fierce, so he was ready for it.

Here’s before:

Yeah, okay, so he looks a bit like a baby hippy. I was okay with it! Look at those cute little curls coming around his ears! But the big problem, and the main reason for the haircut, was those long bangs in the front. I was constantly sweeping them to the side, because he’s a boy, so I couldn’t put in a barrette.

My original plan was to just trim up the bangs a bit so they wouldn’t get in his eyes. But then I looked at him and thought I should clean up around his ears a bit. And then I realized that if I left him like that, he’d have a mullet, and I’m not about to do that to my baby boy. So I cut it all. But I tried to avoid the bowl cut look.

Here’s after:

I managed to avoid the bowl cut look, and his bangs don’t have that “chopped straight across” look that is pretty cute on Hannah, but not really the best for a baby boy. Well, that's not strictly true -- I've seen baby boys with that look, and it can be quite cute, but I was trying to go for a look that didn't look like he'd had his hair cut much at all anyway.

His sideburns aren’t anything like even, but this is his first haircut, so I didn’t try to be too particular. He wouldn’t have let me, anyway. He was DONE with it after only a few snips. Daddy’s coffee is the only distraction that kept him from having one side long and one side short in the back.