A little dose of reality...

I'm not sure where I really want to go with this post. I just had some random thoughts this week that got me thinking. Until Wednesday, our Christmas tree had no presents under it and every time I looked at it, it just looked empty and unfinished to me. After I put a few presents under it, I instantly felt better. And then it hit me. There are so many families that won't have any presents under their tree this year, period. Carly's preschool had a family they adopted and a list was sent home of things they needed. The list had items like diapers in two different sizes, laundry detergent, soap, toilet paper, clothing in three different sizes, and the last two things were new or gently used toys and books. A Christmas list where things most people consider necessities- things that we just run in and out of a store and pick up without thinking twice- are at the top of the list.

P.S. I love you

Does anyone else have this problem? I guess because I mostly talk to my parents and Andrew on the phone, I'm used to saying I love you to end a conversation. Not necessarily a bad thing, unless you're talking to someone like the guy from Comcast or the nurse at the pediatrician's office. Thank goodness it's never slipped out, but I always have to catch myself before I say it.

What do you call people who are afraid of Santa?

Claustrophobic :)

What's something every parent teaches their kids? Never talk to strangers (and never take candy from strangers, but do they really do that??)...except when they are wearing a Santa suit! No wonder so many kids freak out about sitting on Santa's lap for the obligatory Santa picture each year. We hammer into their little impressionable brains how bad strangers are, but then force them to sit on a strange man's lap and even use the candy he gives out to bribe them. I guess when it comes to Santa, all bets are off. We lie to our kids, we ask them to go against what we've taught them, we even sometimes walk away happily with a picture of our child screaming. Would we pay for a school picture of our child screaming? Probably not. And so this leads to the progression of Santa pictures we have since Carly was born.

The first year she was just over a year old. She looked at Santa like he had five eyes and three noses, but she didn't cry. (I'm still searching for the cd it's on...)

The next year, she was perfectly happy looking at him, walking around him, and even talking to him, but as soon as she got on his lap, meltdown! This picture was after he patiently let us take an hour trying and letting other people go.

(Notice how in the first two, Santa still does his nice smiling pose. For the third, I think he just gave up.)

This year, we almost didn't go. Andrew isn't a fan of the screaming children pictures and Carly has gotten to where she'll focus on something that scares her and dwell on it for days. Not a good combination for Santa....she even told me she'd cry if I took her. However, friends and family guilt tripped convinced me that I could NOT miss Taylor's first Christmas with Santa. So I told Carly it was her choice about sitting with Santa but Taylor would be having her picture with him...why not, Taylor is such a happy baby?! We went this morning, Carly said she still didn't want to have her picture, and Taylor protested being woken up to be passed to some bearded man she'd never seen before by arching her back and crying. (did I mention the "happy baby" reasoning?) Insert paci, problem solved. Then Carly catches on that Santa's giving kids suckers after their pictures, so I asked if maybe she'd want to stand by Santa and not sit in his lap.....and voila! We actually came home with a Santa picture with no tears and both girls. Woohoo!!

Dr. Carly...

Carly went for her 3 year check-up this morning. She did so well, even though she had to have her finger stuck and get one shot. I was surprised to find she's in the 50th percentile for height! She's so much taller than other kids her age...all the tall ones must live somewhere else. :) The best part was when we got home. She got her magna doodle, sat down next to Taylor, and started asking her own questions...

"Do you go poop or teetee in the potty?", "Do you go potty like a big girl or a boy?"(not sure how she came up with that one!), and then Taylor sneezed, so she "wrote" that down too.