Mara really has stretched Christmas out a long way! She frequently (almost daily) plays with her "home center" kitchen. And her Playmobil from Susie and Mike is upstairs in her big girl room now. But here's the scene when we opened it initially.

We visited Super Gammy after Christmas and had a nice time with her, my dad, Uncle Carl, Uncle Paul, Aunt Eileen, and Kyle.

Mara, as always, is in a snuggly Daddy mood. Today, we were both competing for Daddy's affections... me snuggling on one side, her snuggling on the other, and then she started crawling further and further onto him, and then punched me in the eye with the chapstick. Ooops. I was laughing so hard, while telling her it wasn't nice. I got an apologetic hug, so that made things better.

She remembers who gives her things, or maybe we remind her enough. She mentions Pop-pop Cherry when she plays with her home center. She mentions "Tavis Care!" when she rides (and gets bucked off) Benny the Bull.

That's all I have for now! Happy Sunday!

Merry Late Christmas

Merry Christmas to all! And Happy New Year, etc. etc.

Mara enjoyed decorating the Christmas tree. Look how proud she was of her hanging ornaments:

I also took her 2 year photos since I didn't do that around her birthday.

Santa, family and friends were very generous this year!

 I wasn't able to get all of the presents the Lewisville Dardens and Travis/Claire brought later in the day, but suffice it to say, this room was JAM PACKED.

Mara wanted to open her stocking before she ate or anything. And she woke up extra early to do so (I guess we talked it up too much!)

 She made out with lots of yogurt drops, fruit roll ups, a slinky, a shirt, a hat and gloves set, Finn McMissile from Cars 2, and some other items.

 Zack and I received stockings, too! We made off with our favorite candies, some markers/pens for me, a beer koozie for Zack, Hangover 2 blueray, among other items.

I think Zack made pancakes for breakfast, but it didn't take long before someone wanted to open presents. She got art supplies.

 Breakfast, lunch, and dinner pretend foods.

 Which Mommy helped open. Those Reeses Christmas trees are half gone, btw.

 Daddy helped with the food removal, too.

 We DID take turns, you just can't tell from these photos. Little Mo was so helpful with passing out a present to either Mommy or Daddy and taking turns. She was so patient and sweet.

 She now has another Elmo, to go with "Monster" (Cookie Monster). She was pushing Elmo around in her doll stroller today.

She received this awesome computer from SuperGammy (among other things).

  She got a small train set... that kinda makes her look like she's playing Twister.

 

 A lot of yogurt drops got eaten Christmas day. She put them in her new shopping cart (courtesy of Adam/Marianne/Max) before it was assembled.

 She was happy about it.

 Cheryll, Graham, Travis and Claire came over before lunch and we had another Christmas! Mara's big present was this amazing kitchen, with a kitchen on one side and a grill/outdoor table on the other. She cooks like ALL the time.

 Here was the only shot I took while the Darden's were here... of our amazing dinner. Spreading around the work really makes it easy! We contributed the tenderloin and twice baked potatoes. Claire and Travis brought the green beans, bourdin spread, and a few desserts! Graham and Cheryll brought a salad, pound cake, and homemade rolls. (I'm probably forgetting something we ate).

 All in all, it was a wonderful Christmas! We got to celebrate some more during New Years when we exchanged gifts with friends... but I don't think I took any pictures of that. Sorry!

Happy 2nd Birthday!

Mara celebrated her 2nd birthday in style, bringing a "carnival" to her home, and adding more grey hairs to my head. BUT it was totally worth it. For those of you who didn't get to see the awesome invites, designed by Derica, here's what they looked like:

I then took the liberty of adding some tickets:

So, I probably stressed out more about this party than I should have, but I'd never really thrown a kid's birthday party before, much less with so many different aged children coming, and then a bunch of adults! But I did enjoy creating the decorations - I tuned into my crafty side (which has been in hibernation, I THINK because this boy inside me is making me crave hot dogs and beer instead...). Take a peek at some of the decor:

 You don't want to know how long it took me to draw this number 2 (and there's another one further down). The color scheme and decor were inspired by Derica's creation. She "loaned' me the cute striped string that I used to hot glue the flags together.

 Painting by Mara, I painted the wagons (like 2 bucks at Michael's). I had 3... but the wheel broke off one and I lost it. More about this later on. The lolly pops were prizes for some games, the crackerjacks, decor and give-a-ways, the blue test tube-looking things are bubbles, and I borrowed the cupcake stand from a girl at work's sister, whom I've never met. I added the red flags on the two layers, and hot glued mini flags (probably the hardest job).

 Not too shabby!

 I had planned on going to the flea market, which has a cotton candy vendor, and purchasing a few bags of cotton candy goodness and dividing them up into smaller bags for the give-a-ways... but check out what I found at Walmart! The girl stocking the holiday candy aisle told me they had more in the back if I needed it (because I filled up an entire oversize Walmart shopping cart with these). AWESOME. I actually never ate one, but was told they were flavored.

 Instead of bringing presents, I asked that people bring their creative minds to make Mara some sock puppets. She's been in a sock puppet phase for probably 5 months, and always with the socks that are supposed to stay on her feet. So here's the layout, with big socks and little socks (for her hands). The sock on the stick is to demonstrate how to dry the creations.

 More of my flags, and a wall that I modeled off an idea of Jane's - I wanted to show how much Mara has grown over 2 years, mostly using the month cards (also made by Derica). There is a framed list of Mara's favorite things to the right. I'll have to take a picture of it later.

 I made up a "program" so guests could see what there was to do, but we didn't really follow it (fine by me!).

 The other number 2 that took ages to draw, and one of the creations/games I am proud of! Instead of pin the tail on the donkey, I had kids "feed a cookie to Arson and Endo" like Mara does daily. The envelope on the picture has the cookies for later.

 I made an attempt at painting a giraffe with kids paints. It ended up looking pregnant, but that's okay. Mara already had this puppet theater from Auntie Tweet. We brought it down to play with, although Blake thought the front was meant to be dived through. Wowsa.

 My flags again, and you can see we had more of a Christmas-themed carnival. I imagine this will always be the case - Christmas themed Mara's birthday. But she loves the Christmas trees and lights so I'm okay with it.

 Flags, restroom sign. I had another restroom sign pointing upstairs, and a Concessions sign in the kitchen that I didn't photograph.

 Some of the snacks on the table. We had goldfish (Mara loves), non-discriminatory animal crackers (chocolate and vanilla), Hershey Kisses, beer dip (a la Marianne), marinated cheese, Lil Smokies and a yummy Velveeta cheese nacho dip (dip a la Derica and both on the counter) and later some pizza poppers (a la Liz). We had juice for the kiddos, water, softdrinks, and 3 types of beer for the adults.

Mara really enjoyed her birthday and started out with us asking what she wanted for breakfast. Can you guess what she wanted?

 Mac n' cheese. She is her father's daughter. 

We also let her open a present from Shirley and Paw-Paw. Check it out.

 It barks and bounces around.

 I caught it hopping! She LOVED it. Look at that smile (and laugh-squeal).

 I had also picked up some balloons featuring her favorite characters the night before, so she saw these when she came downstairs in the morning:

 She wanted to spin around and sing Ring Around the Rosy, so she got a little tangled.

 Here's Curious George, Elmo, and Thomas and Friends.

She found the cart that I didn't paint because I lost the wheel. I watched her go over to a "broken" bubble gun (battery cover was gone), pull off one of the circles, and attempt to fix the cart.

 My little mechanic/engineer! Now we just need to work on scaling to size... but that'll come later.

Now for the party.

For some reason, I got a picture of Cheryll with Max but not with Mara. Max is 9 months now!

 Here are people starting to decorate the socks.

 Baby Jack (Blake's new brother at 5 weeks old) The party animal.

 Ashley and Max at Mara's table and Blake also enjoying the balloons. Broken cart makes another appearance. I did eventually throw it away.

 

And she tried to blow out her candles but they kept coming back on! She just couldn't QUITE blow hard enough. She did seem excited that everyone was gathered around singing the Happy Birthday song... which she'll sing "Hap Birthday to you!" over and over.

 I was so excited to pick up NC State ice cream for the celebration! We got these little vanilla cups for the occasion, and they came with the awesome wooden spoons.

 When I passed out the bubbles, everyone had a good time!

 Especially Blake!

 Mara learned to mix popcorn and animal crackers in the popcorn boxes. Interesting.

Here are the finished sock puppets. Please ignore the phallic shaped example sock. Sorry about that.

 

And finally, our growing, happy family.

 I will post about Christmas, I promise, but this should satisfy you for a little while, I hope?

For those who could join us, thank you for helping to celebrate our little one's 2nd birthday! For those who couldn't make it, we missed you! I didn't take photos of her opening the remainder of her birthday presents, but she loved them!