Snow...Snow...Snow and more snow!!!

YOWZA this snow is nuts! This Western Washington native has some serious adjusting to do now that we live in Eastern Washington!!! We have 8-10 inches of new snow since last night and it's still snowing hard! I have 3 inches of new snow on my car since I cleared it off at 7am! John is staying at my nieces in Walla Walla today, he'll work tonight and we'll deal with getting him home Friday morning. OMGosh will Amanda's flight be delayed or canceled? EEKS! She is scheduled to arrive in Walla Walla at 5:30pm Saturday. Let's pray she's not delayed and arrives safely. I better alert my family still in Western Washington we may need their help. If she gets stuck in Seattle I'll give them a call to get her from Seatac until we can get her here. Thank God for family! :-)

I am off to go pack up, clean off the car and see if I can make it to my mom's a few blocks away. It would be fun if we could make Christmas cookies with Grandma Marcia today. I'll take pictures and post as soon as I can. It's a winter wonderland over here! :-) I think it's pretty likely we'll have a white Christmas!

Brrr...snow & sick lil girl

Winter has arrived in full force! We have about 14 inches of snow and it's 8 degrees right now. John's been busy keeping the walk ways clear and de-iced, thawing a frozen pipe and thawing our cars. Snow is beautiful but a lot of work! I made a trip to the store today to get some staples and survived.They're doing a great job of trying to keep the roads clear. Amanda sent John a text today asking if it was really 15 degrees. She's very excited to have snow for Christmas. I believe school will be open but 2 hours late tomorrow. I am going to take the day off to be with LeAnne, who is sick. She woke me up screaming at 3am. She puked all over when I picked her up. Cleaned everything up and got her back to bed by 4am. I was wide awake so I worked on my grocery list and then took a shower. She woke up screaming again a little before 6am and once again puked all over me, herself and her bed. Then started the diarrhea. Poor baby has been feeling terrible all day long. She has tried to be in a good mood when she could and were trying to keep her hydrated. I hope this passes quickly. Well I am off to bed. I would appreciate your prayers for safe travels for all of us over here this winter and for LeAnne to get healthy soon. John works Monday - Thursday night and then he's off for a week. :-) Stay warm and be safe!

Our snow baby!

I woke early this morning to 6 inches of snow and it's still snowing!!! It's BEAUTIFUL! I love it! I am thinking it's here to stay for a bit too because they're predicting some mighty cold temperatures next week. I mean like high temperatures under 10 degree's Fahrenheit. I am not looking forward to driving in the snow but this is where we live now so I must figure it out!

LeAnne's first reaction to the snow was "oooooh" It took me 15 minutes to gather her snow clothes, bundle her up and she was outside for maybe 5 minutes! LOL!!! The snow suit great aunt Katie sent works perfect! She was very curious, then daddy put her down, she tried to take a step and fell face first. Oh she was one unhappy baby girl! Once daddy put her onto the side walk he had just finished shoveling she was much happier until she slipped and fell face first. Shows over and we went inside.

Christmas decorating & more...

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas our house. Our trip to town on Saturday was fairly successful. We are 90% done with our Christmas shopping, and we got our Christmas tree. This year we got a different type of tree for a change of pace. It's called a Concolor Fir. LeAnne napped in the car so she was reading to go once we got home. Decorating with her toddling underfoot is definitely a challenge! We kept giving her decorations that she could enjoy without harming and she really did fairly well. Our Christmas tree has dog pen around it to keep little hands at bay. So far she is respecting the fence. She loves the lights! If you listen carefully she is trying to say "pretty pretty". Their is a little snowman that makes funny noises when dropped that she LOVES! I'll post a video of her playing with it. Listen for her laugh. Oh I forgot to tell ya she had a her picture taken with Santa at Walmart on Saturday. She wasn't scared at all and had a big smile on her face. We didn't get the picture because you had to wait around for a few hours and she was DONE shopping. It was a free Walmart picture.

12 more days until Amanda comes on December 20th! I decorated the downstairs with Christmas decorations too. Daddy just needs to give it the finishing touch by adding some lights. We are so excited to be together as a family this Christmas! Seeing my family spend time together is the best gift I could ever receive. The recent loss of a dear friend has me cherishing my family even more! Life is such a precious gift, enjoy it, make a difference in the lives around you and share your LOVE!

This Friday is the Christmas program at school. John, my mom and LeAnne are coming. I can't wait to introduce them to the kids, my co-workers and have LeAnne's pix taken with Santa. Now lets hope she holds it together since the program doesn't start until 7pm.

LeAnne & I were invited to the 1st annual cookie baking party at the Hoyecki's next Saturday! The forecast is calling for snow Friday through Sunday! I am praying it doesn't stick around and then over Christmas break snows a ton. I am dreaming of a white Christmas!!

I must run off for now to finish up my lesson plans for this week before lil one wakes up. I pray each of you has a blessed week, full of love and laughter.

(Not so) Silent Night

I saw this poem in Baby Talk magazine (written by Melissa Balmain) and it fits LeAnne's current stage almost perfectly. This Christmas Daddy, Grandma & I are wishing for days without screaming, at least one good nap a day and silent nights.

*******************************
(Not so) Silent Night

Silent Night, sheer delight.
Kid's asleep-shocking sight.
Can't believe she's not up until all hours,
Screeching while the whole
neighborhood glowers.
Hey-let's trim up the tree!
It's our once chance, you and me.

Silent night? Well, not quite.
Kid's awake; plans ignite.
Won't be trimming the tree
after all,
Baking cookies or decking
the hall.
Next year, maybe-we'll see-
Or we could wait until she's 3.
***************************

When LeAnne is reading for a nap we are heading into Walla Walla to finish our Christmas shopping and get our tree. Our hope is she will nap in the car and be a happy girl! We hope to get our Christmas decorations all up this weekend too. This should be interesting with lil one at our feet!

Did she really put two & two together?/Pkg from Auntie Katie!

Good Morning!!!! It's hump day! Up and over we go. Best news for me is John is off for the next 3 weekends and a week before Christmas! Yahooo! So get this yesterday was John's day to have LeAnne, while he was in the bathroom my sister called, well he comes out of the bathroom (it wasn't long) to find LeAnne holding his phone babbling and then he hears my sister saying "give the phone to daddy". WHAT? Are you kidding me? She knew to answer daddy's flip phone? How adorable and scary is that! :-)

Thank-you Auntie Katie for spoiling our girl once again! Our girl is so blessed to have family and friends who love her so very much! LeAnne scored once again... 3 new dresses, a few cute long sleeve onsies, a Winnie The Pooh snow suit and 3 new dresses. Perfect timing on the dresses because I've bene having trouble finding a Christmas dress I likes. :-)

Well I must go get LeAnne some breakfast, wake up daddy and then I am off to work! Oh on a work note I had the best teaching moment yesterday with my student. We don't know if his handwriting will ever be wonderful so I am starting to teach him how to type. The first lesson was really terrible so we've been looking around for a special keyboard and software, but in the mean time I wanted to give it another try. So I told him I had a challenge for him, showed him how to put his left hand on the home keys, I sat next to him and did the same thing and then had him look at me and type asfd asdf asfd many times while saying it in a sing song voice. Then I said okay now look at me and type dad, no peaking and.... he did it! OMGosh he was so proud of himself! SCORE!!! I love this little guy!!! He loves the computer and I see it being a big part of his future so the more I can teach him the better. He wants to be an Astronaut, loves all things space, and Star Wars. I refuse to set limits for him, the sky is the limit in my mind and I am going to do the best I can to help him be the best he can be.

Have a wonderfully wacky Wednesday!!

Jana

LeAnne & Sleeping - Prayers/Wisdom appreciated!

It's going on week 2 or 3 that LeAnne has been having issues with sleeping. Well I take that back it's just a new issue, she's NEVER been the best sleeper. Did I make the mistake of rocking my girl to sleep? We get her asleep then the second we pick her up from our chests or lay her down she wakes up SCREAMING! It's worse for her naps. We've let her scream up to an hour and it doesn't seem to help at all. I don't want to let her scream all day long. I've heard of giving them like 10 minutes then going into soothe them and walking out but for her I don't see how that will work because if we go in there all she wants is OUT of the crib and into our arms. I think that would just prolong the process. I am willing try for a bit on this first nap of the day and then give up on that nap if she won't go down but she still needs at least one nap a day right? I know by giving into her screaming she wins but I can't listen to her scream and scream and scream. It breaks my heart! At the same time I know I need to teach her how to soothe herself to sleep but how do I do that? I feel like I've done something wrong. How do I make it better for our girl? Poor grandma Marcia too! She's trying everything and it's not working. UGH! I know we can't rock and/or hold her while she's sleeping forever but how do teach her? She's not sleeping as good at night again either. She's up once and then not sleeping on. I tell ya our little girl is high maintenance!

If you have any suggestions please share in detail. Also I'd appreciate your prayers! Well I must go give our girl some breakfast before I go to work.