Twas the night before Christmas....

...and all through the house, not a creature was stirring not even a mouse. The stockings were hung by the chimney with care, in hopes that Saint Nicholas soon would be there....

For our "Big" present to each other, Lou and I have decided to finish our bedroom. So we now have an electric fireplace in our bedroom. (so cool) We decided that we are going to start a new tradition for our family. We are going to open stockings first thing when the kid(s) get up. (KidS being plural for the future, no we are not pregnant) So it makes sense for the stockings to be hung on the fireplace mantel in our bedroom, which is upstairs.

sidenote.....sorry but all the pictures of Christmas will not be very good. We left our camera down in Delray after our big Christmas Eve dinner with Lou's family. So I had to use my cell phone which doesn't take great pics indoors .

Lunch in Kelsey's world

Last weekend Kelsey and I took a trip up to Gainseville (UF) to be with Lou while he was in class for his MBA. During the day we were on our own and I took full advantage to finish up my Christmas shopping. Luckily there was a sandwich type place in the mall food court so I could get Kelsey some lunch. After paying for our food I turned and found these cute kid sized tables in the middle of the regular tables. I decided I could probably manage to sit in the small chairs since I saw other adults doing it as well. Kelsey had a blast being able to sit in a big girl chair at a table. She did surprisingly well. Here's some pics I took from my cell phone:

Shellfish and Citrus

I bought some grapefruit today for Kelsey to try. I gave it to her as her fruit for dinner. She was a little timid with her first taste and after trying to eat it 3 times she handed the piece to me (this is what she does when she doesn't want to eat something). Later during dinner I was able to get her to eat all of it with no fight. She tried both regular and pink. I had dinner with her tonight and I was eating a Summer Roll (with shrimp)from Publix's sushi case. (YUM) She asked for a bite, as she typically does when I am eating anything. I gave her a piece of avocado and a piece of shrimp. She ate both and asked for more..... I gave her more shrimp, and more shrimp, and more shrimp. She really liked it. I watched her carefully to make sure she had no reaction since it was her first time having shellfish. All looks good and I checked her before bed too, just to be sure! (thanks mom!)

Going Italian...

While Kelsey already loves pasta (angel hair, tortellini, ravioli, and lasagna) I decided to introduce her to another Italian treat....Panettone. This is something I enjoy, but had never tried until after Lou and I were married.

While she didn't eat too much, she did seem to enjoy it!

Cheese...

Kelsey now says cheese and actually poses for a photo. I know it won't be too long before she starts over posing, so I am trying to take advantage of being able to get smiles. Enjoy!!

Kelsey talking....

The funny thing is right now she is obsessed with watching this video clip on the camera and keeps pressing play to watch it over and over. She also keep answering the questions that I asked her on the video..it's too cute!! This is definitely a fun age.

A sad day in our family...

Thankfully Kelsey is young enough that we don't really have to explain. We had to put our (my)14 yr old Golden Retriever Jay down last week. It was a tough decision, but the right one. My parents came over and mom stayed with Kelsey while dad drove Lou, Jay and I to the vet. Before we left mom brought Kelsey out to say goodbye (and I brought Morgan our cat out). When I walked in the door after we got home Kelsey said MAMA!! and then she looked behind me and said JD with a questioning voice. Oh how glad I am that she's only 16 months. Every couple days she does say JD?? and looks around for him. I'm so happy that he was loved by such a sweet little girl who will miss him.

Kelsey's reaction to elf boogie....

So, this afternoon I showed the elf boogie video to Kelsey. The first time she watched it all she did was keep pointing and saying POOHH!!! The second time she danced a little, pointed out Pooh again and occasionally pointed to daddy. The third time she danced, pointed to Pooh, daddy Tigger and even pointed to herself a time or two. I'm feeling like chop liver by now.... She used her words and sign to ask for more, so we watched it a 4th time too! This time I pointed to me and said who's that, she said mommy, at least she knows who I am!! She also kept pointing to Pooh and Daddy too! She wanted to watch it again, but I told her mommy would show it to her later. It was very cute, wish I had thought to tape her reaction.

Watch us Elf Boogie.....

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Thanksgiving Week

We not only had Thanksgiving day here in FL, we had Thanksgiving week! My baby sister was down from school, My brother and his family drove down from NC, my older sister and her family came from an hour north and my Aunt Jackie and Uncle Doug flew in from CO. Needless to say countless hours were spent b/w our house and my parents' visiting everyone. My dad hired the same photographer that came out last year to take a big family photo and individual family photos.

We spent time on the dock, in the pool and on bikes in the cul-d-sac.

To help my parents out, Lou and I had dinner for everyone at our house Wed night. I just love having a bunch of people over, makes me so happy to share our house with everyone. It was a cool night, so we lit the fire pit. We made chicken parm, garlic bread and tomato-feta salad...yum!

Thursday morning I made scones for my brother and his wife and Lou made his famous apple pie. After lunch we packed up the apple pie and Kelsey and headed down to Delray to spend our Thanksgiving meal/day with Lou's family. It's always a joy to see Kelsey interacting with her cousins. She has her shy moments but usually those are just in the beginning and then she opens right up. She really enjoyed Thanksgiving dinner. She had some turkey, mashed potatoes, cranberry compote, green beans and sweet potato casserole (thanks Aunt Michelle). No pies this year, but she had enough sugar between the sweet potatoes and and the compote to wire her up.