Before I forget...

I've been thinking of a lot of things I love lately.

• When Kayden is in her bouncer across the living room, and I am writing a blog, and I talk and wave to her, and she gets so excited and bounces extra high.

• When Kayden is so amazed by the pups, and they are so amazed by her.

• When Dominic sings to her and she sometimes stares, which is adorable.  And sometimes smiles, which is adorable.

• When she grabs her froggy down from her hanging carseat, and gets the foot in her mouth, then lets go and the foot vibrates her whole mouth.

• When she lays her head on my chest, which is getting more and more seldom =(.

• When she giggles when you blow in or kiss her neck or tummy.

• When she talks to me.  Or Dominic.  Or Anyone.  Or her toys.

• When her whole face lights up when you go to get her from a nap.

• That she is starting to love to touch things.

• When she surprises herself.

• When she starts to cry(not this part) while she's napping, and you go in to put her suckie back in, and she says (this part) nom..nom...nom nom nom om nom om om nom... noooom  om noom.

• How she can roll over now.

• How she looks up at you when she's on your chest, in her bed, laying down, anywhere.

• How she enjoys doing things with me. (This may just be my imagination but oh well.  No one else likes to spend 2 hours in Hobby Lobby, and then 2 more at Michaels with me.  Kayden does.  As long as she can grab 8475 things.)

• How she gets a kick out of "boo".

• How her face goes "oahhhoo" when you pour water on her belly in the bath.

• How anything is fun if we do it as a family.  Even just laying on the floor.  Who woulda thunk?

• How I have a delish man who cooks delish dinner.

• How Dominic will put Kayden up to his mouth and "eat her like corn on the cob" and she lauuuuughs!  And he says "ommm nom nom, Kayden on da cob Kayden on da cob!"

I'll keep thinking...always.

Christmas with Gpa & Gma Conn.

It's always so good to get to see Kourt again when she comes down.

Grandpa Conn couldn't wait to give her a present either.

Help from Grandma Conn.

Lauuuughing with Grandpa Conn, he was blowing on her tum tum.

Kayden and Grandma Ree.

Deeeeeeply concentrating on their game lol.

 

 Kayden found a mirror while I was putting her in her carseat.  We don't have any mirrors that she can touch, only the little one's that are high in the bathroom.  We still hold her up to look into them and try to let her touch them, but it's just not the same I guess.  She was fascinated by this.

Their house is always a fun time.  We enjoyed the mellow day opening presents and relaxing.  Grandma said that when she walked in, they were all asleep on the couch haha.

So we made it through the Christmas weekend alive.  Hopefully we can get up to see the Colorado family soon!  We miss you guys!

Christmas with Gpa & Gma Kitts.

First, another family photo.  It was so nice out on Christmas.  This was even when we were leaving.  I'm not sure how I feel about it yet, it's quite nice to not be freezing, but it just doesn't feel like Christmas without snow.

Grandpa Kitts could hardly wait to give her a present, and she could hardly wait to put the wrapping in her mouth!

All she cares about is the present haha.  She's caught on.

Playing with Grandma Kitts.

Haha, this face is great.  Having a blast with Uncle Josh.

 These goofballs.  Jordan, Alec, and their Grandma.

They got Bezzerwizzer, which we just so happen to buy a couple weeks ago, and happens to also be our new favorite game.  It's a toughy I tell you!  Not easy questions, seriously.  This is also, only like half of that family.  We're missing a few here, I think next Christmas they need a bigger table lol.

Steve and Annette also got a Wii for Christmas, so it was the hit of the day.  Lots of Mario Cart battles going on.

Their house is always full of good food, great people, and lots of noise, laughter, bets, battles, challenges, competitions, and memories.  It was a great Christmas spent doing the norm over there; eating, playing, and laughing.


After their house we went to Dominic's Mom's side of the family.  They had an open house at their Auntie Sharons.  It was super busy and crazy, which is a little overwhelming to me, but at the same time, very exciting and always new.  I'm glad we made it.  =)  Sadly, I didn't get many pictures, because I was a little overwhelmed, but hopefully I will get to steal some off of Facebook or something soon. =)  Thank you for having us over Auntie Sharon, it was a great time!

Christmas day was great.  I'm glad we got to spend it here with Dominic's family, although I missed my family a lot.  I suppose that's the beauty of combining families and making a new family.  Compromise, compromise, compromise.  It was wonderful to see him happy though, and I was happy as long as I was with him and Kayden, so it all worked out. =)

Christmas Eve with the Kitts/Conns.

Ah.  Christmas Eve.  It was full of many things.  We had decided, long ago, that Christmas Eve would be OUR family day, because we knew the rest of the weekend would be craziness.  So that's what we did, and I'm so glad.  =)  We, of course, put off/were too busy until then to make the Christmas goodies we gave to our family down here.  So, we were super busy running around all day for; last minute ingredients, candles for luminarias, gifts, etc.  Lesson learned, it is wayyy too crazy out there.  We won't be doing that again.

After all the goodies were finished, we got to business--of enjoying our family day.  We set up luminarias together.  Dominic on the roof, I around the driveway and sidewalk, and Kayden on the porch in her new bouncer from Grandma Kreisher for Christmas. =)  It was such a great day out, but started getting a little chilly as we went along, so Kayden got to wear this great hat.

After we got them all set up, we drove around to look at all the lights with our homemade caramel apple cider.  As you can tell, Kayden really payed attention.

Came home to our pretty house.

With our pretty tree.

Kayden finally woke up from her nap, after much anticipation on our parts haha, and opened her first present ever =D  I don't know what she's looking at here, but she was too funny.  All she wanted to do was stuff allllll the wrapping in her mouth.

We got her a cool thing that projects a little movie on the ceiling for when she's going to sleep.  Now that I think about it, I think it's kind of a present to us haha.  (Dominic picked that out, haha.  ;-)  The present I picked out was from Santa.  Just kidding, but seriously.)

I looove these adorable little santa and reindeer pants!

It's your First Christmas?? You don't say...

Dominic...I mean Santa... filled our stockings.  Big bones for the dogs, formula for Kayden, and candy for us. =)

And just a shot of little missy hanging out in her great cradle while we were getting ready for the wild day of Christmas.

Christmas Eve was great.  We decided that we are going to make it a tradition to hang out all day together, look at lights, and open our family presents together on Christmas Eve.  We also are planning on giving her an ornament each year, and when she moves out she will have her own collection started.  =D  This year her ornament is her own "handprint" that we tried to make, but turned out more as a blob. She tried to grab the ornament instead of stamp her hand, but it was hilarious.  And I think is even better than if she had really stamped it haha.  We went to get family photos taken together, and more pictures of her (duh.), but some family members haven't gotten theirs in the mail yet (haha sorry. i'm a slacker, i know.) so I'll have to wait to post those. =)

I love that I have my own family now, and we can choose anything and everything.  We can choose our traditions, our plans, our outfits for family pictures ;-).  It's great.  I am so glad and grateful I have my great little family (including the dogs) and we could all spend Christmas Eve together as a family.  I hope we have many more of these.

Rolley Polley Olley.

 Ohhh no!  I'm in for trouble!  Chickadee can roll over.  And boy does she love to do it.  However, she does not enjoy the aftermath of being stuck on her belly.  She's rolled over a few random times lately, but yesterday was the first time I've seen her do it again, and again, and again.

Reeeeeeach.

Getting closer.

So close.

Getting it.

Hey drool face you made it!! =D

Kayden loves the dogs.  She loves to yank their ears.  And watch them wrestle.

Big 'ol kiss! =)

And the dogs love her.  Here is Dozer laying next to her this morning.  They go where ever she goes.  Never out of their sight.

Daddy reading Kayden a story lady night.  =)  I love this picture, and this precious moment.  Aunt Chris got Kayden this great book for Christmas, that I remember reading as a child with my mom.  I love that Dominic jumped right in and started reading to her =).

"I'll love you forever,

I'll like you for always,

As long as I'm living

my baby you'll be."

And I'll throw these two spoiled goof-balls in just for the heck of it.

And little missy almost standing ;-) (She's leaning against the couch, and Dominic is about to catch her, but hey, it was fun.)

And just a little video of her the other day.  It's not the best because she notices the camera and doesn't do what she was really doing.  But often, when I put her down for a nap, she'll just smiiiiiile, and taaaaaalk to me.  It's the CUTEST thing, and I have such a hard time leaving her for her to go to sleep, but I know that if she gets too tired, it'll be worse.  She's so sweet though, she just lights up. =)

Oh my goodness, today we were just hanging out on the bed.  I was giving her kisses on her neck and she was CRACKING up.  Soo much.  For like 20 minutes she cracked up.  It was the funniest thing.  Wish I could have gotten a video of that!

We've just been busy getting Christmas presents and goodies finished, and wrapped.  I ordered a couple packages online this year, and they somehow got shipped to my old address.  So I've been chasing those down all week, and finally picked them up at FedEx last night, after about 7 hours of 1-800 number calling, and going back and forth because the place I ordered it from said FedEx already had the package and I must go through them, and FedEx said they could not put an address change or hold on the package because the company forbid it.  I got it all worked out, and went to pick them up last night and the guy almost gave me the wrong package!!  Luckily, I knew it wasn't the right shape, but good lord-crazy guy.  Anyway, back and forth, back and forth.  I got my packages.  Whew.  So yup, this week has pretty much been craft finishing, card writing, goodie baking, packing tracking, present wrapping, luminaria folding (my first time, its crazy I tell ya), birthday celebrating, and soon...Christmas celebrating.  Busy week, hopefully I will get more chances to update.  If not...

Merry Merry Christmas, and Happy Holidays.  Hope everyone has a great, yummy, happy, warm, enjoyable day, where ever you are, what ever you're doing!

-Xoxo-

Dominic, Kayla & Kayden.

I love Christmas Time.

Kayden met Santa!  We went to the mall to let her meet him and take pictures yesterday.  In the end, it turned out very fun, and I'm so glad we did it.  It was worth it.  I must admit though, I had a little melt-down.  I don't know why, but I just can't handle all that craziness.  Well, I guess I probably do know why: after an hour and a half of all the people, the noise, the toys from the kiosk's running over my feet, the family behind us wrestling and hitting me constantly, the rude employees.  Not to mention while we were trying to change Kayden she pee'd all over 1. herself 2. my jacket and 3. the stroller.  She also needed to be fed right when we got to the part in the line that is hard to get out of.  Anyways, with all that and more going on, I feel claustrophobic, like I need to get out of there...asap.  Lol.  But we made it through it, and now have pictures to prove it! =D  I tried to take a couple with my camera from underneath the picture lady, and only got a couple before it died.

At allllmost the front of the line, we found this cool mirror.  Why they don't have them all through-out the line, I do not understand.  She got a kick out of it though, for the 1 minute we got to stand in front of it.  We got a kick out of it too. ;-)

I think this is such an adorably cute scrunched-nose face =)  She was looking at somebody, and liked what she saw ;-)

Today I did my first attempt at home-made sugar cookies, with home-made frosting.  =)  This morning Dominic had a football game (the Championship game, which he won ;-) GOOD JOB babe, I'm proud of you.), and Kayden was asleep so I thought it'd be a good time to try.  I enjoy baking goodies to take to Grandpa and Grandma Kitts.  During football season, they always have open house kind of things on Sunday's.  No pressure to make it, no specific time.  It's great.  We come over when we get going (which is really nice, at the fact that every day is different for us, and it's hard to get going), and chow down on some great food.  (They always have something that people can eat all day; sandwiches, pizza, stew, burgers, etc.)  And even better, at least one person is usually excited about the treats I bring over...makes it totally worth it.  Anyway, I'm partially satisfied with these...I messed up on a few, and rushed on most.  But not to shabby for my first try I'd say...

In her baby bath she has a slant thing that she lays down on, that keeps her head above water.  Lately, she's been acting like she's dying to be sitting up in her bath.  Yesterday we were giving her one, and let her sit up and this is what she did. =)  I love it, she looks like she's lounging.  =D

Playing with her little Santa Duck. =)

 And this face, just cause it's cuuuute!  It's from my phone, so not the best.  But I like it.  I'm pretty sure this is when Dozer was licking her hand, and she's looking at me like, "Hmm, I'm not too sure about this Mom.  He's so slobbery."  I told her, "Kid, welcome to my life.  That's how I feel about you." ;-)  Juuuuust Kidding.

Oh, I remembered what I was going to write on here the other day.  Last week I had just fed Kayden and was burping her, when she spit up.  A ton.  It dripped down her, me, the couch, and the floor.  I was trying to readjust Kayden so I could clean it up, when along comes Dozer.  Sweet little thing rescued me from having to clean...and licked up alllll of her spit up.  That is so disgusting.  But I found it hilarious!!  I don't know why, but I cracked up, the entire time he licked it up.  Just the way he puts his head into I guess, as if it's soo delicious.

Kayden has been loving her toys.  She really loves her standing up one, so she can bounce.  She loooves to hold her head up, and tries to hold it up while she's in her car seat.  She likes to practice to stand too.  But most of all I think she loves when Daddy throws her up and catches her, and plays airplane, and "the sprinkler dance", and "up to the sky, down to the ground", and all kinds of stuff. =)