Claire's 2011 Ornament... and the Christmas photos you never received...

Take THAT Hallmark... a cute little handmade ornament by Claire.

First something that DID work out.  I decided Claire would make her gift for her daddy this year.  Hallmark had a cheap looking hand print ornament, but I wanted something more handmade than that (imagine at this point me stamping my foot and raising my fist in some crafty determination).  Thanks to a snooty chick at Hobby Lobby, I came away with bake-able modeling clay in red... I finally got a hand print (it involved heating it with a hairdryer first).  Then I cut it into shape, baked it, and shalacked the heck out of it with modge podge.  I actually had Christmas scrapbooking paper, so I cut a piece for the front to frame it, then put a piece on the back to cover it.  This left about 1/4 inch visible on the sides, so I modge podged a sparkly red ribbon on it.  I thought it was sweet and very pretty (and sturdy!  That's what like ten coats of modge podge gives you).

The OTHER crafty Christmas idea came from this blog post.  We don't have a very light house (small windows, bad locations) so I waited for the best weather and dragged all the equipment to the back deck.  I taped up a sheet and lights (which I've had for years in our light box... I was giddy to actually use them this year, even if it was just taped to a sheet on the back of my house).  Then I decided I needed something for Claire to sit on, so I dragged the ottoman outside, plus blankets, pillows, toys, and books as props.  I got her awesome reindeer pjs all ready and tested the lighting.  Then Claire came home from day care.  In a bad mood. 

I took a lot of pictures, but none of them turned out. 

Matt thankfully helped with Claire's flailing and screaming, but we couldn't get one cute shot. 

So we took her inside and put her down for a nap and I watched the sun set on my project.  Before I pulled everything in, I did take some pictures of the Grinch in Claire's spot.  By this time, the light had faded enough where I didn't get the white out look in the back (my test shots before, with no Grinch, were perfect, just boring).  So.  I got bored tonight and dressed up the Grinch's photo like I would have done Claire's... only I'm sure hers would have been a little more classy. 

 

So.  This is the reason you didn't get a Christmas card from me.  My heart broke with no pictures.  And... I kept holding out for another chance at these pictures, but unfortunately it got rainy, cold, and ugly.  Maybe next year?

Christmas Decorating

So, even though we never posted about it, we DID get the Christmas tree up after Thanksgiving, as usual.  We were really curious how Claire would handle the tree (and really hopeful she wouldn't pull the tree over or eat the ornaments).  So during nap time we got everything up and the next day we were ready for the ornaments. 

 

My ornament philosophy is gaudy.  I get ornaments to represent special things--births, deaths, events, hobbies, etc.  I love Grinch ornaments (I have a soft spot for the guy since I read that book so many gosh darn times over the past two years).  I also like Winnie the Pooh ones (especially the baby ornaments--luckily I have TWO of them... because I totally got Wally one for the year he was born).  Then I have a whole slew of random pug ornaments which Wally is quite proud of.  We also have the real Wally (from the movie Wall-E) and Gizmo this year for Mogwai, since Gizmo is a Mogwai... get it?

Claire loves the ornaments.  She likes for me to carry her around the tree and show her everything.  She's used this opportunity to learn a lot of words--puppy, pretty, tree, and of course, NO and DON'T TOUCH, although she doesn't heed those as well as we'd like.  She probably laughed twenty separate times at a few of them, including the Wally pug in a tea cup which gets her every time.

I love this ornament.  It's so old and kind of ugly, but it's been on my Christmas tree since I was but a baby myself. 

My initial strategy with ornaments was to put all the ones with hooks and all the ones that break easily up high, but to put some sturdy ones on bottom to even out the look.  Unfortunately as the season wore on, many of those ornaments also found themselves perched higher and higher, until now our tree looks a little naked at the bottom.  Claire daily removes what she can and carries them around, then tries to get them back on the tree with little success.

She even put her socks on the tree one night.  She's gotten very handy putting up her own toys (and Wally's toys in his toy box--and my shoes in his toy box, and my cell phone, and her sippy cup).  So I guess putting the socks on the tree shows she's also learning how to decorate.  Good.  Next year I'll let her have at it.

Every day though Claire tells us that the tree is pretty.  She can even say it together, "pretty tree" which is pretty impressive for a 13 month old. 

Just look at that face!!  I love how excited she is about the tree and our decorations.  Makes me so happy to be a Mommy and give her these experiences!

Claire has even perfected the "share" technique, where we can put out our hands and she'll give us stuff.  She does the same thing back, but sometimes we don't always hand whatever we wanted to "share" back over... like the ornaments.  She's also learned how to say "thank you" when we give her something (or when she gives something to us, since we say thank you then... she's a little confused, but we're trying.  She can also sign "please" and sort of say it, so that's nice)

Don't mind if I do...

Oh here you go... I'll share... THANK YOU!

Thanksgiving Recap...

I didn't MEAN to not update about Claire's Thanksgiving... I just had a hard time getting around to the pictures.  Getting the Christmas pictures ready, though, I just couldn't let these go to waste!

 Claire dressed up nice for Thanksgiving, even though there's no way I'd let her eat her meal wearing something so nice!  Gotta love the eye rub... that's usually our cue to put her down for a nap... but she was just being shy (or hates the camera flash!)

 At Grandma and Grandpa's house Claire got to hang out with some of her favorite family members.  One of them in her "uncle" Brandon (who is really Matt's cousin, but since she doesn't have any real aunts or uncles, we just call everyone an aunt or an uncle). 

 But after the ads, Claire had to get down to business.  We stripped her nice outfit off, hooked her up with a huge bib (that actually was from the day care, lucky us it ended up in OUR dirty laundry just in time for Thanksgiving!)  Claire liked everything!  She ate a whole roll, my serving plus her serving of dressing, several small pieces of turkey, a little mashed potatoes, some of my sweet potato casserole, some green beans, and even cranberry sauce.  I won't lie, I was snapping wildly trying to get her expressions once she bit into something she didn't like.  I really bet on the cranberry sauce causing some faces, but instead she just popped in even more!  This kid is NOT a picky eater!

Notice the green beans never move from the side of her tray.  Once she tasted the other stuff, they were sadly forgotten. 

Well, from this meal we discovered a whole new menu to start feeding her at home.  She has stovetop and chicken and turkey and we even roll up mashed potato balls for her to feed herself (since you'll notice we fed NONE of this meal to her).  We had a great time and a great meal!  Can't wait for next year!