I'm sure it will taper off in first grade

This applies to two things.

First, is Strips height.  She has ALWAYS been in the 75-95th percentile for height.  I have no idea why, neither of us are tall, in

 fact I was always the kid sitting in front of the sign in class pictures.  Ohh, how I wanted to stand on the back row of the risers.  And her feet!  Thank goodness we lived near a Stride Rite outlet because the kid went up a full size every month at one point in her life.  We just had to buy her new shoes, and check out these skis:

I remember the first day of the first grade.  I had on my brand new pair of white keds.  I felt great.  I went to school, where everyone made fun of my little, baby feet.  "What size are those?"  "11's"  "HAHAHAHA, baby feet, baby feet!"  Everyone else had a size 1, at least.  :-(  At the rate she's going, she'll be wearing MY shoes by kindergarten.  

Anyway, the kid is also an elephant and doesn't forget a thing.  One of her favorite books as a little baby was "Brown Bear, Brown Bear," and she learned all of the animals.  So PaPa and Ma come with us to Disney World for Strip's 3rd birthday.  We walk in to Animal Kingdom, and Ma says, "Ohh!  Look at the parrot!"  to which Strip says, "Ack-ully (actually) that's a Scarlet Macaw."  And she was totally right.

We are doing the library reading challenge right now and the kids have a chart to fill in when they read, and a penguin that they can color.  It's a little die cut card stock thing.  Well, hers had a little stringy piece of paper that didn't quite get cut off.  It almost looked like her penguin had hair.  Rainbaby (as we use to call her because of her ocd tendencies) noticed it right away, but her response?

"Oooh!  Mine can me a marconi penguin!"  

For those of you not up on your animals, here is a visual so you don't have to google it:

And she colored it yellow this morning, and I cannot tell you the last time that kid saw a picture of a marconi penguin.  Crazy.

That wasn't exactly even...

Do I look different?  Hubs went all out for Christmas this year.  We just bought a house, so we sort of agreed that we would just call that Christmas to each other, and maybe just get a couple of things to open on Christmas morning.  

So after decorating the Christmas tree, he stuck an envelope in it, surprising me with tickets to Wicked and a weekend in Chicago.  Not cheap.  And even though it was my Christmas present, that man loves a good musical, so it was kind of a win win.  After house and Chicago, we agreed that we were really done with Christmas.

So Christmas morning, the kids and family are opening presents.  Hubs gave me a card with a sweet little note from him and some cash.  I have to share this part because it cracks me up:

                             I was going to get you a gift card to get some coffee, but then

                            I got in the wrong lane, so I said screw it, I'll give her cash.

Hee hee love you, too!  He also gave me a new lap desk, which I was over the moon about.  My old one was made by my sorority big sister and had completely fallen apart over the years.  In fact, this year, I had actually thrown it away (sorry, Em!), but dug it out of the bag when it was time to address Christmas card envelopes, then thrown it away again.  I figured he saw me dumpster dive and didn't want me to keep fishing it out of the can.

After the kids were in bed, I plopped down on the couch with his work laptop.  He came over and closed it and put it away.  I was ticked!  HellO!  I was in the middle of something!  He said I had one more present to open.  And my loving wife response was, "Well, don't shut that down.  I need to finish what I was doing."  Open the last present and there in the box, shining in all it's glory, is a new MacBook.  Woop woop!  That was the real reason he got me the lap desk.

So last week, I'm video chatting with one of my best buds and she asked what all I got for Christmas.  After rattling off all of my great stuff, she asked what I got him. 

Ummm.  A sweater.

We both died laughing.  He did get some nice pjs from Target, too and some new face wash and shave gel... yeah, I think I came out on top.  In my defense, he did get a nice PS3 with extra controller, games and blurays last year.  I just couldn't top that.  Guess we'll just alternate big Christmases for each other.  Good thing I have a full year to try to come up with something!

Not quite a poker face

Santa gave us Candy Land this year, and strip loves it.  All in all, she plays pretty fair and is encouraging of others.  

The night after Christmas, my brother and I were playing it with her, and we both had drawn at least one special candy piece allowing us to move up faster.  Strip had sighed and moaned how she was NEVER going to get a candy card.  Two turns later, I pull Jib the Gingerbread boy and have to go all the way back to the beginning (and I was up by Princess Frostine, I'll have you know).  So trying to show Strip how to be a gracious looser, I say,

Me:  Awe, man.  I have to go all the way back to the beginning now.

Strip: Awww huh huh huh ha ha hahaha.

So wish I had an audio, but as you can imagine, she starts out with the genuine "Awe, that stinks" but realizing that she can now win the game, breaks out in to an evil laugh.

P and I try our best not to wet our pants laughing.

The big brown hound

 My brother has a reindeer, er dog that came to stay with us over Christmas.  He rode up in the rv with my parents and hung out with our dog, June Bug, until P could get here.  Did I mention he's huge?  Sweet, but large.  Here's a visual:

Bless him.  I should also note that we have squirrels here bigger than cats.  So one day, I let the pups out, and Tay runs full speed toward a tree, jumps, and I swear almost landed on the second row of branches.  That dog has ups.  Fast forward to Wicked weekend.  Sat. morning, I call to check on the kids, dogs and PaPa, and my mom starts talking to the dogs, then my dad about how the dogs want to go outside.  The last thing I hear is my mom saying, "Well there's someone walking by and they want to say hello!  Oh Lord!  *click*"

I knew it.  I wait about 8 minutes and call back.  I asked mom if Taylor had jumped the fence and her response was "like the cow jumping over the moon."  And he went through not one, but two fences, as my mom is standing in her pjs on our porch shouting, "It's ok!  He's really sweet!  He just wants to say hello!" and runs after him.  I just wish I could have been there to see the other person's face as this giant, brown horse comes shooting out of our house toward them!  Priceless!

Dinner Conversations

We are exactly 6 months from our next Disney trip.  I know, because I have been obsessing about it for the past week, and now that it's planned, we can just get excited.  When I was setting everything up, I asked Strip if there was anyone special she wanted to eat with while we were there.  Big shocker, she wants to go to Cinderella's castle.  

We've been three times before, so we know the drill.  The first time, it was our last day at Disney and the only character dining, so we thought what the heck.  Kids loved it.  So, I called like a madwoman trying to get a table for Strip's birthday.  I was finally able to get a seating for dinner during a Pirates and Princess party.  So, Nugget was dressed as a pirate and Strip was dressed as Cinderella.  Third time was another, last minute, they were open, why not, but because we weren't there for a party, we were just in our normal Disney clothes.  We stand in line to be greeted by Cinderella and Strip is all kind of excited.  It's our turn, and the photo guy takes Strip's autograph book and hands it to Cinderella, totally throwing her off.  She looks at her shoes and bursts into tears (and if that weren't bad enough, we still had lunch to sit through, and it's not cheap but it IS pre-paid, so it's not like we were really going to leave).  Cinderella was super gracious and said we could come back after lunch to try again.

I take Strip to the bathroom where she calms down.  I finally ask if she's sad because she wasn't dressed up and she shook her head "no," but I still kind of thought that was the problem.  I assured her that not everyone was dressed up, and she was still a princess even in her normal dress.  She said ok, and we left the bathroom just as a gaggle of 6 year-olds came in all decked out princess style.

So, tonight we are talking about Disney, chatting about Cinderella and she asks if she can wear her new Snow White dress that day.  I said sure, and she says, "That's why I was crying that day." 

Me:  When were you crying?

Strip:  The last time we were at Cinderella's (the kid is an elephant, she forgets nothing)

Me:  You were crying because you didn't have a princess dress on?

Strip:  Yeah.

Me:  Awe, sweetie, I'm sorry!

Strip:  That's ok, Mommy.  Everyone makes mistakes some time.

Three and a half and already blaming her mother for all her problems.  The teenage years are going to be fun.

Everyone's a critic

We are doing the nighttime ritual, teeth are brushed and pjs are being put on.  I  have Nugget in his room, selecting  some rockin' Thomas pjs and Hubs has Strip in her room selecting a story.  Apparently, he made the mistake of picking "Mr Brown Can Moo, Can You?"  Why?  I have no idea, but she comes in to Nugget's room with the book and says,

 

"Mom.  Dad wants to read this book, but it's freakin' terrible.  It's horrible, just horrible."

Wow.  Ok.  Who would have thought that such a sweet little face could have such a strong literary opinion.  

Long time no blog

Whew, it's been a crazy Christmas!  As soon as my little chickens are tucked in, I'll try to get caught up on everything.  Right now they are having way too much fun throwing blocks down the stairs.  Hope everyone is off to a great new year!  Scroll back in a few hours!