January

**I’m so glad it took me three weeks to work on this post!  Now that it’s almost February, here’s an update on January!

 

I can’t believe that January has come and gone!  The mild winter weather has caused us to forget that it truly is winter!

New Year’s Day was spent being extremely lazy!  Kenna enjoyed watching the Rose Bowl parade.  She loved watching all the horses!  Mommy thought the doggy surfing float was the best!  It happened to be a record braking float for being the longest one yet!

Handbands is our new favorite game!  It’s a very entertaining game that always gets us laughing!  Ella figured out that she can see her picture card in the window, helping her to ask questions that allows her to figure it out fast.  Kenna asks one question, then flips it over to see what it is, and then asks us if she is a lollipop (or whatever her card is)!  Poor Uncle Matt asks questions that no one knows the answers to… sometimes or maybe is our response!  And then there is Lily.  All she wants to do is crumple up the cards! :)

This is a great family friendly game for all ages.  There have been many requests to play Banheads (as Kenna calls it) in our house!

Our friend Trey came over for a playdate one night.  We hadn’t seen him for awhile so they were excited to play together!  Kenna enjoyed showing him all her Peoples and Legos.  They took turns playing doctor, G-rated that is!  

We celebrated Grandma Tami’s birthday together.  Going out to eat with three kids can be very challenging, so we decided to have a home cooked meal instead!  Ella and Grandpa picked out Scratch cupcakes and flowers for Grandma.  I made a pretzel salad for her birthday cake.  Pretzel salad was on the to-do list for Christmas, but it never got made due to my oven being broke! 

Not only is going out to eat challenging with three kids, but trying to get a picture of them together is even worse!

After supper we gave the girls baths.  I’m not sure what makes Grandpa and Grandma’s bathtub so cool, but the girls LOVE taking baths there! 

The biggest snowfall of the season so far brought 7 inches of snow!  Matt went out to shovel numerous times during this storm, as the snow just kept falling over a two-day span! 

Matt had just gotten home from work before he headed back out to shovel.  Kenna kept saying, “I need my daddy back!”  I tried explaining to her that he would be back in after he was done shoveling.  I pulled up the shades so she could see her daddy out in the snow.  We went back to playing and before you know it she ran off to find her stool.  This is how I found her… :)

We cheered the UNI women’s basketball team onto a victory to Illinois State.  It was back and forth the entire game making it an exciting one to watch!

Grandpa Dan caught a T’s for 3’s shirt after a made three point shot by the Panthers.  He of course gave it to Miss Ella, who put it on right away!

The temperature over the weekend was incredible for January.  It melted most of the snow we’d just received! 

Kenna and daddy went out for a bit to shovel the remaining chunks off the driveway.  Kenna decided to get brave and walk through the snow.  She ended up getting stuck and wouldn’t move her feet.  She then plopped down, calling for help.  I watched the entire thing happen, but was out in slippers and no coat.  My plan was to take pictures, not rescue my child from the snow!  Daddy had just gone inside, so I quickly ran in, slid my boots on, and went out to get her!

Cedar Falls schools had Martin Luther King Jr. day off so Danielle and I packed the kids up and headed to the Children’s Museum in Iowa City for a day of fun.  It was another beautiful winter day with temperatures in the high 40s!  (See previous post.)

I think Mother Nature was upset that the warm temperatures melted majority of our snow, so she decided to send 5 more inches our way, along with nasty wind!  Friday, January 20th became our first snow day of the year.  This snow day didn’t hurt too bad, as this is the first year Cedar Falls built snow days into our schedule.  We will now be going to school on February 20th (President’s Day) instead of having the day off.

Snow days= jammie days at our house!  Matt brought the girls over so he could get some work done.  Ella brought over popcorn and the girls were determined to sit in the dark and eat their popcorn together.  I’m pretty sure this is when Ella introduced Kenna to monsters…. THANK YOU ELLA!

Even though it was pretty chilly, we figured we better take advantage of having some time to play in the snow after naps.  Ella was in heaven and let’s just say McKenna would have been better off staying inside where it was WARM!  Ella was swiping snow off the neighbor’s playhouse and swiped it right down Kenna’s coat.  The poor girl started screaming.  Who likes snow down their coat…. not me! 

Hot cocoa always makes things better, well until you spill most of your cup all over your new Cuddleduds and chair!

After quickly stripping her down and cleaning the table and chair, I ran her soaked clothes to the washer.  Luckily with the help of a little Spray and Wash her Cuddleduds were back to looking brand new!  Phew!

Uncle Matt and Ella helped Kenna build her first snowman of the year!  They came over at the end of the NFL playoff game.  Daddy was more interested in watching the game, and then running out to give Garvin updates.  It was starting to sleet which also made daddy want to stay inside!  We put him in charge of Lily so that I could get supper ready and so I could run out to get a few pictures! : )

Love our little snowman kit that I got at Basket of Daisies!  Way to go guys!

Ella and Kenna came in and took a bath to warm up from the cold!

Kenna loves taking baths with her cousins!  This was her first bath with just Lily one night that we watched her.  Lily was super happy and had fun playing with Kenna. 

Listening to them giggle together was one of the cutest things!

Probably our most exciting event from January was going to Kenna’s first movie at the theatre!  I wanted to wait to take her to a movie that I thought would keep her attention and one I thought she would enjoy.  When I saw Beauty and the Beast was coming I knew this was the one!  (This was one of my favorites growing up!)

I had promised Ella that we would go to a movie over Christmas break as part of her present.  The flu bug didn’t allow these plans to happen so I knew she’d want to join us!  Grandpa and Grandma caught wind of our plans and decided they would come as well! 

Not only was this Kenna’s first movie in the theatre, but it was her first 3D movie!  I was anxious to see if she would keep her glasses on since she’s never been a big fan of sunglasses.  She’d keep them on for awhile, take them off, put them over my glasses, put them on upside down, switch glasses with me, put her glasses back on, take her glasses off… you get the point!  : )

I brought our popcorn buckets along with so that the girls each had their own container.  Grandpa Dan bought a large popcorn, so the lady said she could fill up the girls’ popcorn buckets for us!  What a deal!  Oh wait… he did pay over $10 for a pop and popcorn!

Overall we felt both girls did great!  They took turns sitting on our laps.  Towards the end McKenna requested her blankie and paci and wanted to sit with me for the remainder of the movie.  I can definitely say our first movie experience was a success!

I find it funny that she didn’t want to wear them during the movie but once we got home she had to wear them everywhere!

We started Kindergym at UNI on Saturday mornings!  It’s a 6 week program that lasts from 10:00-10:50 in the WRC.  We were lucky enough to be in a small group with some of our friends!

Kenna was pretty serious for most of class.  There were a lot of kids participating in many different stations and I think it was very overwhelming for her!

Daddy was in charge of taking pictures.  We’re going to have a little lesson on using the zoom… : )

Things to remember from this month:

*We’ve officially been done with the high chair and booster seat for a couple months now.  McKenna would rather sit in a big chair like mommy and daddy.  She has to sit on a towel since we have white padded seats.  Will someone please remind me why I picked out these chairs?!  They all have one million stains (thanks Ella… kidding!) and need replaced already!  Anyways, if the towel is not perfect (if one side gets folded) McKenna gets super upset and sometimes cries!  Mommy’s OCD behaviors have already rubbed off on this girl!

*McKenna had a hard time transitioning back to daycare after Christmas break.  This was the first time we’d dealt with her not waiting to go with someone, so we weren’t quite sure how to handle it.  Shannon told us that she would cry for majority of the day and say things like, “I need my daddy/mommy back.”  “I want to go home.”  “Can I call my daddy?”  She also would stand at the door (sometimes crying) and watch me leave in the morning.  Talk about torture!  I hated leaving, but knew the faster I got out of there the better it would be for all of us.  Luckily this stage didn’t last for too long, probably a few weeks. 

*Another two year molar popped through leaving just one more to come through.

*McKenna knows basic shapes- triangles, circles, squares.

*We’ve continued working on potty training.  The little stinker doesn’t have accidents, but she’s not going on the potty either.  She'd rather hold it… ALL…DAY…LONG!

*Kenna is pretty much obsessed with our phones.  She amazes us at what she can do on our phones- unlocks (by sliding), scrolls to find her apps, goes back, takes pictures, looks thru pictures, answers (by sliding), “reads” texts (matches puzzle piece), and I even found her plugging my phone into my charger.  I’m pretty sure she’ll be teaching me about my phone in the near future!

*Gatorade is called alligator.

*One night at supper McKenna proved that she knows our bedtime prayer.  Instead of saying our supper prayer she recited our bedtime prayer!  (Now I lay me down to sleep…)  She chooses not to help us pray at bedtime, but she is obviously listening!

*This girl could play games all day long.  Headbands, Zingo, Discovery Toy Bingo, and Hide-in-Seek are her current favorites.  I wish I had started tallying the number of times we’ve played each game.  I can’t even begin to put a number on it!

*McKenna is getting more and more independent by the day.  She will put on her boots in the morning when asked and will “retrieve” items if we ask her to.  She can also play on her own for long periods of time.  Our little girl is turning into a big girl right in front of our eyes!