We're still here.

I have a confession to make. I totally haven't been feeling the inspiration to blog. Other than the occasional return about once a month to give updates on my growing kids, it just hasn't been happening. My kids are what motivated me.  And while I do enjoy sharing and documenting what is happening in our lives, just like anything else, if I don't intentially set aside time to do it, it just simply doesn't get accomplished. And I could tell you I'm just super busy and haven't found a single minute to sit and write, but the truth is, I've put way too many things before the blog. Umm...like pinterest. And if you haven't checked out pinterest, I encourage you to! There are lots of cool things to be found on there. It's a fun site where you can share your interests with others and get inspired by others interests. But just a little warning: it IS addicting, and if you're not careful you can end up wasting a whole lot of time on there. For those of you who are familiar with pinterest, you know this already.

So this morning, as I baked brownies, I got the urge. The little spark that says, life is good. Christmas is 6 days away, Adelynn is more excited than ever,  and my baby is just 12 days away from turning 1. We survived another year, and an eventful year at that. A year when there were times I thought we wouldn't make it through. But by the grace of God we are here, and we are blessed.

Here's what we've really been doing:

On Friday, Santa showed up on our doorstep. That's right. The jolly man came for a visit. Actually, it was Brian's uncle, who by the way, plays a really good Santa.

He even read a story to Adelynn about why the kids leave cookies for Santa and gave her a plate and mug for his cookies and milk.

 I loved seeing the excitment in Adelynn's face. She stood a good distance away frantically waving when he walked through the door. I think she was a little taken back, but she quickly warmed right up to him.

 Lillian, on the other hand, was not as excited. She did great with her first Santa visit, but when the strange looking man actually stepped into her house, she wanted nothing to do with it.

I do sometimes struggle with the whole Santa thing, having some scary looking man sneek into your house while you sleep and leaving gifts. And while I want my kids to know what Christmas is really about, remembering the most important gift God has given us, I also want them to be kids.

So, yes, we'll do Christmas with Santa and gifts. But we'll also celebrate the birth Jesus. We are looking forward to tomorrow when we attend a birthday party for Him with friends. It will be fun!

Potty training

We have days, and even weeks, where we are right on, everytime. And then we have days where we miss...everytime.

Today was a day we missed.

This picture was taken after the third change of pants, chosen by Adelynn, of course.

 There are days I feel like we may never make it there. But we will. Hopefully.

Tomorrow is a new day.

This girl is so close to crawling...

I'm confident it's going to happen very soon. She gets so frustrated trying to get around, especially when she has her eye on something.

She seems to be working on some teeth too. All this just in time for a first birthday.

First birthday. One. My heart gets stuck in my throat when I say those words. The emotions of when she was born are still so raw, it's hard to believe it happened a year ago. But it did. And now we're getting ready to celebrate what the year has brought us.

For now, I have to go get ready for a special Christmas party we're having tomorrow. It's going to be fabulous.

 Happy Day. Merry Christmas. Happy Birthday Jesus.

It's going to be a great week!