1 week to go...

One week until Christmas! Time sure has zoomed on by this year. I've completed all of my shopping, thank goodness. If I don't have it by now, it's not going to get bought :) I do have some things being shipped, so hopefully they'll arrive this week.

The girls are out of school until Jan. 3, so we'll get lots of time together over the next few weeks. They had a great week of school, which was filled with lots of fun Christmas activities. I was at the school on Wednesday when Santa came to visit, and then on Thursday at the girls' class parties. They got to go shopping at school on Tuesday (at Santa's Workshop), but I missed that event because we had our follow-up appointment with the wholistic pediatrician in Tampa. We received the results of the girls' urine & stool samples. I was really nervous and expecting scary results; however, there was nothing alarming found at all! What a relief! Since the girls have been on antibiotics multiple times in their lives, the doctor was concerned that they may have had a big build-up of yeast, but they didn't.

Reese and Paige both had no "bad" bacteria in their systems. Reese was missing a lot of the "good" bacteria. They both are now on a Pro-Biotic vitamin that helps with this issue. Paige also had a low Vitamin C reading, whereas Reese's was high. He added some Vitamin C to Paige's vitamin schedule. So now, both girls are taking Speak (a fish oil high in Vitamin E & K and Omega 3 fatty acids), Super Nu Thera (all kinds of vitamins included here) and the Pro-Biotic. The worst part is if the fish oil...it stinks REALLY bad and makes everything greasy. Reese will only drink it through her cup, and the oil is causing the valve to slide out. At least she's taking it! I sure wouldn't want to...it makes me gag just smelling it.

Paige has just started making more consonant sounds...she now runs around the house saying, "Mamamamamamamamama" and "Babababababababa"...which is brand new! I don't know if it's the vitamins or what, but something is changing for the better! Reese is doing lots of new things...not all good, but still different. She's becoming more aware of her body and the toilet. She likes to strip her pants off now...quite entertaining! She is also into pulling ornaments from our tree. So even though these aren't necessarily "good" things, they ARE good things because it means she is changing and learning! So YAY!

Alright...here are our pictures. Paige couldn't have cared less about Santa! The kids wore their pajamas to school on Santa day.





Reese didn't want any part of this Santa person!


Paige swinging at school...







I didn't get any pictures of Reese at school...her class was outside and they were running all over the place. She kept running away from me, like I was embarrassing her...haha. So I left her alone and took this pic of her later. I love this little penguin shirt!


Paige just hanging around the house today...still wearing onesies to keep her hands out of her diaper...sigh.




And some beautiful smiles from Little Nugget!



See you next week! Have a very Merry Christmas, everyone!

Family Pictures

Helllloooo there! Hope everyone had a great weekend. We did, considering it could've been worse. Paige officially caught her first ear infection on Wednesday. Actually, it is the very first ear infection ever in this house. She was holding her ear and crying inconsolably at school, so I immediately picked her up and took her to the doctor. Sure enough, her ear was definitely infected. A few days and medicines later, she seems back to normal. She played hooky on Thursday and Friday and stayed home with me.

This week should be a fun one at school...all kinds of Christmas fun going on! Monday is cookie decorating, Tuesday is shopping at Santa's Workshop, Santa comes for a visit on Wednesday, and class Christmas parties on Thursday. Then two weeks off! Yay for sleeping in :)

My mom came over today and helped us take our annual family pictures. As most of you know, it's a miracle if I ever get pictures of the girls posing for more than a split second, so out of the gazillions of photos she took, these are the best ones! It seems that in every photo, someone was looking down, trying to run away, had their eyes closed...one person always seemed to mess up the entire picture. So, after sifting through them, I chose the best few. I have come to accept that my girls are not "posers," so we take what we can get. Years from now, I can look back and say, "That is how they were on that day," and know that it's okay. I see so many pictures of children with their perfect posed smiles, and I know that I will most likely never have that. And it's okay!

Anyway, here are this week's pics...

Our family photos for 2011...









Silly Miss Pickles playing in her crib before napping...






Reese snacking on some vanilla wafers...it's all gooey in her teeth!





Our photo with Santa...try not to laugh too hard! The girls were actually having a great time running around looking at all the Christmas trees at the Ramon Theater...they just didn't want to stop and pose! I think this is SO our family!



Reese looking cute in her red snowman shirt...




And Paige looking cute in her gingerbread man shirt...



Something that almost never happens...



Random cuteness :)


That's it for this week! Have a good one :)

Picking the Tree

One more week closer to Christmas...yikes! Why does it always seem to creep up on me every year? I always say I'm going to be prepared early each year, but that never happens. We went Saturday to pick out our Christmas tree. Neither of the girls could have cared less about the trees. Paige just wanted to run around and be thrown up into the air, and Reese was in heaven searching for twigs & leaves. I tried to get some pictures, but you know how that goes with these two. Action shots or nothing!









And just some random pictures from the week...can these children ignore their mother with a camera any more? No one was looking at me on this day. I might as well be invisible.





Really, mother? You want me to sit in this window sill and smile at you? Please.



At least one smile for the week!


That's it...have a great week!