Elf 3rd Week Recap

Do you want to build a Gingerbread house?

I guess GusGus really wants to make sugar cookies.

Gusgus must be cold

Choo Choo

Is Gusgus grilling hot dogs or cooking himself?

Gusgus is drinking Ella's hot chocolate and really wants us to make sugar cookies. He is going to have to have patience. Im not making them with two sick kids.  

I'm coming to put out a fire. 

Friday Favorites- My Christmas List

Can you believe there is only 2 Friday's left until Christmas. I still have so much shopping, cleaning, baking, and wrapping to do. I am hoping to get most of it done this weekend. But for now it is time for Friday Favorites with Erika, Narci, and Andrea. This week I am doing a little theme of My Christmas List. 

Amazon Fire Stick- I would love to be able to watch Netflix on the tv again and not watch it on my kindle or phone. Plus it would be great for streaming my workouts on BOD 

Bidafun Clip- A selfie light would be very useful, The lighting in my house sucks.

Coffee Grinder- Right now I am borrowing my fathers coffee grinder. We have been buying whole bean coffee and you can really tell the difference in taste and quality compared to the pre-ground. 

Ninja Coffee Bar- A girl can dream big. I would love to have a mix of coffee drinks and would be easier when Brian isn't home or doesn't want coffee and I don't want to make a whole pot. I am starting not to like the Keurig.

Disney Sweatshirts- I only have one Mickey Mouse sweatshirt that I wear all the time. I need more to wear around the house.

Phone Tripod- My old tripod for my phone is slowly breaking. I need an upgrade. 

Fun with Christmas Lights

Who doesn't love the glow of Christmas lights. I personally love colored lights. We all see ideas that we want to try on Pinterest. A few years ago I saw these really cute photos with kids playing with Christmas lights. I had to try it with the girls. It turned out pretty well. I had to do it with Austin also.

On Sunday we were decorating the tree and found a strand of blinking lights. I decided to put Austin just in his diaper and let him play with the lights and take pictures. 

He didn't want to smile and look at me, but he had a lot of fun playing with the lights. 

He had fun and is so adorable. 

Aubriella wanted to play with them too. Isn't she so adorable. 

Here is the original picture I took of Claudia and Aubriella. 

Visiting Santa

Last year we found one of our local outdoor shopping malls had a really awesome set-up for meeting Santa. We just had to go back again this year. Crocker Park has pictures with Santa that is inside, but is never busy when we go. You do have to walk outside to get there though. 

What I love about this place is when meeting with Santa there are no distractions. I really should have gotten pictures of the buildings. There is one building where you wait your turn inside, which is heated. Then just your group goes into another building to meet Santa and get pictures. 

Here is my little Prince Charming all wrapped up for the cold walk to go see Santa. He is not a fan of wearing socks and shoes on a normal basis. Now we made him wear two hats, gloves, a coat, socks and shoes, plus a blanket wrapped around his legs. Surprisingly he kept it all on. He must have realized that it really was cold outside. 

Outside where the pictures with Santa location is at, there are 2 signs with a face missing to take your own pictures with. It advertises for a local Catholic all male school, St Eds. Ella insisted she needed pictures with them. 

What I love about this place is when meeting with Santa there are no distractions. I really should have gotten pictures of the buildings. There is one building where you wait your turn inside, which is heated. Then just your group goes into another building to meet Santa and get pictures. You don't feel rushed, you can hear Santa talking with your kids, it is very personalized.

I love how our picture turned out. The kids may not really be smiling but this is the best you can expect. When we first gave Austin to Santa he was screaming bloody murder. We finally got him calmed down but he wouldn't smile. Ella was smiling when her brother was screaming, but then decided she was done smiling. Kids will be kids and this is who they are, and they are all mine. 

Elf 2nd Week Recap

Another successful week with GusGus. 

Austin and GusGus playing blocks

Ella decorating her tree that GusGus brought her.

GusGus wants to bake cookies.

GusGus for the win

GusGus wishing Brian a Happy Birthday

Rooaarrrrr

Bubbles, Bubbles, Bubbles

Friday Favorites

Happy Friday. Hope everyone had a great week. Mine surely has been crazy. So much fun, excitement, and Holiday cheer going on. Time for Friday Favorites with Erika, Andrea, and Narci.

The holiday fun of baking has started in our house. The plan is to make a few things a week. I love the excitement Ella has and always asking are we making something today. 

My new addiction is listening to Audible in the car while I am driving. I hate talk radio, but I love listening to different podcasts and now books on Audible. Right now I am listening to The 10x Rule by Grant Cardone. 

It has went from bearable to OMG freezing in like 2 days in Ohio. Yesterday we decided to take the kids to get pictures with Santa at an outdoor shopping mall. (Santa was inside.) Austin wasn't a big fan of being bundled up, but after he realized how cold it was outside he stop fighting it. I am loving all these new adventures with him, aka the cold. 

I have never been one to wear baseball hats. When I went to Disney World something enticed me to buy a hat. I am actually now loving it on my lazy days when I don't want to do my hair (no mom bang twist) I can throw a hat on and run out the door. 

Fuller House Season 2 was released today. I grew up wanting to be Michelle. Loving the new series spinoff, Hoping to find sometime this weekend to watch atleast a couple of episodes. 

ER Visit Again

My little prince charming surely is giving me gray hair. Tuesday we were at the ER again. We were just there less than 2 weeks ago. This time we went to a different ER and got in and out a lot quicker. 

Austin was climbing up our bed and slipped and fell and hit his face on the bed frame. Our bed has a wooden frame that is about 6 inches high and 3/4 inch wide. He uses it as a step to get on the bed. Unfortunately, this time somehow he slipped and fell. He cried for a little bit, and only bleed a little bit. Every time he went to smile or laugh or cry the cut seemed to open back up again. I decided we needed to take him in to be checked out.

Luckily he didn't need stitches. He only needed it glued and taped together. He was such a trooper. The nurses were surprised at how good he was at everything. He didn't rip off the pulse finger thingy, sat still when they rinsed his cut twice. Now he did scream and try to escape when they did the glue. But who wouldn't when you are held down and your eyes covered.

We had to limit bathing him for 24 hours and don't submerge his eye until the tape is all gone, but really why would you submerge a babies eye? The glue will wear off by itself, and the tape will automatically fall off, if Austin doesn't pull it off himself over time. As of this morning Thursday, 1 piece of the tape has fallen off, out of 3. He was however trying to pull the rest off earlier but we distracted him and he seems to have forgotten about it for now.

I really am hoping he is not going to make this a trend of going to the ER every month. He is mommy's little wild man and very adventurous. 

Daily Christmas Traditions

The holiday season is in full swing. I can't believe that Christmas is only 20 days away, I have so much shopping still to do, but no time without the kids. It will get done like always, and will be at the last minute. The fun part of the holidays is all the different traditions that we have as a family. This year we have 4 that we do everyday. Here is a little inside in our families daily Christmas traditions.

Who doesn't love a Christmas countdown. I have had one since I was little. It was a fabric calendar that had pockets for each day and a cute little cloth mouse that you would move each day. My sister and I would fight over who got to move the mouse. My mom still has that calendar to this day and hangs it up. 

This year my mom bought us a Merry Christmas magnetic countdown calendar to add to our home. Every morning Ella wakes up and moves the peppermint candy piece. 

We also have another countdown calendar I changed the date every day with a dry erase marker. GusGus, our Elf on the shelf brought it with him to his arrival day North Pole Breakfast.

Who doesn't love Chocolate? I always say you can make anything better with Chocolate. Ok everything but most things. Both my kids have advent calendars that we found at Target this year. Ella has Trolls and Austin has Star Wars. (there wasn't much to chose from). Each morning Ella has to look on the calendar and find the correct date. they are in a random order. Then she can open the door and eat the chocolate underneath. Ella also gets to find the date on Austin's calendar and give him his chocolate. This is the second year for this tradition. 

25 Days of Christmas. I know your thinking OMG she gets 25 presents before actually Christmas. Yes, but not really, kinda so. Each night under the tree (right now GusGus's tree that is on the table since our large Christmas tree is not up yet) a book appears and she gets to open it. That book is her bedtime story for that night. Since Ella goes to her fathers house every other weekend she gets the books she missed when she returns either on Sunday night if she is awake, or today she asked if she could open the books this morning, but tonight we get to read 4 books. This is possibly change once we start the tradition with Austin (next year). I haven't decided if they are going to share the books or if he gets his own books yet.

Now about the books. I started this tradition 3 years ago. I bought 25 Christmas books from different stores, Target, Goodwill, Ollies, Dollar Tree... we use most of those same books each year. I have swapped out a few that we didn't like, or she outgrew. Magically a few days after Christmas all this Christmas books just disappear aka get put away for next year. This was a wonderfully horrible pinterst find idea. We really love it. 

The last tradition we started when Ella was 1. I have previously mentioned it before, Gus Gus our elf on the shelf. You can read more about it HERE.

What are your holiday traditions?