12 (ahem 6) Days of Christmas - 2 months later

Back in December I had really good intentions of doing a little twist on the 12 Days of Christmas with Alyssa.  I had 12 activities or projects planned... but we only managed to pull off 6 of them.  Still a good time, with room to improve next year. 

The first day we made snow globes.



On the second day we made Santa Clause.  Who doesn't love projects with glue and cotton balls?

On the third day... or something like that...  We had a Frosty the Snowman party.

We had Torrey come home with Alyssa after school one day.  They ate snowman cookies and watched Frosty the snowman. 

For one of the days we headed down to Thanksgiving Point to see the lights.  It was SOOOO cold!  Tammy had gone a few days before and told us to be sure to get good seats on the wagon so the kids could see everything.  Well..... we didn't have a problem seeing anything because we were the ONLY ones on the wagon!  Everyone else venturing down to see the lights chickened out and drove through in their cars.

 We bundled up the kidlets enough to sleep in the snow... yet there was none.

aaaaand I had a little fun with the shutter speed on my camera.

For weeks before we did this, Alyssa had been asking to go ice skating.  I wasn't sure how exactly that would work, especially taking her myself.  How was I supposed to document this event, take the pictures AND teach her how to skate?  So we invited Little Miss Auntie Mist to join us.

She was pretty brave...

... spent a little time on her toosh...

Then FINALLY figured out the little walker.  It took her some time to figure out just how to dig her toes in to the ice and get the walker moving.  But once she did... she was OUTTA THERE!  Those little legs were flying SO fast.  I even got a "See Ya!" as she sped off. 

At one point in time, a litte boy came up along side of her.  He was probably a couple years older than she is, and he wanted to race.  So not a fair race!  But that didn't stop her.  She gave him the stink face and took off with all her might, trying so hard to beat him.  Unfortunately, he sped off and she just couldn't keep up.  She'll get him next time, though.

She did take one pretty good fall and bumped her bum pretty hard on the ice.  There were tears and she was done with this ice skating business.  Well we weren't going to end with a bad experience.  After hugs, kisses and reassurance that no permanent damage was done, she gave it another go.  She was even brave enough to set the walker aside and skate from Misty to me and back to Auntie Mist.

All in all, the 12 (6) Days of Christmas were very fun.  I think I'm going to try to do it again this year, and hopefully add those last 6 days...

Top Secret Blogging

In the next few days this old bloggity blog will be going private.  If you would like to continue being all up on the Beckstrand's business, leave me a comment or email me your email address and I'll send you an invite to my "by invitation only" blog.  

Later.

Ice Castles

 Alyssa and I headed to Midway today to see the Ice Castles.  They were SO cool!  Unfortuantely, due to the "heat wave" ("heat" apparently being defined as 38 degrees) we couldn't walk through the 2 or 3 great big ones.  You could still get close enough to see in them though.  Way fun.

 Most of them are smaller, can't exactly walk through the castle.  But there were a few of them that were HUGE!!!  The one above was my fav.

 Alyssa loved them.  She also loved picking up "ice babies."  She found a hole next to one of the ice walls and put probably 10 or 12 little babies inside so they could rest.

 Since we were there during the "heat wave" the icecicles were dripping.  One managed to drip right down Alyssa's shirt.  Brrrrrrrr!

And what's an afternoon out without a little tooshy dance?!

Tender Moments

I don't believe there are words to adequately describe the tender experience I had with Alyssa last night, but I'm going to do my best so that I can remember that night.

I was backing up photos from 2010 and pulled out a dvd my dad made me of Alyssa's first year.  He took several snapshots and put them to the perfect music.  Now, of course, I cry every time I watch it.  Through the entire thing.  Every time.

The opening line is "Alyssa - we have been waiting for you and we are so glad you are here."  You can see the reason for the tears.

I pulled Alyssa on to my lap and we watched it together.

After only 7 or 8 photos, I noticed she was tearing up.  When I asked her if she was ok, she told me she was just crying happy tears.

After sharing a movie filled with "happy tears" I wanted to talk to her about how she was feeling.  She told me she was just so happy.  We talked about what a special girl she is.  How our whole family waited to have such a special girl come in to our lives.  That everyone loves her and we are all so grateful that we get to have her in our family.

We called Tim to come up from the basement and have some family time with us.  She told us that she loved us and was happy to be in our family and we told her, again, how much we loved her.

She truly is a special little girl.

And we are the luckiest parents to have such a special girl to be our daughter.

Bed Time

Tonight went as follows. 
9:00-ish - Alyssa in pajammies, Tim reads her bedtime story.
9:15-ish - drink of water
9:30-ish - "nightmare"
9:45-ish - potty
9:50-ish - STILL washing her hands.  I let her know she has 5 seconds to be back in bed before I put her on the porch for one of the deer to take her back in the forest for a sleepover.
10:00-ish - "MOOOOOOOM I have some to TELL you NOW!  I have an owie. See it?"  Um.  No.
10:15-ish - her leg hurts (while dancing in to the family room)
10:30-ish - Alyssa - I just need to sleep somewhere else.  Like your bed.
                  Me - Well sweetie, good luck with that.  Go take a look and let me know where you're going to sleep at.
                  Alyssa - Ok!

My bed around 10:30

Alyssa at 10:45.  Good thing she's tiny.

Field Trip to the "Chapel"

Alyssa's preschool class took a field trip to the state capitol building last month.  She kept saying they were going to the "chapel."  Such a funny girl.

 

Her teacher printed off a bingo card that had pictures of things inside the rotunda.  The kids had to find the different items and mark them off.  

Alyssa, Isabel and Torrey.  Such cute little girlies.

First Day of Preschool 2010

As you can see, Alyssa has made the first day of school picture posing a tradition. 

 At least until she feels I have taken enough pictures.  Then she's done.

Being that we recently relocated, she is in Miss Alby's preschool this year and is loving it.  She has two little friends she talks about, Torrey and Isabella.  Then of course the boy who chews on scissors... not quite sure about that. 

So far, so good.  It's a little weird for me not calling her teacher 5-6 times a week and getting the preschool recap like I did last year.  (Thanks Kaarina!)  So I'm left with Alyssa's rendition of the day's events.  While entertaining, sometimes details are left out (or added) that leave me wondering.... 

And while she spends two hours a day, three days a week at school, it's left me with some lovely me time.  I get a lot of errands done, and have been able to work on some projects.  But it's not so much time that I'm left feeling lonely.  It's gearing me up for kindergarten next year I suppose.      

And the cat gets a point

Poor kitty has had to get used to living in a rather confined space in our new residence.  She was used to being able to saunter through the upstairs at our old house, then be turned loose to go crazy in the basement.  Well she just doesn't have that here.

Every now and then, she goes a little nuts.  She'll race through the family room and make the loop through the kitchen/laundry room area like there's a mountain lion trying to eat her for lunch.  A time or two, she has run right in to my leg.  Once I remember tripping over her, trying not to fall to the floor.  The other time I believe it was her who took a little trip into the wall.  

Alyssa was the unfortunate one to encounter crazy kitty today.  I was having her come in the bathroom to do her hair or something and here comes kitty from the opposite direction.  The cat went racing through the door way that Alyssa was coming through, took her out at the knees and left her sprawled out on her little tummy.  Poor Alyssa!  Dang cat!  Needless to say, kitty got a major time out from her Alyssa.

Side note:  Today as we were walking in to the grocery store, another mom was walking out with a screaming toddler (poor mom).  Lately, when Alyssa has witnessed a screaming child she has informed me that "they are just having a bad day."  Today?  "Mom, is that baby having issues?"  Ha!  Indeed!

Buford

Last week when I was painting Alyssa's soon-to-be room, we were having a little chat.  I love her endless chatter.  She always have something fantastic to say.  That day was no exception.  The discussion went a little something like this.

Me:  Hey Alyssa, who are we painting this room for?

Alyssa:  Um... my boyfriend.  He lives with me.  We live together.

Me:  You live with your boyfriend, eh?

Alyssa: Yup.

Hmmm....

Then her grandpa came in.  Apparently they had a similar conversation.  Alyssa told him she was going for a ride in the back seat of his car with her boyfriend.  (I'm sure she got quite an expressive look from grandpa.)  And an even more shocked one when she later ran by and asked him to babysit her kid for her. 

Oh boy!  The best part of the story?  Her boyfriend's name is Buford. 

Never a dull day with this one.

L-A-GOON

Well, it's official.  I've spent more time at Lagoon in the past week than I have in the last 5-10 years of my life.  And it was quite enjoyable.  We went last week for our stake lagoon day, and met up with my brother-in-laws family.  Then, of course, we had to bounce back with them today. 

I didn't realize how many rides they have for little kids.  My fearless Alyssa had the time of her life.  The only ride she refused to go on more than once was the lady bug bop.  Tim took her on it and as soon as it dropped she started saying "ok, I'm done-I'm done-I'm done-I'm done."  Hilarious! 

When we first got there she kept saying that she wanted to go on roller coasters.  But when we got around to little puff she was NOT interested.  Ok - that's fine.  It's nothing compared to the other things she had been on, but whatever.  Finally today I talked her in to it.  I reminded her about her wanting to go on "roller coasters" and told her that's what Puff is.  "It is?! Well ok - let's do it!"  Silly girl.

She braved the rattle snake rapids - twice.  Both times we were on the side that goes right underneath the waterfall.  Tim and I dove over the top of her so she didn't get pelted with the falls.  It did not save her from being soaked, however.

The swings, of course, was one of her favorite rides.

   Brave, confident and friendly. That's my little girl.  Before we met up with her cousins and she was riding, she didn't care if I went on the rides with her or if I watched.  The little rides that I couldn't go on, and sometimes they double up the single riders?  She just started chatting with whomever hopped in the ride with her.  Or she would just hop in with someone else and make a new friend.  What a fantastic little girl she is.  When I grow up, I want to be just like her.

Moved

It's been brought to my attention that my poor little blog is neglected.  I know - this saddens me too.  I'd like to be able to make a good, strong committment to being better, updating regularly and keeping the family informed on our current events.  I'd like to... but I'm not sure if I can take on that big of a commitment.  For now, I'll say I will try to do better.  :o)

We'll start with the move. 

Our little family has relocated to the land of Bountiful.  We are currently residing in the lower quarters of my inlaws home.  It's cozy, and we're grateful that we are few in numbers, because not many more of us would be able to fit as comfortably as we do now.  We will continue living underground until the end of November, when Mary Louise and Linford will embark on the next adventure in their lives, serving for the church with young single adults in the Belgium - Netherlands mission! 

They are so excited to go, and we're excited for them!  We moved out here just as they were putting the finishing touches on their mission papers.  It was so fun listening to them talk about where they wanted to go and what they wanted to do.  It was also fun to hide their call from them when they came home from vacation, secretly invite the local family over for dinner, arrange skype and speaker phones for the not so local and surprise mums and pops with their letter without them knowing it had been here for 5 days.  Good times.

So far, so good here in the land of Bountiful.  We really like the ward, Tim knows and loves the area and I'm trying to remember where things are so I don't have to look up the address to the bank every time I need to go.  I can EASILY find my way to Taco Bell so that's all that really matters.... right?

Alyssa's favorite part?  She has many, of course - living with a set of granparents upstairs, new friends at church, a new pool to swim at, park play dates.  But the best one?

Little girl friend loves her swingset.  By about 6:00 at night, the swingset it 100% in the shade.  We head out there with her pink little baseball bat, some horshoes and her velcro mits and spend the rest of the night playing outside.  It's perfect.

I thought I would have a hard time adjusting to life out here.  I've lived on the good ol' west side for almost 19 years.  Um... that's a pretty good portion of my life.  But I don't feel out of place here.  I feel at home.  That feeling came almost immediately and it didn't take me long to realize that it was because I have my little family with me.  Home is with my hubbs and my Alyssa.  As long as I have them, I'm fairly confident that I could set up home anywhere. 

And it doens't hurt to have a Taco Bell close by either.     

My Little Graduate

Alyssa graduated from her preschool class today.  It has been the best experience for her.  Every day she comes home and tells me what she learned, who was missing from school, what games they played.  It has been so fun to watch her grow and have this little social life.  Above she's sitting by one of her besties, Cami.  Rumor has it, Alyssa starts up the game of house at school, assigns her fellow classmates their various roles and poor Cami always gets assigned the dog.  I tried to tell Alyssa she could be the family pet sometimes but she didn't think that was a good idea... oh boy.

Alyssa received the "Best Imagination" award from Miss Kaarina.  Um... hahahahaha we weren't surprised!  That is one of my favorite qualities of Alyssa, her imagination is fantastic.  Did you know there is a wicked witch that lives at her house?  And locks her in her room and doesn't let her out?  It's a good thing her teacher knows her parents.

And of course, with the fabulous Miss Kaarina.  Could there be a better preschool teacher?  I think not.  The projects that Alyssa came home with, the songs she learned.  My girl can spell her name forwards and backwards.  She's writing words, sings her ABC's and more.  All of this she learned at preschool.  Thank you SO MUCH for giving my little sweetie the perfect start in her world of learning. 

My Little Dancer

Alyssa had her spring recital for dance earlier this month.  She danced to Strawberry Shortcake and Ain't She Sweet.  Gotta say, Ain't She Sweet was my favorite.  Not only did I make her costume (with the assistance of mom) But she did the cutest little shimmy, shook her little toosh, and flipped that marabou like it was nobody's business.  It has been so fun watching her grow over the last year.  I love my tiny dancer!