Can you tell that she dressed herself here?

Jolie Marie was born at 1:27pm weighing 8 lbs 1.5 oz!

I got a Slap Chop. I present to you, carrots.

But wait! There’s more! If you call right now, you’ll get this awesome cheese grater!

Brian had the idea to write the date on the filter so you can always see when you changed it last. With the cheaper filters, we changed it about every 3 months. They were gross after 3 months, but not horrible. After a few weeks, the new expensive filter was disgusting. Really. I waited until a month had gone by, and then I went ahead and changed it. I can’t tell you the grossness that it had become. Ew. Just. Ew.

After having changed it, I looked at the new one that afternoon, and within an hour, it too had already turned from white to gray. It wasn’t severely gross yet, but definitely on its way.

So my question is: are we (Brian, me, Samantha, Molly and Maddie) THAT disgusting? Do I not dust frequently enough? Do I open the back porch door too often? Is the new filter just that good? What’s the deal? Should I use the new filters and change weekly until we get the house to a decent level of dustiness?

Samantha and Brian got sick a couple of weeks ago with a bad cold. It was a doozie. However, after suffering through that week, they both got better. We had a solid week of health around here only for Janie to get it next. Took long enough. Anyway.

Over the weekend, Brian kept telling me that Samantha’s neck smelled bad. Like, really stunk. I tried to smell her neck but either I was smelling in the wrong place, or I just couldn’t smell at all (thanks to the cold). Last night, as we were getting ready for her bath, I noticed that her hair was stuck to her ear with this nasty goupy stuff. It was quite gross. And quite smelly.

Turns out, she’s got an ear infection. Thanks to the tubes, the goup is draining out of her ear. We’ve got some antibiotic ear drops to start using. (And I’m sure you can imagine the fun we’re going to have to pin down a 2 year old to put drops down her ear.) If that doesn’t clear it up, we’ll have to switch to an oral antibiotic.

She loves peas or beans. To be even more specific, butter peas are her favorite. I never knew what these were until I married Brian, so go figure. I have always hated peas (and most beans). I know that her Papa’s favorite is butter peas, so it’s no surprise where she gets this taste from. It astounds me though when she asks for more at dinner, which happened tonight. More peas? Who would eat more than the required amount? Silly girl.

Oh and edamame is pretty high on the list too. I can’t shell them fast enough to keep up with her eating them.

EDIT (from Brian):  We can’t shell them fast enough…

(from the official athletics website of the University of Colorado)

Similarly, here we say “UA.” “AU” must just be slang.

Apparently, I still have this desire to dress for the rainy days.  Samantha received a cute lady bug raincoat for Christmas last year from her Nana.  (I would link to the picture, but since we switched sites, I have no idea where our pictures are.)  It was an 18 month size and she has really worn it.  It’s been a great coat, well made, and cute to boot.  Sadly, it has gotten a little small.  She can still wear it (at 27 months), but I know it won’t last much longer.

Recently, Nana told me that the new rain coats had just been delivered at Sam’s, where the old one came from!  I finally got a chance to run some much needed errands yesterday.  Sam’s was one of my stops, so I had to check out the new rain gear.  I found this cute green coat and the frog boots came from Target.

Of course, I had to let her try them on when I got home.  She can’t stop talking about the boots and goes to her closet to pull them out every chance she gets.  I hope she has many happy rainy day memories.

Both Brian and I took down ornaments off the tree, then he moved on to taking the lights off as I was boxing up the ornaments.  (Sadly, we did lose 2 glass ornaments when taking down our tree.)  This was the scene about half way through taking the lights off.

Oh my goodness.  I swept the floor after all was said and done.  Then vacuumed several times.  The vacuum got clogged and had to be cleaned out twice.  Poor tree.

I was putting off the one for the door.  I was nervous about making a rod pocket for the already existing blinds’ valance.  I wasn’t sure I would be able to mount it back, but I didn’t really have another option.  Magnetic rods are not made with a projection, so I couldn’t find one that would give me enough room to go around the blinds.  I finally just did it.  It didn’t turn out correctly, so I thought I would have to start over (luckily, I have about 1.5 yards of the material remaining).  However, I had a stroke of genius and decided to bust out the hot glue gun.  It was the best idea I had!  It turned out great, and I should have thought of that long ago!

All in all I like them, although I think they look weird because they are 2 different sizes.  However, the window and the door are different sizes, so I knew it would be like that.  It just looks weird because everything on that wall is symmetrical except for the new curtains.

Here’s the door:

Christmas started with brunch at the Betbezes on Christmas Eve.  I really like this tradition.  We enjoyed brunch then the kids began opening presents.  Samantha got lots of great gifts, but the #1 score (in her eyes) was a new shopping cart from Great Aunt Mary.  She barely had the patience for her daddy to put it together.  Goodness.

After naptime, we headed to mass.  It wasn’t as crowded as usual, so we actually had a whole pew to ourselves.  Our friend Kris took this family shot after mass.  It’s one of the few times that Samantha has actually smiled for the camera.  Thanks, guys!

We came home, had Chicken Tortilla Soup (yum) then nestled all snug in our beds.

On Christmas morning, we got up and opened presents.  Samantha got a few books and some hand glove puppets from Santa.  The hit was the Abby Cadabby magic wand book she got.  I like this shot because it shows Sam in her Christmas PJs and slippers, inspecting her new book.

As we were packing the car and getting ready to drive to Huntsville, I went to feed the cats.  We didn’t arrange for anyone to stop by because we were only going to be gone for a few days.  However, I discovered that we were almost out of cat food.  As in, we didn’t have enough to last a few days.  Uh oh.  It was Christmas morning, and I was sure that no store was open that carried our cat food.  Luckily, the Grissoms came to the rescue.  Thanks for buying our cats’ food and taking it by the house to feed them!!

We drove to Huntsville in time for lunch.  The kids were getting ready for their naps so we hurriedly opened presents.  Wow, what craziness.  If I had to guess a favorite from that bunch, it would be the keyboard from MamaLinda and Pop.  Now Samantha can play the piano and push lots of buttons while her daddy is playing too.  She loves dancing to the beat.

On Boxing Day, my mom and I went out shopping while the boys and kids went to the Train Exhibit at the Botanical Gardens.  I think it was a hit.  Of course, anything involving Jackson is sure to be lots of fun.  See a previous post.

On Sunday, we traveled over to Florence to spend some time with Brian’s family.  We enjoyed getting to see everyone.  We opened presents that night then spent a few days relaxing and playing games.  Samantha’s favorite gift was the rocking chair from Nana and Papa.  She loves it!  She also loved Chloe’s skirt and playing with wrapping paper, tissue paper and boxes!

We had a great Christmas!  Whew.  We were glad to spend a few days at home relaxing before beginning the new year!  Here’s one final picture of us in front of our tree at home.  (And you can see my new curtain in the background, and Samantha’s new white dot outfit from MamaLinda!)