Christmas

We had a nice Christmas this year. My mom and dad came down on Christmas Eve and I made cream of Crab soup and some dips. Raegan was so excited to have her Grandma and Pop Pop here. Raegan got to unwrap one present which just so happened to be new Christmas PJ's but she of course was not interested in going to bed at all. She got to stay up later than normal but eventually she went to sleep. Daddy worked on putting together one of her presents from Grandma and Pop Pop, a sliding board with a basketball hoop. We all watched a Christmas Story and then went to bed. In the morning the first thing Raegan said was " gran-ma" so she went in to see them. Josh and I went downstairs and were scrambling to get her presents out and ready but apparently we took too long setting up the video camera on the tri pod because by the time she was ready to come down she was crying for "daddy". She had been asking for him but we kept telling her to wait to come down. She didn't understand or like that very much. So by the time she came downstairs she didn't even really care about her presents. She is still a little too young to understand the whole Christmas morning thing. And Josh and I actually hope to never let the presents be a focus of Christmas as our children grow older so it's ok. Later on she warmed up to the idea and she started playing with her new sliding board and "Rody" horse ( kind of like a hippity hop for toddlers). We had a nice Christmas brunch and Raegan really enjoyed having her grandparents here for the morning. Later on in the day we packed up the car and headed down to see Josh's family. We had a nice dinner with them on Christmas evening and then a nice brunch in the morning before heading home. So it was a busy couple of days but it was nice that we got to see everyone! Now we are just working on rearranging our house to make room for Raegan's new big toy. It's nice to have something inside that she can play on when it's cold outside so I don't mind if it takes up half of my living room ( and it does fold up when we need to get it out of the way!). We all enjoyed our Christmas and are looking forward to what 2010 brings for our family!

Christmas Photo Shoot Year 2

Well tomorrow is Christmas Eve and we finally got a Christmas picture taken of Raegan so that we could make Christmas cards. Thankfully Target is helpful at creating last minute cards for last minute people and that is definitely what I am this year. So our cards will be late this year but better late than never, right? I have to say taking a Christmas picture of a an almost 2 year old is much more difficult than taking one of an almost 1 year old. Last year I took countless pictures and we had several good pictures to choose from. This year we weren't sure if we would even capture one good picture where Raegan was standing in the place we wanted her to ( in front of the Christmas tree) and actually looking at the camera and smiling. But after several tries we captured one and that was it. Photo shoot was over! She is very photogenic and I often say she could be a baby model but at this age getting her to sit in one place is near impossible. I need to learn some photographer tricks! But anyway I wanted to post some of the pictures that we got of her. Hopefully we'll get some more of her dressed up on Christmas Eve and Christmas!

Blizzard!

Raegan experienced her first blizzard this weekend! We got about 20 inches of snow yesterday! This is more snow than this area has seen in years! When we woke up there was at least a foot of snow on the ground already and it snowed all day and all night. That is a lot of snow and it's not even Christmas. We tried to take Raegan out in the snow yesterday and seemed to like it for about 5 minutes until she decided she didn't want to keep her gloves on and she quickly discovered that snow is very cold! That was the end of that. I brought her in and gave her a nice warm bath and she played in the bathtub like it was a swimming pool. I think it's time for a mommy/daughter vacation to someplace warm! This morning Josh went out to try to shovel us out and Raegan said she wanted to go out again. So we got her bundled up and she liked it ok at first but then she got cold. The only problem was her buddy Christian was outside and she wanted to play with him. So she had quite the dilemna on her hands. Fortunately for her Christian's shoe came off and he had to go inside and he invtited Raegan inside to play. So Raegan ended up with a win-win, she got to go inside and she got to spend all morning playing with her buddy. The Welch's even invited Josh and I over for lunch after they spent the morning watching our daughter. We have the best neighbors ( and friends) ever!

Josh eventually got our driveway clear and he even was able to go to the store for me. But I think we are going to have snow in our yard until springtime. And I can't wait until springtime! Josh declared he loves snow so much he could move to Alaska. I told him I would visit him there in the summer but I am already ready to hibernate to someplace warm!

Where Does the Time Go?

It's hard to believe that we are less than a week a way from Christmas. It seems to me like we had time to take a few fall pictures and then all of the sudden fall was over and it was time for Christmas again. At least that's what it has felt like in this house. Our November was busy with getting ready for our third and final trip to the National Embryo Donation Center for our final embryo transfer. My mom and Raegan stayed at my brother's house in North Carolina while Josh and I went down to Tennessee. We stayed for the embryo transfer and then headed back to North Carolina for the weekend. I haven't posted much about this trip ( well ok I haven't posted anything on this blog since November 8th) but I did post details of the trip on our other blog http://www.adoptingembies.blogspot.com/, for those of you who are interested. And for those of you who haven't had a chance to follow our other blog, we are happy to announce that the embryo transfer did work this time and we have a little embie growing strong this time. Raegan's little brother or sister is due on or around August 7th. So we are really excited and praying that everything with the pregnancy goes well!

So I guess that my excuse for not posting more is the fact that I'm pregnant. I haven't been too sick but I have been extremely tired. As my mom told me " you weren't a bundle of energy before so is it any surprise that you are so tired?". No I guess she's right. On a normal basis I need a lot of sleep so now I am in need of even more. So a lot of things have gotten put on the back burner this Christmas season. Raegan and I did manage to make some Christmas cookies the other day ( she likes the whisk and sneaking chocolate chips). And today we are stuck inside due to the blizzard like conditions outside so we will probably make some more cookies, finish decorating for Christmas and possibly make a Christmas cards. But if we don't get to all of that, it doesn't matter. We are just happy to be able to spend time together ( even if it means watching Christmas movies because Mommy is too tired to do much else!)

I'll post some pictures of our adventures in the snow however I am not sure Raegan and I will make it outside since this morning Raegan woke up and looked out the window and declared "snow!!!". And we asked her if she wanted to go play in the snow and she said " uh uh". I don't blame her, I am not big on snow myself but we'll see if we make it outside later today. We have at least a foot of snow already and it doesn't look like it's letting up anytime soon!

Fall Pictures

Today we took advantage of the beautiful weather and decided to take Raegan outside for some pictures after her nap. We put a beautiful dress on Raegan that my neighbor Desi made and took her out in to the leaves for some pictures. It's so hard to tell what the weather is going to be like from day to day but we were glad to have the beautiful weather this weekend! Hope you the enjoy the pictures of our beautiful girl!

21!

Raegan turned 21 on sunday! 21 months that is of course. I can't believe in less than 3 months our little baby ( i mean big girl) will be 2! Raegan is certainly growing fast. She is as tall as most of her older friends and this girl has some big feet too! Raegan's newest interest is in accessorizing ( hmmm, i wonder where she is learning this). Raegan loves to put "pretties" on ( she calls jewlerly and hair clips " pretties"). She started this while watching me get ready. She likes to go into my drawers in the bathroom and pull out all of my hairbands ( which i no longer use since i have short hair) and she puts them on her wrists like bracelets. She is into the 80's look of multiple bracelets on her wrists. I now find "pretties" all over the house. She also likes to put "pretties" on all of her animals and dolls. She also likes bags ( we call them satchels in our house). She'll take a bag or basket and put it around her arm and say " bye bye". Sometimes she takes her cell phone too. The other day she was on her riding car with a satchel on her shoulder and a cell phone in her hand. I don't know where she is learning this stuff because I very rarely use my cellphone when I am driving! Raegan also loves shoes! She will go in my closet and try on any shoes that she can find. Raegan's hair is growing very fast and it's about halfway down her back when it's wet but it is still curly, curly! Everywhere we go people comment on her hair. I think her hair is beautiful but I have a feeling Raegan is not going to like it when she gets older. It is already becoming a battle to comb it in the morning. Raegan finally has a name that she calls me, "mom". Raegan has not called me anything until about a week ago. She would say "da da" all of the time but when I asked her to say mommy she would just point at me. I know she could say because she would say " mah mah" for food and bottles. And then she started saying "money" which I thought was her trying to say mommy but nope she says "money" when she sees my wallet. But out of the blue last week she started saying " mom" to me very clearly. It sounds pretty funny to hear a toddler saying "mom". It sounds more like a teenage child kind of thing to say. But I love to hear her say my name. And it melts my heart when I come home from being out and I hear her excitedly yelling " mom! mom!". So yes I am glad to finally have a name.

In other news our family is preparing to go to Tennessee for our 3rd and final embryo adoption. We are very excited to see what the outcome is. We are hoping and praying that the transfer goes well and that we are able to grow our family this way. But at the same time although it will be very difficult for it not to work again, at least we will have a resolution and and we can begin the next steps in this journey and begin to pursue another traditional adoption. Raegan loves babies now and we know she will be a great big sister! Tonight we asked her if she wants us to have a baby and she said "uh huh". And we asked her how many babies she wanted us to have and she said "three". We had to laugh but somehow I don't think she would like the reality of having three babies in the house. We are in the process of shots and appointments for me. And I am going to begin to "quarentine" Raegan for the week and a half leading up to the transfer. We just don't want her getting sick or either of us getting sick especially with the flu going around. So Raegan and I will have some good bonding time in the next couple of weeks!

Our Little Ladybug!

This year I made Raegan a ladybug costume for "halloween". I saw the idea in a magazine and decided to make it for her. Sometimes I call her my little ladybug so I thought it was cute. I was going to make her "broccoli" since she eats so much broccoli that I always joke that she is going to turn into it. But I decided on the ladybug. When I first had her costume finished, I tried to put it on her and she didn't want anything to do with it. But on wednesday we were supposed to meet some friends from MOPS to go visit a nursing home so they could see the kids with their costumes. Fortunately that morning she didn't mind me putting on her costume. And I have to say she makes one cute little ladybug. She did really well visiting the nursing home. She handed out candy to some of the residents there and they were really excited to see the kids. Tonight our church had a " trunk or treat" in their parking lot so we decided to take Raegan there. She wasn't too sure what to think with all of the decorations and costumes. One car was decorated as "Christmas" and there was a santa claus who made Raegan cry. But then somebody gave Raegan a bag of oreos as a treat and I opened it for her and after that she caught on! She was going around holding out her pumpkin and taking candy from everyone. Of course just as she started getting into it, it started to rain but we still had fun! There was even a car decorated as a "ladybug" so we took Raegan's picture in front of it. It was a fun day with our little ladybug! Oh yeah and Kona was a lobster for halloween ( have i mentioned lately what a good and tolerant dog kona is!).

20 Months

Raegan is 20 months old as of friday ( i know a bit behind in my blogging). It is so hard to believe how fast she is growing. She will be 2 in 4 months! Sometimes I want to just go back to those days when she was a little baby but I know I can't. Time flies when you are having fun. And believe me this little girl is fun! She always has Josh and I laughing. And she has the most contagious belly laugh ever. She is starting to say a lot more words and sentences. She continues to be a picky eater but she loves her vegetables! She has been having a lot of fun playing outside lately because she can actually start to play on the playground by herself. She also loves coloring with markers and she enjoys painting herself more than painting on paper ( thank goodness for washable markers!). She continues to love books and she is starting to like shows too. We don't let her watch much tv/DVDs but the other week we both had colds and so we ended up watching a lot more shows than normal so she kind of got spoiled. So now every day she asks " Wor world?" ( Word World) and " Pend?" ( the Pond). We are getting tired of those 2 shows but they are her favorites ( really the only shows she watches) and they are good. She is also into singing lately. Sometimes I'll catch her holding one of her dolls and singing to her. And the other day she was downstairs and she was singing and we looked over at her and she was singing into the mircophone from the XBox. She gives the best hugs and kisses! And she just continues to melt our hearts every day!