Friday Foto: Man's Best Friend

Man's Best Friend has a best friend too.
Teya lovingly refers to it as "baby Monty" :)

Celtics Fan Wannabe

On Wednesday night Taber got some tickets from work to go see the Celtics play the Miami Heat. I don't think we realized how intense Bostonians are when it comes to their teams. We were used to the Timberwolves games where people came to hang out, not necessarily watch basketball. Totally different story with the Celtics. From the minute we walked in the stadium and beheld the sea of fans donning green jersey's we realized that we weren't in Kansas anymore. My blue shirt was like a flashing sign that said, "I'm from out of town, shun me!"

Okay, so maybe no one was really shunning me, but I definitely wished I had at least worn something green! It was awesome being there though. The Garden is an impressive venue, and the Celtics did not disappoint. The game was tied or within a few points the whole time but the Celtics pulled it off, even without Pierce. We also learned some valuable things about sports in New England. Such as, Don't talk on your phone during the game or the fans might kill you (happened to a guy near us.)


It's cool being in a city with such great teams. I'm excited to watch them play again, although next time I'll try to dress more like a real fan : )

Chatter Box

Teya is a talker, just like her mama. She chatters all day long with so much expression in her voice. It sounds like she's trying out for a play the way she annunciates and emphasizes her words. I guess the dramatic gene has spread to her too ; ) People always tell us she sounds like a little teenager, it's really pretty funny to listen to. Anyway, I thought I'd share some of the things she's said lately that have put a smile on my face.

When we were driving out to New Hampshire we stopped at a Super 8 hotel our second night. When Teya walked in she took a quick survey of the room, then spread her arms out in joy and exclaimed, "I just LOVE our new house!! It's so beautiful Mom!" We tried to explain that it was just a hotel room but she said, "No, remember, you said our new house was white and LOOK! The walls are WHITE! I really love our new house!"

We got a good laugh out of that. If she was that impressed with a Super 8 hotel room it shouldn't take much to please this kid!

When we went to meet our neighbors across the street, Teya couldn't take her eyes of the father, who is going bald. I guess Teya hasn't really had a lot of contact with bald men because she was pretty confused. We were trying to get to know them and make a good impression but Teya just kept staring with big eyes. Finally she interrupts our conversation, points to his head and says,
"Daddy, why is his hair like that?"
We were both blushing and trying to laugh it off like, "oh hahaha, what a silly little girl" But she kept talking and pointing,
"See LOOK DADDY! His hair and your hair are different sizes!"
I was kind of mortified but the guy and his wife just started laughing and he said, "Well that's a nice way to put it."

She definitely isn't shy when it comes to talking to grown ups either. We were at a dinner party the other night and there were lots of snacks out. Teya was sitting by the snack table and one of the men came over and started munching on chocolate covered pretzels. As she watched him put one after another in his mouth she finally piped up and said,
"Excuse me, if you keep eating those your tummy's going to get sick."
He just smiled and said, "Okay" Then kept right on eating them.
Teya watched a little longer than said,
" I REALLY have to tell you this, you shouldn't eat all those treats, you're going to get sick!"

I don't think he was expecting to hear that from such a little person.: )

And my personal favorite, The other day she was upstairs playing by herself when she randomly yelled down the stairs, "MOM, I NEED YOU TO BRING ME LOTS OF FOOD SO I CAN HIBERNATE!! JUST GRAB SOME GRAPES AND BANANAS AND BRING THEM TO MY CAVE!"

I really have no idea where that came from but I definitely got a good laugh out of that girls imagination!

Local Gems

This past weekend Taber and I took the girls out in search family friendly fun in our area. We took the suggestion of one of our friends and went to an indoor activity center called Imajine That. Now, as a mother of preschoolers living in cold areas, I have been to a lot of indoor kids museums and playgrounds. But this one is definitely one of the best I've seen. Not only was it really clean, but it had awesome stuff that BOTH Teya AND Brinley could enjoy. Usually the indoor playgrounds seem geared towards 5 and up, but this one was ideal for toddlers and preschoolers. I loved that I could let Brinley loose and she could handle all the stuff really well without needing much help. They had a really cool climbing structure/jungle gym, bounce house, music room, dress up/stage theater, kids grocery store, art center, and on and on.

The girls had a blast and Brinley pushed right through her nap tme without even a yawn, We will definitely be visiting that place again!

We also found the COOLEST Movie theater/restaurant called Chunky's Cinema Pub . I seriously cannot tell you how much I LOVED it! It's basically a movie theater and a restuarant in one. You go sit down at your table with your menu. Movie starts. When you're ready to order you press this little pager thing and a waitress comes out with her little glow in the dark pad and takes your order. For near the same price as popcorn and drinks you get a whole meal!! It was so cool because we rarely take them to restaurants because they get bored, and we rarely take them to movies because we don't want them to bug people. But by combining the experiences we did both without one problem! The movie kept them entertained and the food kept them quiet. So so awesome. We saw Alvin and the Chipmunks and even though I had low expectations, I was pleasantly surprised to see how much the girls loved it. They were laughing their heads off and Brinley was dancing like crazy in her chair.

Here's a pic from the web that shows what it looks like inside. Most genius idea EVER!

So those are some of the fun places we've discovered so far. It's always cool when you find a little gems like that so close to home!

Friday Foto: No Longer a Baby?

I wasn't ready for this.
I was in denial for awhile.
Teya slept in a crib till she was 2 1/2!
I just assumed Brinley would do the same.
But she has a big sister,
And she wants to do everything big sister does.
Including sleeping in a big girl bed.
It's been a week now, and she's been sleeping in there every night.
It's amazing, she stays in there all night
and doesn't get out till I come to get her.
This milestone made me a lot sadder than I thought it would,
Especially when I put the crib away.
I guess that's the way things go.
But I'm still calling her my baby. ; )

House Tour

A few people have asked for a picture tour of our new place so here you go. We are still figuring out decorations and such but this is what we have so far. We are really loving it here. The weather is beautiful, we've had some snow but it hasn't dropped below 30 so coming from Minnesota it feels pretty warm! Our neighbors are so nice and our ward is awesome. Hope you enjoy the pics!

Heading down to Bean Town

After two weeks of living in New Hampshire we are finally starting to feel settled! On Saturday we celebrated by heading into Boston to check out some of the sights. Boston is 45 minutes south of where we live and the drive was smooth and easy. Here are some pics I took coming into the city.

The harbor was full of sail boats, even in January! I thought that was cool. And Taber made me take a picture of the Garden were the Celtics play because apparently he is their newest fan : )

There were lots of cool things to see but our destination for the day was the New England Aquarium. Before we left Minnesota, Taber's boss bought us a year membership so we could take the kids any time. I can't think of a more thoughtful and useful gift, especially now that we've seen how awesome it is!


They had everything from sharks and sea turtles to jellyfish and penguins. Brinley was SOOOO excited about EVERYTHING! She was practically hyperventilating as she pointed to each tank shouting "FEESHY! FEESHY!"

At one point both girls were standing in a window of the tank when this huge shark swam by. It was right next to them and they both squealed with terror! Teya, because she was scared out of her mind, and Brinley because if Teya does it, so does she. : )

Case in point: I held Teya up by this big sea turtle to show her how big they are. As soon as I put her down Brinley ran over to Taber and held her arms out and said, "I too! I too!"

So of course, Taber had to lift her up too.

These two are becoming pretty inseparable these days. It was so much fun watching them go from exhibit to exhibit with their eyes glued in amazement to all the exotic animals. As a result, we didn't get too many pictures of their faces, because why on earth would they want to look at the camera when there were penguins, sea horses, crabs, and dragon fish in front of them?

I did manage to get a few pics of Teya with her crazy "I'm really excited to be at the aquarium!" face. Like the one in the bottom corner of the collage above and the one below holding a starfish.


After we had seen all the fish we headed over to the IMAX theater to watch Under the Sea in 3D. Brinley did great and made it through the whole movie but Teya flipped out when the fish started eating each other. I finally had to take her out for the last 10 minutes when the turtle started eating the "beautiful jellyfish" (which happened to be her most favorite creature in the movie) it was all a little too much for her 3 year old eyes. At least she looked cute in her glasses.

All in all I would say our visit was a huge success. We love our aquarium membership and are so grateful for the awesome gift! We also love Boston and are happy it's so close. We'll definitely be back often for more adventures and exploring!

Enjoying

I recently read the blog of a friend whose new year resolutions all revolve around the word ENJOY. Instead of focusing on things she doesn't have or isn't, she is going to focus on enjoying all the things that make her life beautiful. Her son, her hobbies, her role as a homemaker, etc..

I was really impressed reading that and thought I could use a little dose of that attitude. Right now is the perfect time in my life to be able to sit back and ENJOY. I don't have a lot of commitments or know many people yet so I can really just dig into my life at home and enjoy every part of it. We're not in a hurry to be anywhere or do anything, so instead of rushing my kids from one activity to the next, we're just trying to enjoy each job, chore, game, story, and moment that comes into our day. Here are a few of the simple things that highlighted our week. ENJOY!

We pulled out an old ball pit that the girls haven't seen for almost a year. Now that Brinley is big enough to play in it the two of them went wild!

I love the static hair action that's going on with Teya and Brinley in the background.

I was actually going to give this away because Teya didn't play with it much before. Guess having a little playmate makes it much more fun!

Seriously entertained them forever!

On Wednesday we woke up to find our driveway covered in heavy soggy snow. Normally I would've dreaded shoveling that long steep monster, but I decided it needed to be done, and we were going to enjoy it!

I bundled the girls up, armed them with their own "shovels" and we got to work.

Teya loved being the big helper and even Brinley was putting her back into it. I love how she's squatting down and digging in in the last picture.

And last night I decided to make my normal chore of cooking a little more enjoyable by doing a kid friendly meal the girls could help with. We made homemade pizza and they were SO into it! I need to get them their own little aprons and make cooking together more routine!

Brinley prepped the crust with a little brushing of olive oil.

Teya carefully layered on the sauce

Then it was time for the cheese! Brinley took several hands full but I don't think any of it made it onto the pizza ; )

Teya put the toppings on the pizza, and Brinley continued to put them in her mouth (that's her sinking her teeth into some pepperoni in the background ; )

Happy Faces with their finished product, ready to go into the oven!

I know our schedule will pick up and things won't stay simple for long, but I still hope to follow my friends example and make this years theme all about enjoying the journey.

Making Friends

Before we moved I tried to prep Teya on making new friends. I told her she needed to smile and introduce herself in a clear voice, then ask the other person's name and invite them to be her friend. We practiced it quite a bit.

Teya:(Smiling) Hi my name is Teya. What's your name?
Me: My name is Mommy
Teya: Do you want to be my friend?
Me: Yeah!
Teya: Okay! let's play!

I figured she would be dealing with other 3-4 year olds, so this little formula would be pretty fail proof.

On Thursday, after 4 days of setting up the house and no sign of any of the neighbor kids, we set out to the indoor playground at the mall. There Teya found a little girl exactly her height and decided this was going to be her new friend.

Teya: (Smiling) Hi my name is Teya. What's your name?
Little Girl: Blank stare
Teya: Come on, let's go play
Little Girl: Ignores Teya and goes off to play somewhere else.

Teya looked confused but was determined to make a new friend so she started following her around the playground. The little girl made NO interaction with Teya, and watching this unfold I started getting a knot in my stomach. I never told Teya that maybe someone wouldn't want to be her friend. I didn't know how she would handle the dissapointment.

Luckily Teya seemed oblivious to the fact that the girl was ignoring her. She just kept following her around and when she saw me her face broke into a giant smile and she shouted, "Look Mom! This is my new friend!" I gave her a nervous thumbs up as I watched the little girl escape Teya again. "Where'd my friend go?" She would ask every few minutes when she lost sight of her. "Mom, where's my friend?"

At this point I just felt sick. Moving is hard enough, we'd been here for 4 days (an eternity to a 3 year old) Why couldn't she just meet one friendly little person? My mother bear instincts wanted to shake that kid and say, "Why don't you play with my daughter!?"

Then I noticed that the little girl was wearing a diaper. I heard her call to her mommy, she didn't speak very well and still had that baby talk voice. Her mom was sitting near me so I asked her, "How old is your daughter?" "almost 2 and 1/2" she responded. Suddenly I felt relieved. 2 and 1/2? No wonder she wasn't responding to Teya's fast paced dialogue. For all I know she could just be learning to talk! Teya is almost 4 but she is pretty tiny for her age, and this girl was pretty tall for her age. Teya just assumed that same height meant same age, and so did I!

When Teya came back over to me and said, "My new friend is kinda shy." I pointed out that the little girl was wearing a diaper and was still little and probably didn't know how to talk really well. Teya seemed to be happy with this explanation and said, "well mom, we need to find a friend who's my age!" I laughed, where did she learn to say "my age?"

The next day some people from our ward came over and introduced themselves. They have 5 kids including a 4 year old, and Teya was a pretty happy to meet them. We went to their house on Saturday and another family with 3 little girls ages 5, 4, and 18 months was there too. It was great to see Teya glowing as she interacted with all her "new friends."

Making friends can be scary and hard, but it's amazing how it helps us to go out of our comfort zones, stretch, and grow. While I was so stressed about that little girl not talking to Teya, she was completely unaffected by it. Whether that girl talked to her or not, in Teya's mind, they were friends! I love watching her go out and without making any judgments, unconditionally invite and accept people as her friends. She doesn't have insecurities or wonder if people will like her, she just assumes they will and goes for it! I'm trying to follow her example and even got brave and took the family with Taber to introduce ourselves to the neighbors. They were wonderful and so nice, giving us their phone numbers and inviting us to call if we ever need anything. Just like Teya, I'm excited to make new friends and I know that with the right attitude, we're going to have a great experience here.