Sickness

Well it seems like we just cannot get past this sickness thing.  Christmas break was spent being sick, by Nora and myself.  We all finally started to feel better and guess what....Nora is sick again.  This time she has a bladder infection.  Poor little girl...I feel so bad for her.  Hopefully there isn't a theme to this year!

Recap of 2010

Wow!  I cannot believe that another year has flown by.  I think this year has gone faster than most.  2010 was a pretty busy, but good year.  We had lots of things happening and here is the recap.

A few things happened for me this year.  I left a job and friends to take a new position in the Affton School District.  So far I am not regretting that decision.  I am still counseling, but with 2nd and 3rd graders and am liking it a lot.  I have made some new friends and am really enjoying most of the people that I work with.  Building those relationships take time and I think they will get better in 2011!
I turned 30 this year!!  I still cannot believe that I am 30 years old and to most who cares, but I still feel like I should be in my 20's.  Not that being 30 is a bad thing, it is just kind of crazy to me to think that I am! 
I drove Nora and myself to Chicago, which is a huge deal for me.  I don't think I could have done it before and now that my little girl is getting so big, it makes it much easier.
I finished 3 chapters of my thesis!  I have two more to go, but I would have never thought I would actually get it done!

Peter has had a busy year as well.  Last January he decided he was going to lose weight and he did!  He has lost and kept off over 20 pounds!  I am so proud of him. 
Peter also got a new position within Express Scripts and will be starting that in a few weeks. 
Peter bought a new car...we traded in my Ion and he got a Focus.

Nora had a very busy year growing and learning tons of new things!  Nora is potty trained!  She is talking up a storm and can actually carry on a conversation with you.  She had her first ear infection this year and for the first time ever we had to give her antibiotics...pretty lucky for us!  She spent another week in Chicago with Grandma and Grandpa. 

Sweet Pea Photography has taken off!  I cannot believe it.  Thanks to my family and word of mouth I have been busy taking lots of pictures. I did 31 shoots between April and December of this year! I am hoping to buy a better camera this year with the hopes of doing a wedding.  Thanks to all of you that have hired me to capture your families moments.  It means more to me than you know!

And there are tons of other things that happened this year as well!

-Katie got engaged!
-My cousin Kurt got married!
-My cousin Kristina got engaged!
-Tim and Candace are expecting a little girl!

Lots of great things happened in 2010 and I can't wait to see what 2011 brings!

The rest of Christmas

Well.....our poor Nora got sick....on Christmas Day.  She had a rough night of sleep, but I didn't think too much of it because she has had a stuffy nose and it was a long Christmas Eve, just busy and off her normal routine.  She woke up quite a bit and slept until 9:45 Christmas morning.  Once she was up she was her normal Nora self.  We opened gifts, ate breakfast, opened more gifts, took a bath and then went down for a nap.  She woke up from her nap and was not our normal Nora.  She was crying and wanted to be held then didn't want to be held and it kept going in that circle.  She didn't want to eat or play.  I finally convinced her to lay on the couch and watch her new Shrek movie.  She did that, but was still sad and crying and then she started the ear tugging.  We looked to see if there were any Walgreens take care clinics open, but there were not.  We waited a little longer and the poor girl was miserable!!!  No one tells you that a piece of you heart breaks when your child is in pain.  I could hardly stand it she was so sad and hurting.  So Grandma found a clinic/immediate care that was open until 5:00 and we flew out the door, it was 3:50.  We got to the clinic, saw the dr. and had a script in our hands in under an hour.  She has a double ear infection!  This is our first time taking antibiotics for being sick.  We are so lucky, I know. I am so thankful for the dr. and nurses that were working in that clinic to make my daughter better!!!  She got some motrin in her and then her first dose of antibiotics and WOW, within 15 minutes she was back to her normal Nora self.  We continued on with the rest of Christmas and went to the Harrigan side of the family and had a great time.  Nora is feeling much better today! 

Merry Christmas Eve and Morning

Nora had a great time on Christmas Eve last night visiting with the Reid Family.  I did her hair with the curlers and made her take her nap in them and oh it turned out so cute!  She got a new baby with a potty that she just loves...it is actually pretty funny...the baby really goes to the bathroom on the potty...hours of entertainment for young and old alike.
This morning was great!  We opened presents from Santa and then had Reid family chistmas.  We are so blessed.  Nora loves her new Ariel doll and all the princess stuff she got.  So fun to have a little one.  Merry Christmas!

The Big Man

 So we went to see the "Big Man" as we have been calling him so Nora doesn't freak out.  She really does not like to get too close to Santa Claus.  As you can see in the picture above she was as happy as could be waiting in line.  She had no clue who was right around the corner!

 So it was our turn and I picked her up and walked over toward Santa and she flipped out, like I knew should would and clutched on to me for dear life.  She would not even look at Santa.  I set her down to turn towards him and she darted away from me. 

 She was not a happy camper by any means.  We even offered her a candy cane and she just did not want to be by him.  Santa was no help either.  He just sat there and stared at us, you think he would be a little used to this and tried to help or talk to her, but oh no.  He just watched as she cried.  I finally got her to stand in front of Santa and we got a couple of picks with her crying.  These pics on here are the best because grandma got them as the action was happening! 

After we were done she was back to her normal Nora self and as happy as could be.  She really enjoyed the candy cane too!  Here's to hoping for better next year....I have my doubts though!

St. Louis Christmas

 We celebrated Christmas in St. Louis on Monday and Tuesday.  Monday we celebrated with my mom and Tuesday we celebrated with my dad.  Monday we had breakfast for dinner and then opened gifts.  It was definately the Nora show!  Nora was in a smiling mood and was willing to take some pictures beforehand.  That phase of not even looking at the camera is beginning to end!  Thank goodness, because I couldn't handle much more of it!

 We had so much fun opening gifts and about half way through Nora said she was done.  It was pretty funny.  Jalen was so patient because he only had a couple of gifts to open since everyone else was going to be seeing him on Christmas.  He helped me open a few and Uncle Peter and when he asked Nora if he could help her she said, NO!  He patiently waited until it was his turn and he had been keeping his eye on the one gift that was from us.  It was a DS game and when he opened it he was sooooo excited.  It just made my night and he put his hands in the air and exclaimed, "I love Christmas".  All over one tiny gift!!!!  I can't even imagine what he is going to do when Santa comes.

Nora was spoiled once again and some of her favorites included her Barbie, barbie & Cinderella dress ups and her beanbag chair!  On Tuesday we had dinner with my dad and Nora got a gift card to Toys R Us, which will be used after christmas!  I was super excited because I got a gift card to Creve Couer Camera to get a new flash for my camera!!!  We are so blessed and so lucky to have such great parents!  Can't wait for round two!

Merry Christmas!

Curls!

So I decided to go ahead and buy some curlers to see what would happen when we put them in Nora's hair. I had been talking with my mom about it and finally did it! She was very patient while I put them in. At first she said, "no mom", but then let me do it anyway. I am lucky that I don't have a kid that throws tantrums about much! Her protest of no was next to nothing. So while we talked with Grandma and Grandpa I rolled her hair! Isn't she cute?!

I only had them in for about an hour. I wasn't going to make her sleep in them because she has been sick so I used the cool setting on my hair dryer, but they still were not all the way dry when I took them out. I think if I let her hair air dry and did this a couple of hours before we went somewhere it would actually be pretty cute.

So here are her bouncy little curls! It was pretty curly for only being half way dry and in her hair for an hour. Of course this morning there was no curl left, but that is okay. I think we are going to give it a go for Christmas Eve to see what we get. It was funny because after I took them out she kept touching her hair and then looking at me like, "what did you do?"