Say Cheese!

I got a new camera. A nice one that I'm still trying to figure out. It's a Canon Rebel XS and it should take some really nice pictures if I ever learn what I'm doing. For now it's auto mode until I learn some photography skills.
Meanwhile, Sasha saw me studying my new camera and tried to show me what it's all about by grabbing my old point-and-shoot camera. These are some of my first photos taken with the new camera.
Say Cheese!

About a month late

I uploaded pics from my old camera onto my computer and realized I forgot to tell the tale of our gingerbread house.
My older daughter Cassie got a gingerbread house kit as a gift from her Grandma Pat. Grandma Pat was her babysitter from way back when Cassie was a little baby, and is as close as family. A few weeks back, Cassie went visit her Grandma Pat and family for a weekend.
Anyways, Cassie made her gingerbread house. As I took her picture, she gave me her best "Starbucks Apathetic" facial expression:

It's our joke that someday Cassie will go work for Starbucks, and she has to practice her apathetic facial expressions, annoyed sighs, and condescending glares.
Here is the finished gingerbread house:

And here is what Sasha thought of it (click to enlarge):

Note the sign in front of the house which says, "Trespassers will be shot". Hehe, I love Cassie's dark sense of humor.

Still sick, off and on

At the mall, enjoying an ice cream cone.

Yesterday, Sasha was in great spirits. We thought Sasha had recovered from whatever was ailing her. She was playful and didn't seem feverish. She got to go to the mall and play at the indoor children's playland, which she loves (and her mama got some A&W rootbeer, which she's been craving lately).
But then by the late evening it became apparent she wasn't well again. She was whiny and her fever spiked up to 101.3.
I think she'll have a doctor visit today.
She has no other symptoms other than the fever and her whiny clinginess. She obviously doesn't feel well, but she says she isn't in any pain when we ask her if she hurts.

Snuggly sick

While sleeping, my husband and I both noticed that Sasha felt unusually warm. Actually, her head was VERY hot; I could feel the heat radiating off her before I even touched her. She snuggled up to us more insistently than usual as she tried to sleep.
For some reason, when Sasha gets sick, she becomes very snuggly.
When we woke up, I took Sasha's temperature with a tympanic (ear) thermometer. She doesn't mind getting her temp taken this way. She had a low grade fever, about 100F degrees (38 C). We asked her if she was in any pain, and she said she wasn't hurting anywhere. She had no other symptoms other than the fever and clinginess.
So yesterday, Sasha spent the whole entire day cuddled up to my husband or I, or both. We took turns laying down with her on the couch while she watched tv and hugged us fiercely.
Sometimes she would give me a huge forceful hug, then look me in the eyes and ask,"Much better?", as if she was comforting me instead.
But for the most part, so long as she had someone to hug and cling to, she was okay.
And that wasn't a bad way to spend a day at all. If it wasn't for the fact that I knew that she wasn't feeling well, I would have been very happy to spend a whole day cuddling with my two year old.

Our "cookbook"

Just a quick link to a family project. My husband and I have collected recipes over the years that have become family staple meals. We have been meaning to compile all the recipes together in a central spot, but the recipes are in so many different forms that it's been difficult. It's always been on our to-do list but just never got done.
So we are finally tackling that project. We have started dragging out the family favorite recipes. Some are written on sheets of paper. Some are in cookbooks. Some only exist in our minds and tummies.
Mike, if you're out there! Jon says that he could use some input from you. There were a bunch of recipes that you could probably share with us that he remembers growing up with. Let us know if there are any that you care to share with us. We'd love to have them.

Mom & Daughter moments

Here are a few Mom & Daughter moments:
Watching traffic from a restauraunt with an indoor bridge over a freeway. She and I sat there and watched the cars and trucks pass under us for quite a while.
She and I went for a walk outside a strip mall. We browsed all the stores. But best of all, she loved pushing the shopping cart. "I'm shopping!"
Sasha is my little buddy. I love playing with her and spending time with her.

My buddy

This is the best age! Sasha has been my little buddy and it is so rewarding to be her parent.
I haven't blogged much lately, and I think part of it is there are just so many cool new things with her that there's no way I can keep up. And now I'm way behind, but I guess that's okay.
She still pretends to be different people or animals, which is now the norm with her. She is NEVER Sasha anymore. She's a dog, a cat, a frog, Wow-Wow Wubbzy, Cassie, Mom, Dad, Grandpa, Grandma, "Max and Ruby", Spongebob, or whoever she decides she is at that moment.
For example, if she's a dog, she'll run around the house panting with her tongue hanging out, barking, and she'll try to lick me on my face!
When she's in trouble, she'll pretend she is Dad in the hopes that she won't be punished. "NO! I'm Dad!", as if that changes everything.
When she wears a hat, she is Grandpa. Because a Grandpa always wears a hat, of course.
Sometimes she runs up to Cassie and says "I'm Cassie!", then she'll run around and copy everything Cassie does.
There was a show on tv about animals, and it was talking about snakes. Sasha was enthralled with this new information and clearly found it cool. "I'm SNAKE!", she yelled and then pretended to be a snake for a few minutes until it was time to be something else.

She takes great care of everyone and is so amazingly affectionate. If she thinks we're hurt, she'll kiss our owie, look us deep in our eyes and ask, "Much better?". If we look sleepy, she'll get us a pillow and blanket and carefully tuck us in. Then she'll hug us and try to snuggle us to sleep, the way we do for her.
Sometimes she'll just sit down next to me and snuggle for a little while. Sometimes she hugs me then lays down in my lap and falls asleep. It reminds me of when she was much younger, when she always fell asleep in my arms. It eventually became rare for her to sleep in my arms, so it's cute that she's doing that again. I enjoy it as I'm sure it won't last. I try to enjoy every moment.
I could go on and on. She is very expressive about everything she sees. She cracks little jokes. It's really fun, now that she's talking, to hear what she thinks about things, especially when she observes something new.
Her copycat ways can be very enlightening. Sometimes she'll mimic me and I won't notice. Then I'll see her looking back and forth between herself and me, while she's trying very hard to sit cross legged or to position herself in the same way I am.

I wish I could remember everything I meant to write about, but there is just so much that I can't remember any of it. She has dozens of new skills and tricks every day and she just has so much personality!

Portraits slideshow

I found a way to share a slideshow of the family portrait session we had taken a week and a half ago. I love how the pictures turned out but they charge too much for the digital rights.
SLIDESHOW LINK

I'm not sure how long that link will work but I think it'll work for 90 days from the session. And I think it uses javascript, so some browsers might have difficulty viewing it depending on settings.

Merry Christmas!

From our family to yours, have a Merry Christmas!

Rose Petal Cottage

Here is Sasha in her Rose Petal Cottage while her dad was assembling it.
My husband is amazing when it comes to assembling stuff, and it took him barely 15-20 minutes to assemble the house AND all the additional toy sets that came with it. I think I read somewhere that it takes like an hour to assemble. This included the stove, sink, washing machine, table and chairs, and the whole house.
A special "thank you" to Mike, my husband's relative, for the Rose Petal Cottage set. It was his gift to Sasha. She LOVES this little house set.
She spent the whole evening in it. It has doors, so Sasha was in and out of the doors all night. She loves to point out the windows. She pretended to cook us some oatmeal, she took off her sweater and "washed" it in the washing machine. She is constantly rearranging her furniture just-so. She constantly (yet forcefully) invites her big sister to come in the house then kicks her out again.
Definitely her favorite present.
I didn't realize that I didn't take a picture of the full set all assembled, mostly because Sasha started playing with it all even before assembly was completed.

Opening Xmas Presents!

Playing with her new "My Little Pony" while opening gifts.
Reading a book that came with one of her presents.
Sasha wanted to stop and play with each and every gift as she opened them, so opening presents took her a while. She got some really great presents this year!
-A wooden puzzle with airplane, helicopter, firetruck, car, boat, train, and ambulance pieces that make noises.
-A My Little Pony
-A wooden doll dress up set
-A Rose Petal Cottage playhouse
-A Rose Petal Kitchen Sink
-A Rose Petal washing machine
-A Rose Petal table and chair set
-A Rose Petal stove
Basically, the full Rose Petal Cottage set. She actually got two Rose Petal Cottages, because I ordered one from Amazon.com before I learned that someone (Thanks Mike!!!) had also got one for her as a gift. I couldn't cancel the order in time, but that's okay. We can take one back and she can pick something else out. Great minds think alike :)

Ready for Christmas

Sasha is ready for Christmas!
She has a pile of gift-wrapped presents in the living room (Thanks Mike!), and those presents have her full attention. My husband wanted us to put the presents out to steadily pique her interest, and his tactic has definitely succeeded.
She likes to pick the presents up and shake them. She grabbed one present and was walking around the house with it. I asked her what was in it. She had a look of deep thought cross her face. She shook the present, listened to it, thought some more, then knowingly announced "It's candy!". She nodded to herself and continued to walk around with the present again.

We've been talking to Sasha about Christmas, and Santa and presents. She seems to understand somewhat. The other day I asked her if she wanted presents and she nodded and said "Mmmm-hmm", which means yes. I then asked her what she wanted to have inside her presents. She thought for a few seconds and said, "A house please". She's been in a house playing mood lately.

Portraits

Thumbnails only from the family portrait session the other day.


And yes, that is a wrench in Sasha's hands. The photographer had a toy wrench among her props. Once Sasha saw that, she grabbed it and wouldn't let it go.

Fun and games

Sasha has been so fun to be around lately. I can't keep up.
Her pretend play cracks me up. Yesterday, she renamed us all. She now insists we call her "Wow Wow Wubbzy", her favorite tv show character. My husband she calls "Fix-it", which is what she calls the "Widget" character from Wow Wow Wubbzy. Her Mom (that's me!) is now Walden, and Cassie is renamed "Daisy", also from the same show.

She is always in my closet, pretending that it is her house. It's a nice little hiding spot for her.
She's been more affectionate than usual with me. Lately, she gave most of her affection to my husband but she seems to be making up for that with extra hugs, kisses, and snuggles. It warms my heart to see her charge at me from across the house to hug me as she yells "I GOT YOU!".
Her vocabulary is really growing! Full sentences and she's constantly amazing me with new phrases.

At the mall yesterday, my husband went into the Apple store to drool over laptops and computer stuff, while the girls and I went to pick up our family portraits. Sasha noticed he was gone and started asking me, "Where's Dad go? Where's Dad go?". Her sentence syntax amused me. But it was neat that she was able to ask a question about someone not present.
We still have plenty of times where we wish she could communicate to us what she wanted. Temper tantrums and fits are still a constant struggle in our household and we're often mystified as to what she wants. Soon though, she'll be able to tell us what she's thinking.

Getting ready for a winter storm

We're expected to get about a foot of snow tonight, and it's supposed to snow pretty much non-stop for the next 4 days. As I type this, it is snowing pretty good outside. So I do believe that Cassie will have a snow day today. I will still have to work, but otherwise we will probably be holed up in our apartment for the next few days.
Not that it's much change. This winter we've been mostly hidden away indoors anyways. Just now we don't have a choice. I do worry that we could lose power or cable or internet connectivity. That shouldn't be much fun.

These storms should keep me very busy at work as well. They're calling for extra help so I might have to work some extra hours. Our workplace is very prepared for the storms. They've purchased some groceries and even some toiletries in case we get stuck at work for a while.