Random Diego videos

Here's some random videos I had. Diego has been singing Frozen as always but in my new car it's quiet enough I can record him singing while I'm driving. It's black as you are just listening to him sing, I'm driving after all! He is too funny he knows so many words and can really get into it. Small sampling of more than one song.

Then this other video is Diego reading a new book he opened for 12 days of Christmas. I need to record him saying ho ho ho. If you recall when Callie was this age I made ornaments with recordings of her voice saying love you and ho ho ho. Diego can't say love you but he can say lots more words. He says ho ho ho merry Christmas. Usually he just says Christmas and leaves out the merry. I'll try to get one good recording of him so he can have a matching ornament to Callie. Having two kids really limits the time I get so crafty. Yikes we haven't even done any ornaments this year!

Birthday Bonanza (late)

 I just found this post which had an error actually posting from over two weeks ago. Oops guess I should pay better attention. Better late than never.

Today we squeezed in a visit to see Grandma, PaPa and Ford and two birthday parties. It's was a busy day but Callie had a blast.

Diego ate a Rice Krispie treat with blue m&m and had a blue face. Callie got balloon swords and saw a majic show in the morning with Matt and Bryce. 

In the afternoon, she jumped for hours and broke a piñata. Her afternoon birthday party was her first birthday invite from a friend at school. This is her first real friend she made all on her own. I'd never met her family before today but we had a great time celebrating with Lily.

She was exhausted at bedtime and went right to sleep. Happy happy birthday celebrations!

Elf Shenanigans and Rudolph?

My mom sent me an email awhile back with this super adorable recipe for making elf donuts. Basically they are Cheerios dipped in chocolate topped with sprinkles. They are meant to look like mini donuts. Well I saved the idea then told Callie maybe we could make it for her elf. Of course she was thrilled to do it. They sure didn't look cute like the Pinterest version but my 3 year old made ones tasted just as good and Elfie and MiMi as well as the rest of the family loved elf donuts!

And in other news Rudolph the red forehead reindeer was spotted today! Diegos been walking around wearing Papa KiKi flashlight on his head. It's hysterical!

22 days of Christmas

As I kid I grew up with a special tradition. My parents gave me 12 days of Christmas presents. They were usually very small gifts and I got to open one each morning the 12 days before Christmas. I can remember being so excited to pick one each morning and to count down the days to Christnas each year. I remember my friends thinking it was so cool and being jealous. Well this year Papa Ed brought the 12 days presents but instead of 12 there were 18. And then Callie was allowed to open them starting the day Papa arrived. So now GiJu is bringing a few extras to fill the final days for a total of 22 days!! Alright this tradition needs to be 12 next year!

But the kids love it. There has been some learning activities involved as GiJu numbered all the gifts. Callie can pick any present she wants. Sometimes she can identify the number but more often than not her job is just to find the matching number for Diego. She can do it really well!

It's been exciting to watch them open and see how excited they are. Diego didn't quite get it at first. We would rip the paper and Diego would try to put it back down to make it perfect again. Today was the first day I saw him say open and rip his own paper. I think all this practice will make him ready for the big day.

AND one other positive is that the kids have to use self control. All the presents are under the tree but they cannot open more than 1 a day. They haven't even asked or taken more than one. It's rather impressive considering most people have to keep ornaments away from their kids on the tree never mind wrapped presents.

2015 Christmas Card

This year I decided not to do paper cards in the mail. There were several reasons why. One was the frustration and stress of getting them done in time and sealed in envelopes and out in the mail. Two was saving money on my newly adjusted budget. Three was that I throw all my Christmas cards out after the holidays and assume you all do too so I killed quite a few trees for just a few weeks to look at it.

So I hope you all adjust to my ecard. I know I'll end up printing one for my pile that I save of my kids cards, so I ruin the don't print it.

But I hope you like it. I'm pretty happy with the outcome :) happy holidays!!

My First NEW car!

To say it's been a stressful week is an understatement. That would be why I haven't gotten to any posts. My car has been overheating and I drive a lot for work now. I was so worried I would be stuck on the side of the road. I brought it in and found out it needed a new head gasket which was nearly $2000! My car is barely worth that. The car plus sick Callie and grouchy teething Diego.

So Juan and I decided it was time for a new car. I needed something bigger that can accommodate the kids and all our stuff as well as more people so when we start toting around friends of the kids. Car shopping is stressful. Even once we figured out what we wanted, getting a good price is another story. Good thing I have persistent wheeler and dealer Juan who took care of all of it. So without further ado.... My very first new car, a 2016 Kia Sorrento. And I love it! Callie might like it even more than me. She's been sitting in all the seats and checking it all out.

I did have lots more photos I didn't get to posti while my evenings were full of car shopping.

Callie picked her very first edible lemon from our tree and made lemonade from it.

And we decorated a mini tree. We had a bunch of tiny ornaments so I wanted to get Callie a real miniature tree. Nena gave us this one she had which was adorable. Unfortunately it's not as adorable with the ornaments as the tree is more ornamental and doesn't really have true branches. The tree just sags with all the weight but Callie likes it so we just call it our Charlie Brown tree :)

And lastly we went to visit Tio Christian at work and Callie decided to help him work on the computer. She was really insistent. I had to drag her out when there were actual clients wanting to shop which she was not happy about.

Christmas pajama fun

Grandma bought the kids their annual Xmas pajamas. Getting an actual photo turned out to be next to impossible this year though. Three kids and 2 really mobile and wiggly ones made it impossible. I think these are still hysterical and will remind us in years to come that this is what life was like.