Elf On The Shelf and Holiday Traditions

 Today starts a new Leptuch Family Tradition.....

Santa came last night and left this box on our front porch. 

Ava and I went to get the mail and there was a present from Santa. Ava was soooo excited. 

Here we are reading the story. 

 The very first part of the story, you have to name him. She wanted to name him Bobo, but we told her she already had a Bobo, so she named him Freddie. 

And here is where Freddie flew back to sit for the first day in our house after going to see Santa at the North Pole last night. He had to report back to Santa if Ava was naughty or nice. Unfortunately, last night he had to tell Santa that Ava was naughty. (more on that in another post)

We started another tradition today too. It is a Santa Advent Calendar. I found it on Pinterest.

Every morning you have to put a cotton ball on Santa's beard and once it is all filled up, Santa comes that night. 

At the bottom it says:

Santa's beard is very bare,

On his chin there is no hair!

So each day add a puff of white.

When they're all on, he'll come that night!

Ava was excited to do that this morning too. 

Hopefully we will have more traditions to add this month. I know Zoo Lights will be one of them. 

What's Up!

This is going to be a random blog of what has been going on around here.

This weekend we made a trip out to the zoo. I figured that Noah would actually enjoy it this time and Ava always enjoys going.

We headed out after Noah's nap and everyone had a great time. The weather was perfect. We got to get up close to a lot of animals. There is a kids petting zoo where you can pet the goats. Because we are members at the zoo and almost always go the hour before the zoo opens, the petting zoo isn't usually open. Mike took her in this time and wasn't sure how it would go, but she LOVED it. She was petting the goats. I took Noah in as well and he was talking to them. 

I got Ava to pose in front of the fake animals.

 Here she is in the petting zoo.

In the mornings, I usually do my workouts and I get warm, so I open the front door to cool it down a bit. Noah absolutely loves to go and sit by the screen door and look out at the neighborhood. (And eat all the fallen leaf pieces that are on the floor). Ava likes to use the bar as "monkey bars!"

Ava is still not sleeping through the night. IT.IS.KILLING.ME. Last time she woke up 4 times and then started screaming at the top of her lungs at 5:22am because I took away her paci and told her to go to bed. I am not sure what to do at this point. I feel like I have a newborn. She pretty much woke up every 2-3 hours. She has never been a great sleeper, but come on. The problem is that some of the time she has to go to the bathroom and sometimes she just wakes up, sits up and calls for us. We just go in and lay her down. This morning I decided that I have to start taking things away from her. So for today, Splash, the animal that she slept with last night is gone for a day and she doesn't get to watch any TV.

Noah on the other hand is sleeping through the night fine. He has been fighting going down for his naps lately though.  I think he just needs a longer wind down before going to bed.

Noah has been doing lots of new things. He can now pull himself up to standing and get back down to the floor. He has been cruising along the furniture. He is also giving kisses. It is soooo cute. He just opens his mouth and leans down on you. He gives Ava kisses all the time. I just love it. If you ask him for one, he gives it.

He also mimics everything you do. This morning, I had one of his cars that if you roll backwards and then let it go and it goes forward. He took it, rolled it a couple of times and let it go. I am surprised at how fast he picks up on stuff. This afternoon, I was giving him some puffs and I got some puff crumbs on my leg, so I brushed it off. Right after I was done, he brushed off my leg. SO. FREAKIN' SMART. (Maybe I am biased).

Ava is also doing a lot of stuff too. She has quite the imagination and says the funniest things. She told me to calm down the other day. I had to snicker because it was so funny and it came out of nowhere. She is at that stage where she asks the same question a million bajillion times. Sometimes, I just say the wrong answer to get her to stop asking or I just don't answer. I discovered that if I am in the car, I can just turn up the music. She will also tell you to stop talking if she wants to read a book herself. 

Thanksgiving 2011

Thanksgiving is a time for giving thanks, so here is what I am thankful for:

My wonderful kiddos. That they are happy and healthy. That they make me laugh and make me miss them while they sleep.

My wonderful husband. That he is as patient as one can be with me. That he loves our kiddos so much that he would rather hang out with them than do anything else.

My family. That they are happy and healthy.

We did the same that we usually do on Thanksgiving. We went to my sister, Jacy's house. We deep fried our turkey and it was awesome. There weren't as many people there that there normally is, which made it a bit more intimate.

Here are the few pictures I did get.

 Ava, Noah and Daddy playing with the lemons from Aunt Jacy's lemon tree.

Ava picking up the lemons that they threw in the grass.

Looks like Noah already ate Thanksgiving dinner, with that belly!

Playing with my moms dog. He really loves her tail.

Appetizers. (minus the puffs)

Getting the Turkey ready for the deep fryer.

My Grandma, Noah and I

This is the first Thanksgiving that I didn't stuff myself to the point of being sick. I only had one glass of wine too.This was also the first Thanksgiving that I was able to enjoy dinner without any kids. They were BOTH napping during dinner. It was so nice to not have to scarf down my meal or get up 5 or 6 times to get them something. Ava enjoyed playing with my Aunt Judy. We took a nice walk to the park after dinner and everyone looked at Black Friday ads afterwards. What a  great day!

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BLACK FRIDAY

My mom and I were planning on getting up at 5am and go shopping. Then I was going to take her home to play with the kids. Instead, I woke up at 3 am and was wide awake. Finally at 4, I got up and figured that my mom was probably up, but I decided to shower and get the coffee going and then I was going to knock on her door. As soon as I came out of my room around 4:15ish, I saw that she was up and asked if she wanted to get going, so we headed out. We went to Toys 'R' Us first. It wasn't busy at all. Then we went to Bed, Bath and Beyond, which was completely empty and then headed to Target. It was the perfect time to go out because everyone had done the early, early opening hour shopping and then went home. We hit the mall and Carters as well. I got Ava done and a couple of other people too .In fact, I got so many gifts for Ava that I am putting some away for her birthday, Easter and Valentines's Day. There were just so many great deals and so many things that I thought she would like. I am pretty much done, with the exception of a couple of small things. I was going to go back out to the mall, but by the time I wanted to go, it was going to be too late. I have even wrapped all my gifts because I didn't want Ava to see any. I would say it was successful. I am going to check out Cyber Monday to see if there are any good deals that day too. That way, I don't have to go out with all the crowds.

Christmas

Yay! Christmas is coming. I know, let's get through Thanksgiving first. It is hard these days to even get through Halloween with all the retailers pushing Christmas before Halloween. Anyway, it is my favorite holiday and I am really excited for Christmas this year. I think Ava will have a BLAST!

I grew up with many traditions and I am a sucker for traditions. We would open one present on Christmas Eve. That night my sisters and I would sleep in one bedroom. I wouldn't sleep a wink. Usually around 5am, I would rouse my youngest sister, Jaclyn so that we could start working on our oldest sister, Jacy. We couldn't get up until 6am, per my parents. Jacy HATED getting up early. She would even try to change the clocks, so she could sleep in. At 6am we would get my parents up and my dad would drop a penny down the stairs to let Santa know we were coming. Then he would go down stairs and make sure Santa was gone. We would all go down stairs and start opening our stocking stuffers while my parents got their coffee! Then we would rip open our presents and were usually done within 30 minutes. It was always done so fast, but we got to enjoy our presents the rest of the day.

I want to start some traditions in our family. I definitely think we will still open one present on Christmas Eve. I hope that when Noah and Ava get older, they will want to sleep in one room on Christmas Eve. Hopefully we will start some new ones. I would like to try the Elf on the Shelf thing, which means I have to get one the day after Thanksgiving.

We have been using the "Santa is watching you" thing with Ava lately. I know, bad mama! But it seems to work. Every night before she goes to bed, I tell her she has to sleep through the night because Santa is watching. (More on this sleeping thing later!!)

Santa told me that he was getting Ava the Loving Family Dollhouse this year, so if anyone out there wants to buy rooms to fill it up. We have already gotten the Laundry Room, Living Room and Dining Room. For those that read that are family, here are some other ideas for Ava. Play-doh things. She has some play-doh, but she would like the maker things. She would like some costume jewelry, an age appropriate laptop (I think V-tech makes some), stickers, Dora stuff, books that are stories, games (I think she will be ready to play some of the younger games soon) and toys that are for 3+ years. For clothes, she is in a 4T top and 3T bottom. She is a 7.5-8 shoe.

As for Noah, he needs 24 month fall clothes. Carters is always nice. 2T PJ's. He loves cars. He likes anything that he has to do things with. He loves to open and close things, push buttons etc. He doesn't need a lot. We aren't getting him a lot this year because basically anything that he gets is really Ava's. He needs things he will grow into, so 18 month toys. Also, don't forget his birthday is just around the corner too!

Not sure when we are going to get our tree this year. I know that Noah will be all over it! He is way more curious than Ava ever was. I know he is going to get all the ornaments and try to climb up it and get into the water. We might have to wait until the weekend before Christmas. That makes me sad, because we used to get it the weekend of Thanksgiving, but I just can't follow him around 24/7!!

The other day, I was trying to take pictures for our Christmas card and this is what I got. If I can't get any better ones, you may just see this coming to you....

This was as good as it got. Noah was too busy looking around at everything outside.. I guess that is just how they are going to be for the next couple of years.

Ava and Noah's Baptism

Ava and Noah were baptized on Sunday November 13th, 2011. It was a busy crazy weekend full of family and fun.

Let me back up and tell the history of getting the kids baptized.  We talked about getting Ava baptized before she was born and after she was born. But we never got around to it for a couple of reasons. One was the fact that the 2 churches near us had a lot of "hoops" to jump through to get her baptized. It shouldn't be a reason, but it was for me. Second was that we had to take a class and I wasn't comfortable leaving Ava with anyone for a long time after she was born. Then it just got put on the back burner. Then came Noah. Again the discussions came up and again the excuses came with it.

Then Mike decided that he wanted to become confirmed in the Catholic church, so he looked online and found a church that had a program that just started meeting on Thursday nights, so he decided to check it out. He liked it and found out that there was a class coming up for us to take to get the kids baptized and this church didn't have any "hoops" to jump through to get it done. So we went to the class. My dad and Patty were already coming to visit this weekend and this also happened to be one of the weekends they do the baptisms, so we scheduled it and there you have it. Both, Ava and Noah got baptized.

I, unfortunately, did not get a lot of pictures, so am hoping that those that did will send me some!!!
Here are the 2 that I did get.

It was a beautiful day and Deacon Jim told us to write down the details of the day so that we can remember it. As it has it, the weather channel was calling for rain. It rained that night and it was cloudy in the morning, but by the time the baptism came around, the sun was out and the weather was beautiful.

 Ava's godmother is my sister, Jacy and her godfather is my step brother, Brian. Noah's godmother is my other sister, Jaclyn and his godfather is also Brian.

Both kids did great during the baptism. Noah only cried when the Deacon put the water on his head because I didn't do the greatest job of holding him and the water ended up getting on his face. Ava even had Deacon Jim bless Bobo. He asked that Bobo be her security when she needs it. Other than that, it was a nice ceremony.

We had everyone over afterwards for Mexican (which we picked up), wine and dessert. 

Both kids were pooped that night after a long weekend with many activities. Ava had the most fun playing with all her grandma's (Nana, Grandma Nini and Gramme) and of course her Papa Ron. 

Noah is 10 Months Old

WOW! I can't believe my boy is 10 months old today!! *tear, sniff*

Dear Noah,

These have been an amazing 10 months. This past month was a big one for you. You learned soooo many new things.

Let's start with the biggest one, you learned how to crawl. It isn't the traditional 2 knee crawl, but it works for you. And you are getting fast at it. You crawl so fast when you hear anyone going into the bathroom or Ava's room. You love to be in the middle of the action.

This month you also learned how to sit up from lying down position.

You learned to pull yourself up to standing position, but you can only do it if there is a stool, or mommy to get you started. You still can't pull yourself right up to the couch. You need some more leg/arm strength.

You also learned to clap.

You love to walk around if we are holding your hands and you love to talk while you do it. It must bring you so much joy and satisfaction.

You love to sing. If Ava or I sing the ABC's, you sing along too.

You love to share. You always give me something and then take it back. You love to play ball. We roll the ball around between you, Ava and I. You grab it and push it off.

Your personality is ever changing. You always wake up happy. In the mornings, you talk to yourself and I think the animals on your sheets! You hang out forever waiting for us to come and get you. BUT, you have a feisty side. If Ava tells you "no" or takes a toy away from you, You get M.A.D! When you get bored, you let us know, by putting up a stink. You are probably going to be my tantrum kid. You have already thrown your face into the floor when you are mad.

You are eating more solid foods. We haven't been too adventurous with you because I am afraid of what will upset your tummy. You still get 4 bottles a day and 3 meals a day too. You love Graduates Lil Crunchies. You shove 3 or 4 in your mouth at a time. You are going to give your daddy a heart attack. 

You just learned how to color on the magnadoodle. You think it is so fun. Not sure you really know what you are doing, but you love it. 

You had your first Halloween and went to your first pumpkin patch this month.

You love your sister. You follow her every where, even though she hates that you try to get all her toys. She is always asking mommy if "Noah is going to get it?" You will follow her all around the room.

You are still cautious of people you don't know. If you hear a loud deep voice, it makes you cry.

You are in a size 5 diaper and size 18 mos clothes.

You are sleeping through the night and take 2 naps a day. You usually sleep about an hour to an hour and a half for each one.

Your smile is infectious as is your laugh. I love to tickle you to make you laugh uncontrollably.

The" mamarazzi" was out in full force today...

Ain't this the truth....

I can't wait to see what the next couple of months bring. You will be one years old before I know it.

Just the other day, you took the pen to the magna-doodle and started drawing...

We love you bud!!! Keep on growing and exploring. Do things at your own pace, but try not to grow up too fast!

Leptuch Halloween 2011

It's no secret, Halloween is my least favorite holiday. Ava doesn't really enjoy dressing up, but I still go out and buy her a costume every year. And every year, she only wears it for a short time. This year was no different. The only difference between this year and last year is that I made sure to pick out a costume that wasn't "itchy,"so she would wear it longer than 5 minutes.

Ava was Bat Girl

And Noah was a Doctor...(I wasn't going to spend a lot on his costume either, so I found this cute onesie at Buy Buy Baby for $7.99)

 My Halloweenies...

 You see the green thing on the couch? Well, it is a dog costume of a frog and we had put it on Bobo, but Ava tore it off right before this picture.

As the usual goes, we go to my sisters house for Halloween, put the kids in their costumes, take pictures and then see how the night goes. This was no different. For some reason though, Ava wasn't in the greatest of moods. She didn't like the scary music outside and kept wanting to go back inside. I asked her if she wanted to go trick or treating and she said "no." I asked if she wanted candy and she said "no."

She didn't really eat any candy. The one thing she liked was Mounds (I was actually surprised by this). I had to eat the almond because she didn't want it. 

Because Noah only took a 50 minute afternoon nap, he started to loose ground at 6:45 pm(his usual bedtime), so we headed home shortly after that.

The next morning, Ava said that Troy the horse wanted candy. I told her that she wouldn't go trick or treating so we didn't have any candy. But, she caught me because we grabbed a couple of pieces of candy on the way out and I left them right in plain view. So Troy got some candy for breakfast this morning!

And that was our Halloween. I wonder if next year will FINALLY be the year where Ava will enjoy it. I am saving this costume for next year, so be ready to see it again!!!!