Tuesday, December 31, 2013

New Years

Today is New Year's Eve but here at our house you would never know it. I spent the day cleaning up a bit, paid some bills and ran errands. And tomorrow will be a lot of the same.

We did celebrate a bit and went out to a local Mexican restaurant (thanks to my dad). The food was great and it was fun to go out. Ollie was pretty cute, he tried eating a lemon that came with my water and we had some fun with that (see attached video). He also insisted that he would feed himself and not let us help and made a giant mess. We got Ollie ready for bed wished him a good night and put him down at his normal time. My husband and I then looked at each other and said "now what?"

Usually we would be with my sisters and their families gathered at my oldest sister's house around a table eating treats and playing games. Most of the men would be upstairs watching a movie or some sports game and the kids would be running wild and getting into all sorts of mischief. I am sad that this year isn't the same for us, but hope they have fun.

We plan to have a low key night watching the new movies that we got for Christmas and enjoying the fact that Corey doesn't have to go to work tomorrow. Something that we do every year that we did this year was our New Years resolutions. I have never been good at keeping goals or sticking to a long term plan. I feel like I only make it through January or into February with my resolutions so this year one of mine is to keep them going till at least June (by then it will have become a habit, right?). Good luck to all of you with your New Years resolutions and I hope that it was a fun holiday for you all. 


Friday, December 27, 2013

Traditions

I hope that everyone had a very Merry Christmas! Our Christmas was pretty awesome! We have had 3 Christmases together before this one that have been so good and full of family. Before we have had to balance and split up Christmas so we could feel like we both had times with our families and having time with our own little one. But this year it was all different. This was our first Christmas in Virginia and our first away from our families and being on our own. We put together our favorite traditions growing up and made new ones, making our Christmas this year our own.

We built a fort on Christmas Eve and Oliver loved crawling in and out of it and playing peek-a-boo. The fort didn't last very long before Ollie started to pull down the blankets or trying to climb up on the blankets bringing them down. It was a fun way to pass the time but I'm not sure if it will be done every year. 

We opened up two presents on Christmas Eve - pajamas and a Christmas book. We changed into our pjs and then read our new book (The Night Before Christmas) and then put Ollie to bed. And the next morning it was fun to see how excited he was when he saw all the presents stacked up in the middle of the floor. 

One thing that I wanted to do was to have shrimp salad with our Christmas dinner (which has been done by my family ever since I can remember). We usually only have it on Christmas and it's so good that I just had to have it this year too. It was my first time making it so I was a bit nervous that I would mess it up. I checked everything twice and was very careful in making it but still for some reason I messed it up and it was not very good, so this year we did not have shrimp salad. But we still had a very yummy dinner with turkey, funeral potatoes, super yummy rolls and other yummy foods. 

Another tradition that both of our families have had but that we really don't like and have tried not to follow (and I am sure other families have this one too) is of course having a child sick on Christmas. We had a great day full of food, presents and fun. We enjoyed opening our presents and spending the day enjoying them and each other, but then late afternoon our little Oliver got a fever and started to be fussy. We had a rough sleepless night and early on Thursday we took him to the doctors. It ends up that he has strep throat. No fun. Another rough night leading to a morning of tired people, and Oliver just didn't want to be awake but did at the same time. So this is us still in bed at 10 am. I hope that all of you did not take part in this tradition and that your children are all healthy but if you did, I hope that they get feeling better soon and can enjoy the rest of their break and the beginning of the New Year.



Tuesday, December 24, 2013

The Artistic Husband

Before I started my blog I wanted it to look cool, have a good title that would sum up what I was going to write about, and attract people. This blog is for me, to write about the things in my life. It makes me excited to know people are reading it but it has been fun just writing what I want. So my awesome husband Corey did this fun illustration for my blog header and changed the font, making it more of a SUPER blog.


He is so talented it's crazy. I have no artistic abilities so it always amazes me with what he can do. He has just started his life long dream of being a book illustrator and has had the opportunity to illustrate 4 different books and is in contracts to do 3 more. I am very excited and happy for him!!! He also loves painting, mainly with oil. When he paints, his art comes alive and I love to see what he comes up with. One of his books that he will be doing this year will be done in oil, so he gets to combine both loves into one. To see more of his work, check out his website.

So thank you Corey for making it SUPER and always helping me when I need it. I love you! And thank you readers for reading my blog - it makes writing so much more exciting!

Monday, December 23, 2013

Christmas Magic

Like many of you out there I love Christmas! I love the Christmas music, the holiday feel, the food, the time with family and all of the fun Christmas decorations. So in my excitement I convinced my poor husband to help me decorate the house a little early this year. Oliver was so helpful hanging up ornaments on the tree and pulling things out of boxes. It was a fun night and made me all the more excited.

For the first little bit Oliver was good at not touching the tree, But our cat was a different story. Rex loves to go behind the tree and sleep in the corner, try and climb it or swat at the hanging ornaments. After a while Oliver decided he too wanted to climb behind the tree and be with his Rexy or play with the ornaments. We pull him away telling him that it's not okay, we distract him with toys, books and songs, we put him on our laps to be on time out, or just leave the room to play somewhere else. Our once pretty tree has become quite sad looking, the lights are starting to come loose and the tree has become slightly top heavy.

So I came up with a plan, I would wrap all of our presents and stack them up perfectly under the tree so that they could not climb under it any more. This amazing plan of mine worked for a bit but a few days ago he started to play with presents and now tries to unwrap them. I have not decided yet which one is worse but I can say that I think Oliver will love Christmas day when he can open all of the presents under the tree and I can't wait to take down the tree! If you have had this problem or something similar how did you solve it? Some moms have the coolest tricks and I have yet to learn them.

My mom and dad were so good at making Christmas so magical. My mom started listening to Christmas music around June or July and didn't stop until January. We would decorate our house the weekend after Thanksgiving. Go up the mountains to cut down our very own tree, thanks to our dad who would trudge up and down those hills with us kids searching for the perfect one and always getting it for us, especially the ones that he would have to climb up the tree to cut off the top. And even though we weren't the richest of families out there, my parents always made sure that we all had presents under the tree (and somehow we were opening presents all day). Oh and the food we would have, there was so many choices and oh so yummy!! We would play with our toys, put together puzzles, watch movies and play games. Now that I am the parent that is making the "magic" I can now see just how much work that must have been. I am so grateful for my loving parents who gave so much for me and my siblings. And I can only hope that Corey and I can be as good of parents one day. Good look to the parents that are making Christmas awesome for there kids!

Sunday, December 22, 2013

Church with Kids

Have you ever wondered why you go to church when you have kids? Are you getting anything out of it? Are the people around you annoyed with you and your kids? When I was younger I remember looking at all the kids in church being so loud and destractive and thinking "just take them out or take them home!" I think back on that and now know how big of a brat I was being.

It's so easy to say to yourself "it's okay if we don't go this week" or "he is so tired and needs his nap". Other times you go and half way through you are tired trying to keep your little rugrat entertained and keeping him quiet so you go home. Other times you find yourself walking the halls the whole time. Of course there are the good weeks when Oliver will just sit on our laps reading books or playing with his cars and you are reassured when he folds his arms when all the prayers are said.

So today being the Sunday before Christmas, we set out to go to church, looking forward to feeling more of the holiday spirit. We get there, sing our opening song, and Ollie folds his arms for the first prayer and we're thinking it's going to be a good day at church. But then another couple with their little girl walks in and sits right behind us, pulling out toys and all kinds of snacks, and Oliver wants to do the same with his toys and snacks. Then the sharing begins - she wanted his stuff and he wanted hers. They played well together mostly, but times they fought.

Done with the first class and on to the next. Oliver is too young to be with all the kids so he comes with us to the grownups class and by this time he is restless and getting ready for his nap. Trying to get him to sleep in our laps with his pacifier and blanket only works on the rarest occasions, and today was not one of those days. He started to get loud, so the walking of the halls began which then led to our decision to leave for home and miss the rest of church.

On Christmas day is our Ollie's 18 month mark and is the age when he can go to nursery to be with the kids at church so we hope this is the end of us wondering the halls, making our excuses and leaving church early. Well I guess we will have to start all over again when we have another... To the hope of nursery next Sunday!

Saturday, December 21, 2013

A New Blogger in a New World

So this is my first post on my first blog and I hope you all like it. My name is Natalya but most people call me Tal, I grew up in a small town in Utah called Manti but we just moved in August in our little Subaru over 2,000 miles away to a small town in Virginia called Buena Vista (which people here pronounce B-you-na Vista). I just celebrated my 3rd Anniversary with my amazing husband Corey and have an 18 month old son Oliver that is beyond the simple word "active" that keeps me on my toes. Oh and an orange striped cat named Rex. I am a stay at home mom with many adventures trying to entertain my son, finding time to cook, clean and spend time with my ever so busy husband.
For my blog I want to write about the whatevers of life. Planning parties and trips, cooking fun treats and meals, cleaning a house, teaching and playing with Oliver, learning new things and being a better person, but also the ups and downs of life. Life can be full of great days but then other days when you just want to stay home in Pajamas and watch TV. Days where you can take on the world and others when your bed wins. I want to be a SUPER mom and wife but like most of you out there I have weaknesses, I have my KRYPTONITES!
So this is me and this is my blog. Thank you for reading and feel free to comment. Have a Merry Christmas and New Years.