Fun in the Snow!

Molly and Alex got bundled up and had some fun in the snow on Grandpa and Grandma's farm.

Molly makes great snow angels!

Sledding!

More Christmas Photos

Molly and Danessa (her 2nd cousin)
They had so much fun together! It is great to have a cousin the same age! :)

More puppy love.

Molly and Alex both were given 2 toothbrushes (one standard, one spin brush) from Grandpa and Grandma Ehlebracht.
Molly and Alex had a great time trying to see if they could use both at the same time! :)

Puppy Love

Loeschke Christmas Photo

Alex holding Rudy
My parents got Rudy, a little Papillon puppy, last summer. Alex adores Rudy, and Rudy actually seems to like to have Alex hold him.

Here's Molly holding Tootsie, Aunt Sally's miniature Dachshund.

Molly with Rudy

Christmas Program

On Dec. 16, Molly was in a Christmas program at church. She did a great job singing!

Aren't they adorable?

After the church service, there was a community meal and a Christmas party. Alex picked out a gift during the White Elephant game, and it turned out to be two used kitchen sink water sprayers. I wasn't impressed, but Alex LOVED them. :) He grabbed one and pretended to spray people (complete with sound effects)! Alex made it seem like so much fun that a friend wanted the other sprayer so he could pretend to spray too! :)

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Music and cookies

Alex loves music. He likes to try to sing, and he loves instruments. Here he is playing his drum. :)

He got a toy guitar for his birthday, and he struts around and kind of dances as he "plays" it. :) It's really cute.

Molly and Alex love Christmas cookies. They like to put the sprinkles on them too.

We've been limiting the cookies, but we've let the kids have them every once in a while. Today before lunch Molly asked if she could have one after lunch. We said yes. However, things got kind of busy right after lunch and we forgot to have cookies. Just a little bit ago, Cory and I were playing Go Fish with Molly while Alex napped, and I wanted a cookie. I remembered that we had told Molly she could have one so I told her she could pick one. She said, "I want the snow man one. I'll go get it!" Then she ran into the kitchen (we were at the dining room table). She came back into the room with the snow man cookie. Cory and I asked her where she had gotten it from, and she showed us.
She had snuck it from the cookie container earlier today when we weren't watching, and she hid it in the couch!!! (We have a couch in our breakfast nook while our basement is being renovated.) Cory and I had to turn away from her so she couldn't see how hard we were laughing. After we could get straight faces, we explained that she shouldn't sneek food or hide food in our furniture. Silly girl.

---

Advertising strikes again: Cory said yesterday Molly was watching Care Bears, and she came up to him and said, "Dad, we need to go to Build a Bear Workshop. It's where best friends are made." (That is exactly what the commercial says, by the way.)
Then she added, "I've seen it at the mall, but I've never been there before. We should go."

O Christmas Tree

It was snowing Saturday morning when we went to pick out our Christmas tree. Then we all came inside and had some hot cocoa. I think that was the first time Molly and Alex had tried hot cocoa, and they loved it. :) Molly told me she wanted to have some every time she came inside after getting cold playing outside all winter.

Molly and Alex got to hang all of our unbreakable ornaments on the tree. They loved it! One funny part was that Alex didn't want to have the Christmas music playing. Every time we turned it on, he went over to the stereo and turned it off.

Molly told Alex, "Be careful. The tree is very porkely!"

( It actually has very soft needles.)
I asked Molly, "Do you mean prickly? Or pokey? Prickly things have needles that can poke you."
Molly said, "Yeah mom, but look at all the porkels on the tree!"

Sweet hugs. :)

How precious is this?!?

-----------

Alex has been really cracking us up lately. The other day, he was eating a clementine in the kitchen. Cory and I were in the living room, and Alex walked up to Cory and said, "YUCKY!". Alex gave Cory the inside stringy stuff from his clementine, and then said, "Thank you!!!" and walked back into the kitchen.

There is a new cook book out there that is all about hiding vegetable purees in other foods so your kids eat more vegetables.
I was skeptical, but I thought I'd try it. I made a box of Kraft mac n cheese (that they love!) for lunch and put only like 3 Tbs of pureed squash in it.
NEITHER kid ate it. :( Molly said it was too cheesy and she didn't like it. She only ate one spoonful and refused to try any more.
Alex found one little squash string on his spoon and said, "Uh Ohh, Uh Ohh, HELP!" and had me rinse it off for him. Then he didn't eat any more.
I ate it, and I could tell the texture was different but it tasted the same as always.
I guess we'll just stick with baby carrots, frozen peas, corn, and canned green beans. At least they eat SOME vegetables. Maybe they'll branch out when they are older. :)

NOT fun times at the dentist :(

This morning Molly had another dentist appointment.
Molly has done really well at both of her cleaning visits. However, at the last one, they found a cavity on a top back molar. It is a baby tooth, but it won't fall out until she's around 12, so it does need to be filled.

In September, we went to our normal dentist to have the cavity filled. Molly did really well until he started using the drill, and then she got scared and wouldn't open her mouth any more. Our dentist referred us to a pediatric dentist in Burnsville.

Today we had an appointment there, and they told me on the phone that it would just be to meet us and check her teeth. They said they don't jump right into doing fillings because they don't want the first appointment to be traumatic.

That was the appointment that we had this morning, and it was a disaster. They decided when we got there that Molly needed x-rays taken (for the first time ever), and Molly was not prepared for this. I won't go into details here, but the x-rays didn't happen and Molly WAS traumatized. :(

They found a 2nd cavity in another back molar, and gave me the options of either putting her general anesthesia in a hospital (just like surgery!) for the fillings, or we can wait 6 months and see if she does better.

We're going to wait 6 months and also try to find a different pediatric dentist. I am never going back to that one again.

Here's why I'm posting this for all of you to read: I'd like your help. Please, do NOT offer Molly ANY candy, juice, chocolate milk, fruit snack, fruit rollups, chewy granola bars, or other chewy snacks when you are around her.

Cavities grow quickly in baby teeth, and we need to be really strict about taking care of her teeth, especially in the next 6 months or until we can figure out how to get her cavities filled. We need to brush her teeth 2-3 times per day and floss every day, but we also need to avoid all of those things listed above that can encourage cavities. Thank you for your cooperation!

Happy Birthday Alex!

Happy Birthday Alex!

Yesterday, November 19, was Alex's second birthday. I can't believe our little guy is 2!
Alex at 2 -
Likes: buttons and switches, especially when pushing/switching them makes things happen! Alex loves books, songs, running, being silly with Molly, and exploring (getting into everything!).
New Talents: Undressing himself, peeing on the potty (about 5X per week), and jumping where he twists 180 degrees and lands facing the opposite direction.
Dislikes: Going to sleep, sitting at the table longer than 90 seconds at a time, and sharing toys.
---

Funny Molly stories:

---
Yesterday, on the way to preschool, Molly saw a pop can in the grass near the road. Here is the conversation that followed:
M: Mom, look, there is some glitter over there!
E: Glitter? Where?
M: Over there! (pointing) Someone threw trash on the grass.
E: Oh. That's litter with an "L", not glitter. Glitter with a "G" is the sparkly stuff we use to decorate art.
M: Littering? Yeah, look at that can. That is very bad for our earth.

A few minutes later, she saw a paper plate by the road.
M: Mom, look, more glittering!!!
E: Littering. Littering starts with "L". Glitter is the sparkly stuff that you shake onto glue.
M: Yeah, littering. People should not litter.

---

Molly was watching Dora, and Dora was saying how it is nice to say "Please" and "Thank You". Dora also teaches them the Spanish word for please, "por favor".
We overheard Molly say to Alex, "Alex you are in the way. Please will you get out of the way, por savor?"

---

On Saturday, I browned up some ground beef and onions for chili. The onions were really strong. Alex was napping and had been upstairs for quite a while. Molly was playing in the living room, and she said, "Yuck, it smells bad in here. I think Alex pooped!"

---

Yesterday late afternoon, Cory and I were discussing where we should go in the evening to celebrate Alex's birthday. Molly was in a time out, and she yelled from the corner, "How about McDonalds?!?"
I said, "Molly, we can't hear you when you are in time out."
M: (Yelling louder) I said HOW ABOUT MCDONALDS????
E: Molly, I meant that we can hear you but we do not talk to you while you are in time out.
M: (cupping her hands around her mouth and yelling even louder) HOW ABOUT MCDONALDS!!!!!

More of Alex's Birthday Party

Alex LOVED it when everybody sang Happy Birthday to him. He was lucky, too, because we ended up singing it twice. :) After the first time we realized we didn't have the video camera out, so we did it again so we could get it on video. :) He was excited to blow out his candles.

Cake and Ice Cream!

All of the gifts were great. He is obsessed with his new remote control dump truck. He loves it and played with it the rest of the day.

I couldn't even get him to look at me and smile because he was so focused on his new toy. :) Yay, what a fun birthday party!

Alex's Birthday Party

Here is the Curious George Cake I made for Alex's party.

The kids played a variation of "Pin the Tail on the Donkey". They had a butterfly sticker they had to stick to the right spot on the Curious George poster, and they got to wear a little Curious George mask so they couldn't see. It was cute. :) That's Alex above.

Here's Molly playing the game.

Pizza!

Salad

Tonight we were eating chicken tacos for supper. Suddenly, Molly ran to another room, grabbed a large leaf (a mostly dried out one that had fallen ouside) and gave it to Cory.
Cory: Molly, don't put that on my plate!
Molly: I thought maybe you could use it for a salad.

???

Advertising - it works!

Normally, Molly and Alex only watch shows on PBS, which thankfully has very minimal advertising.

CBS recently started showing Care Bears and Strawberry Shortcake cartoons on Saturday mornings, and we let Molly watch them yesterday. Of course, the commercials are all for girl's toys. Molly is in their target group, and boy are those commercials working!!!

She was so excited to tell us all about some flower toy that grows plants and has little people inside. The same few commercials are shown over and over, and after each one she told us she really wanted it. After saying she wanted them all, Molly finally declared, "Everything I see on TV, I want for my next birthday!"

Nice.

Oh, and by the way - these are all TERRIBLE looking toys, so please, please do not buy them for her. The flower doll one is like a combination of a junky plastic doll-house and a Chia pet (you actually pour seeds in and have real plants growing on the toy!). Yuck!

Even More Halloween Fun!

Last night (Nov. 1), our church had a Fall Festival. There was a costume contest. Here's Alex's age group. :)

Here's Molly's age group. :)

There were art projects. Here are Gideon and Alex coloring a picture.

There were a lot of fun games for the kids, too. Here Molly, Madeleine, and Josiah were doing the Cake Walk game. There were around 30 kids there, and everyone had a great time! :)

More Halloween Fun

Molly and Alex were excited to do some Trick or Treating on Halloween Night!

We joined up with Madeleine's family. Mado was a purple butterfly!

I think Alex's favorite part was ringing door bells. They had fun!

Here are Alex, Molly, Madeleine, and Calvin at Cal's house. They are all too cute!

Halloween Fun!

We have had a lot of Halloween Fun this year! Molly and Alex both happened to fit into their costumes from last year, and both wanted to wear them again so I had it easy! Alex is a giraffe and Molly is a monkey, if you can't tell. :)

They got to go to the Halloween event at Mall of America a few weeks ago. Then on Saturday, I took them to the nearby grocery store where they had a special event for kids. Every child wearing a costume got to trick or treat around the store, decorate a cookie, and get a free hotdog for lunch. Molly and Alex loved it!

When we got home from the grocery store, they were excited to see that Grandpa and Grandma Ehlebracht had sent them packages in the mail. Here they are checking out the goodies!

Then, Saturday night, a nearby park had a HUGE Halloween family fun night. We went there with the Nelsons and had a great time! The kids got to trick or treat along a trail, roast marshmallows, jump in an inflatable bounce house, and go on a hay ride. It was great!

Here's Alex with some lovely green fake teeth he was given at the park. :)