December

December!  I know it's somewhat lame to sum up a whole month at a time.  Sorry.  December was a wonderful month for our family.  We managed to stay pretty uncommitted the whole season, which was refreshing in a time of year many feel rushed from place to place.  First, the Christmas card pictures that took a lot of convincing to capture:

Josiah finally took the time to feel the baby kick, and his eyes lit up in joy when he realized just how strong the little person on the inside is getting.  He requested that I take a picture of him and his littlest sister together after that magical moment, hence the following:

 I finally stepped up to the plate and realized I just needed to make time to potty train Evangeline since I knew she was ready and had come up with a million excuses on why I couldn't yet.  I stripped her bottoms off, rolled up the rug in the playroom, and informed her that we were now putting all our pee pee in the potty.   I reluctantly embarked on what I felt like would be a harrowing journey for a few days.  Pee #1---on the floor.  Not cool.  I cleaned it up and informed her, "No, we put our pee pee in the potty."  I watched like an eagle for what seemed like forever.  We were playing when she declared non-chalantly, "I need to go pee pee."  Really?  Was that all it took?!  I swiftly moved her onto the potty and voila!  She put the pee pee in the potty just as I had requested.  I couldn't believe it.  We celebrated, did a dance, clapped our hands in glee, and did a jig on the way to dump the baby potty into the big one.  It seemed too good to be true.  For the rest of the day she very reliably put her pee pee in the potty without prompting.  She even sat down and pooped on the potty as if it was no big deal.  It was AMAZING.

She very easily mastered the bottomless methodology.  It has taken her longer to master the panties part.  If given a choice, she will still beg for a pull-up and very comfortably walk around in a soggy pull-up all afternoon if it means she doesn't have to stop what she is doing to go.  What that means is...no pull-ups.  We introduced panties and have had our share of panty accidents, the worst of course being when she has pooped in them.  Just this week (the second week of January) have we had major breakthrough in the panty and pull-up department.  She has reliably used the potty when wearing panties and pants, and she has even elected for the potty while in a pull-up (after nap or on outings).  We are very proud of her and feel like she will be there by her birthday at the end of the month.

Back to December events...We went to see Grandaddy as Santa at Chickfila one night.  We never imagined we would get a crying Santa picture, but it took a little time for Evangeline to realize that Santa guy was quite familiar to her.

Evangeline's December hairdo.

 Who is that Incredible Hulk?  Oh, it's just that sweet little girl.

 Josiah was very into Christmas tradition and calendars this year, and so I wanted to take advantage of his excitement and introduced a new tradition--a Jesse tree.  I made it out of a Christmas tree stump and sticks out of our front yard.  The tree tells the story (roughly) of the lineage of Christ, also known as the root of Jesse.  We started with Creation, actually--and each night after we read a story Josiah got to add the corresponding ornament to the tree.  He really enjoyed this method of counting the days until the coming of Jesus, and it helped him understand the expectation of the coming Christ through the generations.

 This was me at 22 weeks pregnant on Christmas with the baby girl to be.  The picture on the left was me at 22 weeks with Josiah.  Definitely a different shape, not a huge difference in size so far (thank goodness).

 Josiah's favorite presents this year were his new bike and RC airplane.  The airplane was the only thing he requested for Christmas, and he was very pleasantly surprised by the bike.

This was the first year at my new job where I have no holiday commitments.  It was a wonderful privilege to choose when I wanted to work during the season.  It was also the first New Years I haven't worked since becoming a mother, as I always traded with coworkers for other holidays.  We decided to continue a fun tradition that Jonathan started with the kids last year.  We took them to the Varsity for a later dinner.  It's such a simple thing--and nothing special happens there--but we definitely don't gut bomb with the chili cheese dogs, fries, and onion rings on many occasions, making it special enough for us.

 We did sparklers and small fireworks around 9:30, as we didn't know whether the kids would actually make it to midnight.

It was a big year for Josiah because it was the first one he DID, in fact, make it to midnight.  He was a little perplexed by the significance of a ball dropping on a pole and why that was so intriguing, but he enjoyed shouting the countdown and having a glass of sparkling grape juice for the occasion.

The following morning we went to Krispy Kreme (Josiah's guilty pleasure of choice) and watched hot doughnuts roll off the line while we consumed way too many ourselves.  It was a great way to start what we hope will be a fantastic year!