Tea For Two... or Four

This morning our little principessa decided to have a tea party. This morning I decided to not freak out when she insisted on getting her "tea" from the bathroom -
primarily because I heard her at the sink in there. Whew!

(For the record, these pictures are from March. The sun is NOT shining today and 

Princess Pea Pod's attire is slightly more appropriate for the season.)

She poured a cup of tea for Mommy.
She poured a cup of tea for Daddy.

She stopped.

She looked around.

She puzzled.

She asked "Where's Daddy?"

Daddy left for work an hour ago.

She decided to save a cup of tea for Daddy.

She also decided to get the kitty in on the tea party. (I say "Why not!

He already insists on drinking from a cup anyway!")

I'm pretty sure he isn't even aware that he isn't human.

So she filled a tea cup and put it on the floor next to his water bowl.

I shouldn't be surprised that he drank the tea readily when it was on her table

and shunned it completely when it was placed on the floor.

Geez! Don't we know he belongs at the table with the rest of the family?!?

Tea anyone?

The Princess Dreams

Princess Pea Pod likes to tell me about her dreams, and I encourage her to. I treasure our little exchanges in the mornings after she has had a particularly vivid dream. I love the creativity and excitement in her voice as she paints the picture to share with me. However, I have been confused because she does not call them dreams. Instead, she tells me

"I had a wish last night and I remembered it!" Where in the world did she get that?

For example, yesterday she told me "Last night I had a wish that I was a princess and Daddy was a prince and we danced at the royal ball." How sweet!

Then today we were in full princess mode and I found myself humming

"A dream is a wish your heart makes

when you're fast asleep..."

OOOOH! I get it!

Princess Pea Pod wishing peacefully on vacation last summer.

Any Snow Is Good Snow

It snowed here last night. Not much... not much at all... but to our four year old it was very exciting. She woke up this morning and ran to all the windows, peering out and finally assessing that it snowed "EVERYWHERE!" She promptly began gearing up for a romp outside, then ran to the back porch to make a snow angel.

The snow angel picture was taken through the window with my phone camera. (Its too cold for this chick to be standing around outside.) This is a picture of her cute little nose peeking out of its warm, cozy place. She's standing in front of the grill, which is where she was standing when her daddy came around the side of the garage and pelted her with a snow puff. (There isn't even enough to make a respectable snowball!) Then he flipped snow off the grill and onto our principessa.

She would not be outdone! Haha, Daddy-Waddy! Back atcha!

Then Daddy-Waddy announced that he had just about had enough of this white stuff and the wind that came with it.

She sure does love that Daddy-Waddy! She likes the snow too.
(And the backyard birds like all the food she and Daddy-Waddy set out during
their morning frolic in the snow.)

Now THAT'S Resourceful

I happen to know a kid who loves to open gifts. (Who doesn't?!?)

I also happen to know a kid who loves to give gifts! She's a lot like her mother. So after all of the paper slinging and gift giving of the Christmas holiday I was a bit frustrated that our little principessa was upset that she had run out of gifts. We had a long talk about how a gift is from the heart of the giver, and we should be thankful for them without being greedy. I was really getting into a discussion about materialism and appreciation for the best gifts of all - love, friendship, grace - when she set me straight. "But Mommy, I don't want MORE, I just have fun wrapping and opening them." OH! I get it! So I asked her how she wanted to solve the problem. She decided to re-wrap her gifts so she could open them all over again, so she gathered up gift bags and went to it. Now THAT'S resourceful!

Looking Back

You know, I finally kept a resolution all year! Last year I realized that I was living every moment through the camera lens, determined not to miss a moment, but to record every event of our lives. I ended up living our moments through the pictures I took, and rarely enjoying them with my family at the time they occurred. Therefore, I resolved to live more in the moments. Looking at the number of pictures I have taken this year vs. last year, I have managed to do just that!
Having said that, here are a few glances back at our Christmas and New Year's celebrations.

There was some friendly family competition! Note to niece: I said I wouldn't put the pics on Facebook and tag you. There were no blog-related promises!
I do regret promising not to take pictures of Hot Daddy playing Just Dance 2 with his brother and all the kids. It was priceless!

Maddi, the panda, made out like a Build-A-Bear bandit! Princess Pea Pod was psyched!

Do you see that Maddi is asleep, but Princess Pea Pod is still dancing and prancing in her Snow White slippers?
She did a lot of that.
She's still doing a lot of that!

This was Princess Pea Pod's first year to really get into leaving cookies and milk for Santa. Those are some of our Cookie Day cookies.
That's a tradition we should definitely keep!

There was a lot of this. Sleeping peacefully, dreaming blissfully?
About every 30 seconds we would hear "You can tell Santa I'm asleep now!"

But she did finally give in! Thanks to a pretty rigid sleep schedule, we were able to get up at the usual time and get the camera ready before she stirred.
We know this year could be the last. We savored it!

She was even groggy enough to let me get a picture before the paper slinging began!

This little beauty is our 4 year old's first gun.
"You'll shoot your eye out." (If you can't name that movie then you seriously need to go watch  A Christmas Story. NOW! The come back and finish reading.)
It was Papaw's idea. Was I upset?
Just a little jealous that I didn't get mine until I was six!

These beauties are my cousins. I love them. They are some pretty fantastic females!

(Hey C! We'll see YOU in June!)

And THIS is the remains of an M&M cookie ice cream sandwich.
Princess Pea Pod loves them.
She ate the cookies first and scooped the ice cream out of her palm
to eat it with her fingers.
I only spazzed a little about the sticky mess.
She must be breaking me down.

What better way to bring in the new year than with loved ones we don't often see?
This side of the family lives  seh-veh-ral hours away.
We love these guys!

This is what Princess Pea Pod looks like when she's wired on sugar
(see the ice cream blob above) and wound up!
"I'm so happyyyyyyyyy!"

We had an experience with Build-A-Bear, and I learned a valuable lesson in making promises I may not be able to keep. I also learned a valuable lesson about malls in the big city. You see, I looked online to check the  hours for BABW on my handy-dandy phone. Then I told Princess Pea Pod that we could do something very special and go to Build-A-Bear with her cousin, Caitlyn. As a result, we had a very.excited.principessa.
Then we got to the mall and found all the stores closed. Including BABW. As a result, we had a very.bummed.principessa. I was in the dog house, and it was not one of those cute, foofy Build-A-Bear doghouses either. I decided to make it up by having her at the store when they opened the next morning. Again, I used my handy-dandy phone to check BuildABear.com and quickly found the local store hours. I made a plan for all of us to arrive just minutes before the store opened. The plan was executed beautifully. And then my sweet principessa ended up standing outside the store for an hour.

So what is the lesson here? When in the big city, make sure you are looking at the hours for the correct location. Apparently there are places big enough to have multiple malls.
I am shocked!

So Princess Pea Pod and Caitlyn built matching puppies. True to her style, our principessa named her puppy for a friend. The above picture shows her with Caitlyn the puppy, Caitlyn the cousin, and Dawg.

Princess Pea Pod and the Rapunzel Map

This is too stinkin' cute to not share! Yesterday Princess Pea Pod's fren gave her a Christmas gift. It was a Rapunzel bath set, which was very exciting for our little principesa. This morning she insisted on using the various products (all of them) and even sat still and quiet as I dried and brushed her hair with the Rapunzel hair brush. But she wasn't only excited about the products in the set. She pulled the picture out of the back of the box and spent all day telling us that it is a map to Nonna's house. This afternoon I loaded her in to Granna's car and sent her off on a big weekend trip without Momma & Daddy, and she made me check to be sure that we packed her map. I just talked to Granna, who told me they have arrived safely at their destination, Princess Pea Pod is sacked out with her pillow pet, and she followed the map all the way there. She's such a smart kid!

Princess Pea Pod's map to Nonna's house.

Of Brick Walls and Christmas Cookies

I hit a wall somewhere around Thanksgiving and fell into a time lapse. Or I fell asleep and didn't wake up for 2 weeks. Chances are much better that I simply forgot that days were fading into nights, which all too quickly give up their peace to the busy days that always lie in wait for me. Somehow they always know the alarm clock is going to go off and eventually my bed will eject me like some slapstick routine from a movie that probably would have been shot in black and white. The other day I literally had a meltdown because somehow I managed to miss paying the mortgage and several other bills and had no idea how I could possibly miss something so huge. The next day I realized its because I was 3 whole weeks ahead of myself and none of those bills are even due yet. Yeah, I just told on myself. Tell me I'm not the only one who has ever done that! Please!

And now I vow to kick down the brick wall and not miss out on another day!

Having said all that, we did have a nice, peaceful day at home the other day. Princess Pea Pod, Hot Daddy and I made Christmas cookies. Yay for Christmas cookies!

That awesome little number up there is a double decker blood sugar spike buttercream sandwich. I made it for Hot Daddy. Then I drooled over it and wondered what idiot made one for Hot Daddy and not for myself!
We also made these little cuties for Grandma & Grandpa.

And then Hot Daddy got playful and did this little number on the kitchen!

No, not the dishes piled in the sink from making tons of cookies and buttercream. No, not the cabinets that I still haven't painted. No, not the babysitter instructions I keep forgetting to update. The big blobs of gooey, sugary, real butter-y (because if its not real butter I'm not interested!) totally yummy buttercream on the cabinets. And counter. And dishwasher. And floor. I found remnants for two days! (Which is also only about how long those cookies lasted. I miss them when they are gone.) Don't worry though. Cookie Day with the Z's is already scheduled and there will be more cookies, bigger messes, and more fun! I can't wait!