Welcome 2022! And welcome surprise visitor/guest Niki! Niki came out to visit us over the New Year weekend, and we had a great time. We let the girls stay up until a little after 8 pm, and did our own countdown with poppers before they went to bed. We didn't tell the girls what the poppers would do and let it be a surprise. Brooke thought there was going to be a little toy inside, so they were surprised by the pop! I didn't want to say there would be a pop because I didn't want them to be worried about the noise. They really liked them, though Winry couldn't pull her string and Niki had to help her.
On Monday Brooke was feeling sick and threw up and had a fever. She was feeling a little better later in the day, so Monica took her for a COVID test just in case. They waited in the line for I believe 90 minutes, and Monica captured the line of people waiting for testing as they were heading back home. The line was rather crazy... so that's... exciting?
Brooke got a science kit for Christmas and she's been really excited to give it a try. Monica helped her get through some experiments this past week, and she loved it!
One night this week we had fish tacos, and Winry put hers together. At first I thought it was only going to be cucumber and sour cream, but she did add some fish in the end. She was very happy with her taco.
It's been a struggle to get Grayson to eat lately. He was getting a new tooth, and that's probably what started it all. He'd put things in his mouth and spit them out, and then basically just wouldn't put anything in his mouth. And he'd scream and scream at us anytime we tried to feed him, even foods he liked. The blender was rather active and he ate many a pouch for a day or two. His mouth doesn't seem to be hurting anymore, and he'll eat a bit more. It helps the most to let him take charge. Sometimes that's picking the food off his plate himself, sometimes its getting into his food on the floor. This has only happened once, and it does seem like it helped.
My oh my... Winry was curled up in her shirt while getting ready for bed one night. She needed chapstick and naturally went out the neck hole to take care of that. The shirt was already a little big before, but it might be stretched enough to wear it the rest of her life now.
We took out our Christmas tree Wednesday night to get it out for trash day. We lost LOTS of pine needles (I accidentally put the tree all the way down, so it couldn't suck up water...). Good news, Grayson loved the crunching sound! The mess was already there, so I guess whatever to the stomping, and the plus side is that the house smelled nice and piney for a bit after.
Here are all the girls on the last day of 2021! This was close to bed time.
The new year brought with it the first real snow fall of the winter. The high on the 1st was somewhere around 9 degrees F, and we bundled up for the backyard shortly after breakfast!
We had a lot of fun in the backyard, and it didn't feel as cold as I thought it would. We did all the great winter activities, like snow ball fights.
And Niki pulled the kids around the back yard loop on the sled.
And I ran the kids around on the disc sled. In addition to that, we had a competition for the best somersault to snow angel, and I tried a few headstands. We had a great time playing out there, but eventually we started getting cold and headed in for hot chocolate.
After warming up inside a bit, it was just too good a first snow day to not keep taking advantage. Monica ran to the store to grab a few more sleds (I might have broken one in the backyard in the morning...) and then we headed to a close by park to sled down the hill! When we got there I put Grayson in the sled to pull him along to the hill. He liked it for a few seconds, but in the end was carried over, which was probably for the best.
Brooke and Winry both helped get the sleds over to the hill, and then it was time for sledding fun! Everyone enjoyed the sledding! Here's a video of Monica taking Grayson down.
Here's Niki and Grayson hanging out at the top of the hill. Grayson really took to Niki when she got here, which was great! When we went to Utah for his birthday, he shied away from everyone for several days, but Niki was his best bud right away! After a bit, Grayson had to head back for a nap, and Brooke went along to warm up her feet in the car. Winry and I sledded together for a little until Niki and Brooke got back and we continued to all sled together. Unfortunately I have no videos of Niki sledding. I really hope she got to go down. If not I'm super sorry you didn't get a turn Niki! We may have handed her too many babies and cameras...
That night after the kids were in bed we played some Skyjo and had a great time.
On Sunday, the girls both got the same hair style for church, so of course Niki didn't have any other choice!
Winry brought her Wikki Stix she got for Christmas with her to church. These were a really good activity cause she was super quiet doing them the whole time. She made the logo from the container all by herself! It turned out looking the exact same!
After church we headed up to Tyson and Tina's house so that Niki could see everyone while she was out. She also had to take Matthew his Christmas present. We got there early enough that we got to see Andrew before he had to leave to the airport to head back to school too! Of course Grayson found a chair to stand on. Later he found a little rocking chair and stood up on that. I didn't have time to take a picture of that one, but I did grab him before he fell over. Speaking of grabbing Grayson, earlier this week, Grayson threw himself off the couch. So Monica dove across the couch and was just barely able to grab his ankle and keep his head about an inch from hitting the hardwood. The unfortunate part, she dislocated her shoulder while doing so. Luckily it went back into place and other than still being really sore, seems like it's ok. Sounds like we're going to have many a Grayson save in the next little while.
Matthew and Winry played together the whole afternoon. Brooke alternated between playing with them and Megan. It's awesome how great all the kids get along, and they just had a super wonderful time together all day.
I'm feeling pretty excited for the new year, but nothing specific really comes to mind as to why. I still need to work out all my resolutions, but I want to work on speed reading which I already started into a few weeks ago, and I want to start using training plans for running again. Speed reading has been going well and I've enjoyed it a lot. It's also keeping me motivated to read more, and I spend some time each day reading a book. I already finished one last month in fact! As for running, it's just felt a bit unstructured (because it has been) and because of that I haven't had a way to track progress or improvement. While I've enjoyed going on runs, they've just felt harder than normal lately, so I'm hoping getting back into some structure will help get things moving again. Hopefully I'll get the rest of my goals figured out this week, and if I remember can talk a bit about them at the end of next weeks blog as well. Have a great week!
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