We Wish You a Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!  Our holiday was busy and chaotic and messy and just the way we like it.  We started at Dave's parents' house on Christmas Eve.  This was her first gift- it is a talking monkey.  It has over 100 phrases, sleeps, snores, burps and farts.  His eyes blink regularly and in all honesty, it kind of creeps me out. BUT....Avery loves it and I suppose that is all that matters.  

Dave and I each made some gifts this year- I made this board for each of the moms, some mason jar center pieces and Dave made Ashley a wine rack.

Ryen even managed to hang out later than her normal 7:45 bedtime.  This bottle was at about 9:30....

I was up before everyone on Christmas morning....is it supposed to be that way?  Ryen wasn't too excited about presents.....

 ....but Avery was a different story!

We opened gifts from Santa-

And Avery tried to give this Lalaloopsey to Daddy because "it was his favorite and Santa didn't bring him one".

Even after gifts, there was some time for a Christmas morning snuggle.

We hosted Christmas Day this year.  Dave's parents joined us as well as my parents, the Antfellners, and Ashley and Patrick.  There was great food, gift giving, and a Carrion tradition- Christmas carols sung by the fireplace!

Ryen received some musical instruments for Christmas including a drum.  She is a big music fan...especially when Uncle Patrick is playing:

Shortly after everyone headed home on Thursday, Avery asked to cuddle and watch a movie.  This was her five minutes later:

Even after napping, the girls (and Dave and I) were exhausted from the craziness of Christmas.  We wouldn't change it for anything.  This was the girls around 7pm on Thursday night:

One of Avery's Christmas gifts from Santa was her very own kitten.  Santa left a note explaining that she would need to go to the shelter in town with us and she could pick one out.  Throughout our process of "considering" (yes, there are quotes because I am not sure how much thought we actually put into this!) getting her a kitten, we had heard lots of advice from people.  The number one piece:  Get 2.

On Friday, I called the shelter and they had zero kittens!  Luckily our friends came through with 2 boy kittens that are about 5 months old.  They both have shots and have been fixed.  So, please welcome our newest additions-

The black one is named Kitten Love (by Avery) and the gray one is named Kanobi (as in Obi-Wan named by Dave).

Ryen of course went right for the ears.  This will be loads of fun....

We were so excited to have them in our home - until 4:45AM Saturday morning.  Kanobi decided to sleep under our bed, but his brother couldn't find him.  So Kitten Love stood in front of our door meowing constantly.  Finally, he was taken back down into the laundry room for the night.  Today seems to be a bit better of an adjustment.  We hear it can take several days for them to warm up.  Fingers are crossed.

We hope everyone had a Merry Christmas and that you have a safe and Happy New Year's Eve!  Best wishes to you and your family in 2014!!

Happy Holiday Happenings

Ever since Thanksgiving happened, we have been busy, busy, busy!  From decorating to preschool concerts, and photo sessions to getting ready for Christmas, I am not sure we have stopped all month.  Here's what we have been up to!

The weekend of Thanksgiving, we headed out to get our family Christmas tree!  We were very excited, Dave especially, about going and cutting down our own tree at a tree farm.  (Yes, feel free to think Christmas vacation- I was)  However, this was the best tree on the lot- no joke!

 

  So it was back to Casey's to buy our tree.  I was told that I could not get anything over 7 feet tall.  Avery and I came home with an 8-1/2 foot  tree.  :)

We also attempted to make a Gingerbread house.  This was this first one I have ever made, so we bought a kit.  The kit had many broken pieces, so we made an open concept home.

Avery had her very first Christmas concert with her preschool class.  This was such a big deal, that both sets of grandparents came down to watch her "performance".  And that it was.

She was pretty excited once she was on stage.  However, she spent a lot of time moving her dress around, sat down at one point, and then in a nice quiet moment, turned around and told the kid behind her to leave her alone (in her nice loud voice) because he was pulling her hair.  We were very proud.  :)

At the very end, all the kids were supposed to yell Merry Christmas...check out who did it a bit early!  :)

And then of course there was the cookie reception afterwards.

We also had our pictures taken with Santa and our favorite photographer.  Avery even got a little story read to her.  :)

We have had our first big snowstorm....and now it is gone.  The girls were very excited about it!  By the end of that day, Avery had built a fort and a snowman and had gone sledding.  

Ryen turned 9 months old and getting this picture was quite the challenge!  This girl is on the move constantly!!  She is currently 16.9 pounds (21st percentile), and 30 inches tall (50th percentile).  She is the happiest baby which makes everything easier.  She is a wonderful sleeper - 7:45pm- 7am plus 2 naps throughout the day.  Her first tooth finally popped through this week with another one close behind.

Remember how I said she is always on the move- well, she opened this drawer and crawled in herself.  We might be in trouble.

We have also been working on a little bit of sign language and simple words like cup and food, but this is what we get from Ryen regardless if she is happy, sad, needing something or tired.

Merry Christmas from our home to yours!!
Love,
Dave, Nikki, Avery & Ryen

Happy Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving sure came and went quickly this year.  I think it has to do with how quickly Christmas is approaching.  Don't get me wrong, the Glacinski family LOVES Christmas!  However, I am not a fan of it being so close to Thanksgiving.  I don't even have a chance to try and digest the goodies from one holiday before the next one rolls around.  I guess it just means that I get to see more family in a shorter span of time.
Thanksgiving for us is usually a Glacinski family holiday.  However, this year, Dave's mom and dad made the trip to New Jersey to spend some time with their daughter and her family.  That didn't stop this tradition following group...we just had a Thanksgiving a few days early.

Ready to celebrate with Gaga and Papa!

This was Avery's plate....barely a spoonful of everything.  She did eat a lot of it, but was more interested in what she got later.  (See below)

While playing at Grandma's house, she did find this from Daddy's day as royalty!

And after about 10 pictures, this was honestly the best one I had.

A tradition in our family is that each holiday requires a little Farkle playing.  Now, I had never heard of this game before meeting Dave but in our 12 years together, I think I have gotten pretty good at it.  I always believed that this was a game made up by his parents, until I started seeing it popping up in stores recently everywhere.

At Avery's first Thanksgiving, Papa Dave held her on his lap and played Farkle.  He let her touch the dice to make them lucky (I wonder if this will lead to a gambling problem) and let her help throw them.  This year, it was Ryen's turn to be initiated into this family tradition.

She looks pretty interested, right?

Somebody just lost their turn....

This was Avery's favorite part.  She ate the pie, but kept getting a whipped cream smiley face on her plate to eat.  :)

Then, we spent the actual Thanksgiving holiday with my mom's side of the family.  It was a full house and full of noise, laughter, and tons of food.  Avery loves going to Aunt Judy and Uncle Rich's house because of all the fun stuff they have.  (See pictures in the pool in the September blog post)  This time was no exception!

This is Ryen's new silly face...it cracks us up!

Hanging out with Gigi

and Auntie Debbie

 and Auntie Ashley and Lucas!

The next day, we went and visited my old college roommate and a very dear friend to both Dave and I.  She has a 2 year old and an almost 1 year old mixed with our two crazy kids, we thought for sure it would be chaos...but the babies did a lot of this:

Lots of staring at each other.  Then they would crawl to a new toy and....

stare some more.  And then repeat.

The two big kids kept mainly to themselves too or played with the baby that wasn't their sibling.

Unless they were sharing puffs with each other (which belong to the babies)

or hugging

they just kept to themselves.

It was a busy weekend, but we were then able to come home and get our house decorated for Christmas.  Here's one last picture for you-

Ryen is such an easy baby.  She sleeps really well, falls asleep on her own, puts herself back to sleep if she wakes in the middle of the night, plays alone or with people, and eats really well.  One of her new favorites- beets!