Ringing in the New Year!

we decided to do something a little different and special this year for New Year's.  On the afternoon of New Year's Day (after naps!) we bundled everyone up and went to a KTV (karaoke) with some friends.  the way they do karaoke here is in private rooms that have big couches, huge tvs on the wall, and your own personal set of wireless mics to use while you pretend to be the rockstar that you and your mother know you really are.  We brought two of our own toy microphones along as well so the kids were never without their own even if the adults were using the real ones.  at first, the kiddos didn't know quite what to to think of it all, but they warmed up to it eventually and had a blast dancing and singing along.  unfotunately, i didn't get a ton of great pictures from the day.  the lighting was really dark and everyone was moving around so much!

eliana made sure that titus got a turn wtih the princess mic

he was definitley seranading me in this picture ;)

we always love an opportunity to dance!

Sweet Gifts

been getting some cute pics of the two little stinkers lately!  titus LOVES watching his sister, and she LOVES it when she can help out and love on him!

she also thinks its quite fun to copy him.  we've caught her several times trying to place her feet in her mouth as well!

it looked like they were having way too much fun...i just  had to get some kisses for myself! 

Christmas Wrap Up

well, i guess it's about time i wrap Christmas up....seeing as it is the end of January and all! 

this is how we open presents with our grandparents!!  we had fun skype dates for opening up all the goodies they sent!!  thanks to the grandparents we have a vast supply of playdough toys, wii games (and her own pink remote even), new books, dress up clothes, art supplies, new clothes, and many many other wonderful things!!  thanks again for sending us so many wonderful things AND for shipping them all the way over here!!  they are enjoying it all still!!

i might have gotten a little carried away with demonstrating Eliana's new tutu!  i will probably also regret putting this on the internet for everyone to see and ridicule me, but oh well. 

titus got in on the unwrapping fun too, but, of course, he was kind of oblivious to it all.  he sure did look cute though in the Christmas outfit nanny sent him!

Elly Bean is flexing her muscles in order to show you her cool new princess watch!

titus' gifts from us included a teething ring (which is coming in very handy these days!) and two lovey blankets that i made from the same fabric i used to make his quilt.  i also added ribbons folded in half along the edges to make it like a "tag" blanket.  so far, he's liked playing with them! 

playing with his girlfriend :)

there are several funny parts to this picture.  1)eliana got these cute new elmo pjs for Christmas and really liked wearing them, so we let her just stay in her pjs all Christmas Day.  why not?  2) during her naptime, she usually just sleeps with her shirt and pull up (haven't progressed to panties during sleeping times yet!), but i guess she was so enthralled with her pjs that this is what i saw when she woke up.  she had grabbed her pj pants and panties and put them on...pants inside out, and then put the panties on inside out AND on top of the pants!  we all had a BIG LAUGH over this!  she didn't quite understand why we wanted to take a picture either :)

such a silly girl!!  why not put elmo and a tutu together?  sounds like fun to me!

Update on our week without Daddy

We are almost there!  Daddy will be home in two days!  yeah!!  thank you to those who have lifted us up during this week!  needless to say, it's been a VERY LOOOOONG week.  here are the highlights...

• titus is still teething...nothing wants to poke through, but i'm pretty sure i see at least 4 under the surface!  this has led to him sleeping inconsistantly again (boo!), nursing more frequently, and needing lots of cuddles (making the Moby Wrap my LIFESAVER!)
• titus started running a very low fever today....hoping (and asking you to lift him up, please!) he's not coming down with eliana and I's cold. 
• Eliana spent about 2 whole days on the couch watching movies (i don't care if i ever see Mickey Mouse AGAIN!) and downing fluids.  she had two large smoothies a day, lots of "tea" (warm water with lemon juice and honey), and chicken noodle soup for about two days.  and, today she seems to be back to her energetic self.  yeah!  i'm pretty much over it as well but still have some lingering nasal junk. We started the fun process of disinfecting everything yesterday and today!
• We haven't been able to leave the house since last Friday.  yes, that is almost one entire week.  the weather was too cold, eliana was too sick, and i just couldn't handle the thought of it all by myself.  (i think we will definitely be ready to escape when Daddy gets back!)
• Father was MERCIFUL last night!  they were both down by 6:30.  titus was up around 8 and Eliana was up around 8:30.  oh, how i loved the quiet in this house this morning!!  nothing like a Good Book, warm cup of coffee, and a QUIET house in the morning till 8 a.m.!  healing to the soul!  

so, we have survived (so far).  vip and i think we will try to avoid this long of a trip again though.  :)  

daddy's little girl

the first night we attempted to take our much anticipated family picture, we did happen to get some cute ones of Eliana and Daddy while we were getting it positioned right, etc.  she loves her Daddy!!! 

happy birthday, JC!!

When i was a child, my family often attended a birthday party for JC that my piano/voice teacher and her family held every year on Christmas Eve.  I have lots of fond memories of going to that party, driving around afterward to look at Christmas lights, and different things that we did depending on the year.  anyways, i really wanted to start our own traditions this year since eliana is old enough to understand it all a bit more.    one of our new traditions was making a birthday (cup)cake for baby Jesus to eat Christmas eve after dinner! 

we worked together to blow out the candles and even sang Him a little song! happy birthday, Jesus!

Life according to Elly Bean

 two of her favorite things lately....dressing up like Elmo and playing "mommy"

a few fun conversations with the Bean...

(to Lao Lao concerning the delivery of a card for Crackers (my grandma))
Eliana:  I go outside with Daddy...to airplane...give Crackers my CARD!!!
me:  why don't we mail it?? 
Eliana:  no

after we deal with a behavior/heart issue, we always pray and ask Father to help her do better next time.  recently, she's started to pray herself afterwards...this is one i've heard a few times recently...
Eliana:  dear God, thank you children obey parents IN THE LORD, AMEN!  (emphasis denotes her excitement in saying those words...she kind of says them like they are staccato notes.)

concerning Daddy watching football (thanks to the slingbox at Nanny and Gampa's house!)...
Daddy:  elly bean, you want to watch football?
Eliana:  its TECH! watch TECH!  (referring to Virginia Tech, her Gampa's alma mater...it wasn't TECH, but she recently received a VT cheerleading outfit, so everything concerning football is TECH now.)

after i pummped some milk for Titus to drink while we are out on a date tonight...
Eliana:  now, i need do it.  need get milk from my tummy for MY BABY drink! (i told you she likes to copy me!)

needless to say, she keeps me on my toes for sure!  we love you bunches and bunches, Elly Bean!!

Our first ever Gingerbread house!!

 i had so much fun this year doing special activities with Eliana during the Christmas season.  she is finally old enough to start enjoying them!  and, thanks to our 12 boxes of goodies that i mentioned in a previous post, we had graham crackers as well as some fun candies to make her first ever gingerbread house!!  as you can see, she was quite enamored with the sugary creation! 

 and, since we have our super helpful helper here these days, there was actually someone on hand to take a picture of ME with Eliana and our sugary mansion!!  oh the joy of being in pictures again!  hehe!

it was very hard, but we did decide to wait for Daddy and eat it with him after dinner.  she was actually more excited to eat the fruit snacks off of the house than anything else, which was fine with me (more icing and graham crackers for us!)

this week

this week is a LONG week for us here at the Vipperman casa.  Daddy left on Saturday for a business trip in the big city, and won't be back till Saturday.  yes, that is 7 1/2 days!  7 1/2 very full days, which include antarctic temperatures (thus no adventures outside), a baby that i am 99% sure is teething (those silly things won't pop up though!), a baby that has also stopped sleeping through the night (a feat we were so excited about and ENJOYING last week!), and a toddler and a mommy with some nasal congestion that i am hoping and praying GOES AWAY and doesn't pass on to the baby...you know, the one who had pneumonia recently.  :)

once again, i am extremely thankful that my sweet hubby pushed me to hire our helper.  when she showed up this morning, she worked her tail off helping me out!  she helped me wash all the toys (after the bout with pneumonia, i've gone a little crazy with the disinfecting!) and then went to the store to buy vegetables so i could make some chicken noodle soup (trying ALL the home remedies i can to get rid of this cold), and that was on top of her normal load of helping with the cleaning, dishes, and laundry!  i seriously would have probably lost my mind today if she hadn't been there.  and, we definitely wouldn't have had anything remotely healthy to eat since i couldn't get all of us out in the antarctic weather by myself to buy anything.

So, if we come to mind this week, please lift us up!  Specifically, ask that I have patience, endurance, and that we would all be HEALTHY!!  Eliana has told me pretty much each day since Vip left that she wants Daddy to come home.  she's going to be missing him LIKE CRAZY by the time Saturday rolls around.  so, please lift up her little heart too.

our family

now, that's more like it!  a family picture that doesn't look like we live in a dark cave!  of course, the kids didn't want to smile, but that's just the way it is when you want a family picture with two kids under three!  i was also about a week late in putting all of our decorations up becuase i was so determined to get a pic of us in front of the Christmas tree, but we finally got one! 

catching up

 here's the story behind this pic....we haven't taken a family pick in a WHILE.  every time we have friends over we get busy, or Titus goes down for a nap, or we just forget.  so, the other night we decided to set the tripod out and just take it ourselves when titus woke up and before Eliana went down for bed.  i put make up on (hadn't done that on that particular day, put a nice sweater on, and put a dress over Eliana's pjs.  we got the camera set up, and then the battery died!  ahh!  so, we took it with the video camera because i refused to not have a picture after all that effort.  hopefully we'll remember to take another one when the nikon is fully charged!! 

you've heard the tale of the 12 days of Christmas, right?  well, this is the tale of 12 packages of Christmas!  recently, Eliana and Daddy were getting ready to go to the park and play in the snow with some new friends when we got a knock on the door.  it was the postman.  he came upstairs and asked if we were expecting some packages.  i said "yes, our family has been sending us things for Christmas".  he said there was 12 boxes down in in his van that he needed help bringing up!  we said "12??!!"  he said "12...just come and see."  it turns out that a group of sweet brothers and sisters that we have never met before sent us all these goodies (to share with some other friends as well).  they had asked us to send them a list of things, so we sent them a few things, not knowing that it would result in such an amazing display of generosity! 

 stuff was everywhere

 my living room got swallowed up by all the goodies as we sorted through them and divided them up

 seriously...it was everywhere! 

 the kiddos thought it was pretty amazing too!  thank you so much, sweet friends that we hope to meet in person some day!

we had fun making Christmas cookies last month!  we made a double order of the dough the first time and froze the extra so that we could make them a second time.  eliana loved cutting out all the shapes and eating them, of course! 

Mr. T. LOVES his toes.  when fussy, you are pretty much gauranteed to get a smile if you strip him down and give him unhindered access to his little piggies.