It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas . . .

The first week of December was crazy. I only taught two days out of the five. I spent the Monday after Thanksgiving break at an Elementary Science Academy and, after dropping the girls off at school on Thursday, I drove up to Long Beach for the National Science Teachers Association Conference. I had another great weekend of sleeping all by myself in a quiet hotel room and did a four hour workshop about Argumentation in Science with some of my fellow Noyce teachers. Even better, I got to see my former student Kat and catch up with her! Matt kept the girls all by himself. He took the girls out to dinner, to breakfast, and to a birthday party to keep busy!

Hotel room view! That's the Queen Mary!

Kensington Cafe with Daddy

An Elsa Party!

Of course, after a weird week of work when I am expecting to actually teach my students all five days, we get a phone call on Thursday that Eleanor has a fever at school and needs to be picked up. Thank goodness I have a students teacher this year! I was able to leave school early and take Friday off to be home with Ella since Ms. Davidson was in my class teaching. Ella spent two days with an off and on fever followed by a lovely rash that broke out on Sunday evening all over her body. Looks like roseola.

Sick cuddles with Daddy

My mama made me go to Target even though I have a fever

Cuddly sick baby

Grandma Sue and Gramps came down on Saturday night to watch Ella while Matt and I took Madeline to her first showing of the Grinch at the Old Globe. Hopefully Eleanor didn't infect them since her fever was gone before they came to babysit! Madi had a great time seeing the play. I was impressed that the theater had boosters for the kids so Madi had no problem seeing the stage. There were a few moments that Matt and I thought she was going to ask to go home when the Grinch first started singing and was scary . . .but Madeline made it through and ended up enjoying the play and the happy ending!

Showing off her new theater outfit

Waiting for Daddy to park the car

Family Selfie

 On Sunday, Matt had his last home Charger game of the season. The girls and I had a very busy day. We met Grandma Sue and Gramps at the club for Brunch with Santa! Madeline was so excited this year and said she was definitely going to sit on Santa's lap and talk to him. She was willing to stand near him, didn't cry, said hello every time she saw Santa walk by, and generally did a million times better than last year! Eleanor . . . not so much.  After brunch (and a car nap), I took the girls to see the snow at Kensington Park. It was not so awesome. There were unwatched big kids everywhere hurling snowballs at any and all humans. We made it about 5 minutes before leaving the snow and going to play in the regular park. The girls had a great time on the slides and swings. After Matt got home, we walked down to the traffic circle for the annual Talmadge neighborhood caroling event. This was wonderful, festive, and chilly! Even Lani came with us, all dressed up like a puggle sausage in her christmas sweater.

Ella waiting for Madi to wake up in the car.

"This snow is cold mom"

Santa's car

Lani as a Christmas Reindeer. Her sweater was awfully tight!

The girls at caroling

Grinch Ticket

I love the obligatory screaming child on Santa's lap

Looking at Santa

Before Brunch

On the way back from getting food

Happy Madi with Santa

Ella not so happy

Eleanor is Walking!!!!

Excited!!!

It's official, Eleanor is a walker. She has been sort of standing up and cruising holding people's hands or the couch since not too long after she started crawling, but Ella hasn't been too interested in walking by herself until recently. I was sure she would start while I was away in San Francisco, but she kept on crawling until the week of Thanksgiving. By the day after Thanksgiving, Ella was ready to start walking alone and now her main mode of transportation is her feet! Hooray!

"Now that I can walk, I'm just going to climb this ladder thing ok?"

The rest of November . . . .

The week after my trip to San Francisco, I had the luxury of a day at home with no kids. I know Veteran's Day is about honoring our service members, but for me the day is a much needed time to get things done all by myself! I spent the day painting a wall in the kitchen, relaxing, and even doing some work for CREEC. Matt rewarded himself for holding down the fort without me with a concert and a night out with his friends on Wednesday. Luckily, I was super relaxed after my day off and had plenty of patience and fun to give the girls. We played peekaboo, made a huge mess in the playroom, and rocked to sleep

The dogs are so happy when I am home all day and the kids aren't

Painting time

Peek-a-boo!

I love lazy Saturdays with Matt and the girls. We drink coffee in the living room while the girls watch the neighbors out the front window and then do an activity or two, followed by a car nap. This Saturday we took the girls to play at Kensington Park. Ella is starting to really enjoy exploring the slides and activities at the park.

Madeline has had a list of activities she wants to do since September. She regularly dictates the list to me: Sea World, Beach, the Zoo, Train to the Carousel with Brennan or Joss or both (whoever is available and I need to call their moms right now), and a trip to the new park by our old house. Since Madi was able to cross off her zoo trip with Grandma T and Daddy, she requested a trip to Sea World after her swimming lesson the following week. It happened to be the first weekend of Sea World's holiday celebrations. We were able to see some San Diego snow, reindeer, and enjoy a quiet Sea World visit since most of the people were hanging out in Santa's Village.

Flip flops and snow? That's how we do it.

Ella had to see how the snow tasted

Turtle and fish viewing

Trees and Christmas music. I wasn't quite ready for this mid-November.

We have settled into a comfortable morning routine. The girls roll out of bed around 6:30 and must immediately eat since they seem to wake up starving. They like to watch some Mickey Mouse Clubhouse while waiting for Matt and I to finish getting ready if they have time. It is so nice to be able to get ready without hauling Eleanor around now.

Madeline's new favorite place to eat is Sonic. We have gone a few football Sundays in a row while Matt is at the Chargers game. Basically, this is an awesome way for me to get Eleanor a long nap in the car and feed Madi at the same time. Madeline loves sitting in the front seat like a big girl wile she devours her corn dog and apple juice.

Yummy corndog

Ella has no fear. She likes to try to stand on the chairs now

Lani makes an awesome pillow

Thanksgiving week was so amazing. It was hot and gorgeous. Matt took the day before Thanksgiving off and we went to Mission Beach with the girls. This is why I live in San Diego!

Digging in the sand

Ella testing the water bucket

Post beach neighborhood watch

We spent a lovely Thanksgiving with Grandma Sue and Gramps at the club. None of us had to cook or clean . . . it was perfect! I stuffed myself with mashed potatoes and stuffing, Matt had multiple servings, and Madi got to eat french fries and nuggets. It was such a relaxing holiday! We met up with Auntie Nee in Carlsbad on the Saturday of the break. Madeline requested Ruby's so she could watch the trains and eat eggs. We followed up breakfast with some shoe shopping (Mama's favorite).

The girls had a great time helping Matt get our new patio furniture out of the boxes they were delivered in. After the chairs were outside, they played in the box for a while. Madi said it was her house and they should sleep in it.

Post-thanksgiving we started getting ready for Christmas! It was so much fun to decorate our house even though the decorations we have don't stretch nearly as far with a whole house as they did in a condo. Madeline and I took a quick trip to Target (her favorite store) to pick up some decorations for the outside. Our house looks so festive, I am unbelievably happy to be celebrating the holidays in a real size home!

Mom's weekend away

The weekend after Matt's trip to Vegas, I had a conference in San Francisco for my Noyce Fellowship. I was so excited to sleep in a bed by myself and eat all of my meals with two hands for a couple days. I completely overdid the fun one of the nights, but remembered how to deal with a hangover from my college days and managed to power through the conference. It was nice to have a chance to miss the girls and I actually came back with a few more hours of patience than I might have otherwise had.

View from the top floor of my conference hotel!

While I was gone, my mom took Madeline for the weekend and Matt had Eleanor. Madi had a ton of fun with Grandma T, shopping, playing with Bella, and eating at The Brick. Eleanor went with daddy for breakfast out at Kensington Cafe, visited Grandma Sue, and relaxed at home (by which I mean she screamed in her crib while Daddy tried to help Ella learn to go to sleep without Mom rocking her). On Sunday, Grandma T took Madeline to swim lessons and then met up with Matt and Eleanor at the zoo. Happily everyone survived me being away and now I can leave whenever I want, hahaha.

Visiting Grandma Sue and Yoda

Grandma T took Madi for a haircut!

New boots

Stealing all of grandma T's bed

Ella and Jameson <3