Kylie's thoughtful ways of giving gifts...

On Sunday morning, Kylie came into my bedroom, while I was sleeping and said, "Mom, I think there's a present under the tree for you -- you should get up and open it." I said, "but it's not Christmas yet." She says, "It's ok, it's a fake present."....LOL! said, "Ok, let me sleep a little longer." She comes in about 5 minutes later...

"Mom, get up and open your present." I rolled out of bed and went to the tree and she gives me my present (in the meantime Dawson woke up too) -- it's wrapped and taped all the way around...and as I was holding this I was wondering what in the world?? I started opening it up and SURPRISE, it was my cell phone...LOL!!!

She says," see Mom, I told you it was fake." -- "DO YOU LIKE IT?" I said, "of course, I LOVE IT -- THANK YOU SOO MUCH!!!!"

Then we proceed with Dawson -- she gives Dawson two wrapped presents...one in wrapping paper and one in a piece of copy paper and Kirby wanted to help too -- so he grabbed one and started ripping it and Kylie freaked...but Dawson started on the other...and WAAALAAA it was two "My Little Ponies"! Dawson looked at me like, "what is this Mom?" He didn't know what to think. BUT, Kylie was quite excited about it...LOL!!!

Then it was Daddy's turn....and umm...yeah, Daddy's gift was no where to be found (Dave remembered her wrapping it). Dave says to Kylie, "umm...Kylie where's Daddy's gift...that's a very important one, we should find it." She says, "it's downstairs, you stay right here and I'll go get it." So she goes downstairs, grabs another piece of copy paper and the tape and a pen and I helped her wrap Daddy's gift. She gives it to him...and it's taped all over the place. He starts opening it and notices its HIS cell phone...he started jumping up and down, and saying, "thank you SOOOO much Kylie, this is exactly what I wanted -- How did you know this is what I wanted." and Kylie was just laughing!

So we had a very eventful Sunday morning that was just hilarious and Kylie put lots of thought into this morning :)

**I'm STILL laughing over this!

Guitar Hero "Rockstars"

Last night Dave was playing Guitar Hero on PS3 and Kylie was playing along with her Barbie guitar and totally getting into it -- it was hilarious :)

Kylie got her hair cut in a salon...

YAHOO!!! For the first time ever, Kylie finally got her hair cut in a salon. I've cut her hair 2-3 times since she's been 3 and we've attempted to have it cut in a salon but its never gone over too well in the past. I've heard some good things about this place called, "The Jungle" in Elk River and they have these little playground animals (as chairs) for kids and they have movies to watch while they are getting their hair cut -- it's fabulous!! We didn't get a whole lot cut off as we still like it long, but thank the lord we can now get it cut more often :)

As I mentioned in an earlier post...

Dawson loves to play in the cupboards and underneath the sink when I take the garbage out (and yes, he has his book in there with him...lol) :)

Promised Pictures!

Kylie and Dawson with Santa

Kylie's Christmas dance recital - Dec. 13, 20o8

Kylie and her friend Madison

Kylie and her friend Kristen

A few other highlights...

The kids got to meet with Santa on Dec. 2. Dave took the day off (his birthday too!) and I took Kylie to work with me on the bus and let her have a fun day with Mom and Dave came downtown around 11:30 and we headed over to Macy's for their spectacular event "A Day in the Life of an Elf" and then met with Santa afterwards. Kylie told Santa that she was a REALLY big doll house and a pink elephant (not sure where this came from) and that Dawson wanted a really big truck that goes really really fast. As for sitting on Santa's lap, Dawson wasn't quite sure -- he tried to squirm his way out as Kylie sat on the drum next to Santa (picture to come). But I was quite proud as she was still able to tell him what she wanted -- we're progressing every year :)

My friend Kelly had baby Lauryn on December 8 (yes, I now know 4 people with this birthday and two were born this year, hehe) and she weighed in at 8 lbs. 15 oz. and 22" long! I finally got over there last night to visit and she's absolutely gorgeous -- she's got a full head of hair and her face is soo pretty -- she already looks older than she really is.

Kylie had her Christmas dance recital on December 13, 2008 and Grandma, Grandpa and Grandma Denis came to watch. It was a lot of fun and Kylie looked beautiful as always! :) She is doing really well this year and really getting into it. This is her second year of dance and she's really enjoying it! (Again, pictures to come -- I haven't had time to get them uploaded.

This last Monday, we had some nasty snow storms come through and Dawson only allowed us about 4 hours of sleep, so I ended up calling into work and kept the kids home with me and around 9:30 a.m., Dave rolled in and said his crew didn't show up, so we had a nice family day at home. Kylie and I baked peanut butter/hershey kiss cookies and Dave baked his chex mix -- we had a really fun day!

As for the upcoming holidays, we have a busy few days (as if it hasn't been busy all month, LOL)...on Saturday, Grandma is taking the kids so we can get some gifts wrapped and then that afternoon, we have Christmas at my Aunt Ivette's house in Anoka with my Mom's side of the family and then on Sunday morning, we're headed down to Albert Lea to celebrate Christmas with the Sletten's (Dave's Mom). With Kylie getting into the whole entire Santa thing now and Dawson not far behind, we've decided we will be staying close to home for Christmas Day. I'm super excited for this year as its Dawson first year hopefully opening gifts and now that Kylie is a bit older, she totally gets into it. :)

If I don't get to post prior to Christmas -- I hope everyone has a safe and Merry Christmas!!

Dawson's 15 month check-up

Dawson went into the dr. for his 15 month (15 1/2) check-up on December 5 -- he weighed in at 22.4 lbs. (25%), which is a 1.5 lb. gain from his 1 year check-up. As for his height and head circumferance, they were both in the 25% tile as well...so he's seriously a little runt to us...Kylie was always in the 75-90% tile for everything all along. He finally completely graduated from his 6-9 month pants and is in a solid 12 month pants (with some pants still big in the waste) and 12-18 month shirt...yahoo! Otherwise, he's doing really well and is right on track with things. He got to show the dr. all sorts of tricks he does now :)

His new thing is to crawl underneath the sink cupboard where the garbage can goes...as soon as Dave or I pull the garbage can out to take it out, he's right there ready to get in...it's really funny (picture to come). He's starting to really interact with Kylie and she's really enjoying his company these days...they play so well together (most of the time) and yes, Kylie will literally run from one end of the house to the other and Dawson will chase her and just laughs...they both find that hilarious!! Dave and I just sit back (usually) and watch them, it's so much fun to watch them interact and watch Dawson learning each and everything that Kylie now does...he catches on quite quickly and is starting to copy everything she does :)

It's been a long time since I updated...

...I don't even know where to start with updating!!

We had a great Thanksgiving at Dave's Dad's house in Sioux City, IA. When we got there on Wednesday night before Thanksgiving, we went bowling and then had a great dinner on Thursday and got up nice and early (3:45 a.m.) to go shopping on Black Friday!! We actually ended up leaving a bit early as Dave was not feeling well. We came home Friday night, but were planning on staying until Sat. But we did manage to stop on our way home at the home of the Blue Bunny Ice Cream! The kids and I and Dave, of course, had fabulous ice cream cones (Dave just had a little as he wasn't feeling well).

Christina, Kylie and Casey Jo

(Christina and Casey Jo are Dave's little sisters)

Grandma Semple and Dawson

Over Thanksgiving weekend, we got our Christmas lights put on the house and our Christmas tree up! It's beautiful. This is our first year with a fake tree...unfortunately with Dave and Kylie's allergies, we're unable to get a real tree anymore :( But we were fortunate enough to get a tree from my aunt and uncle and it's big and beautiful -- we love it :) Kylie had a blast being able to help decorate and thought it was really cool putting her own ornaments on the tree! But I was really in the spirit early this year, I was super excited to get the tree up and couldn't wait to get it done! We also got a lot of our Christmas shopping done early too! Now, we just have to find time to wrap! :)