Snow Day!!!

Finally, some more snow has come to Connecticut!!! Despite very cold temps, we haven't had any snow since around the beginning of January... and my little one LOVES the snow. So here's to a very happy snow day!



I stayed inside with the babe, so these pictures were taken through the living room window... not the best, but they'll do.

Most of our snow accumulation forecast is still yet to come... we're hoping for about a foot or so... yay!

Our Candlemas...

Candlemas was February 2nd. We celebrated last night, the 3rd. I'd like to be able to blame our belated celebration on there being a newborn in the house.... but, really, its just that I'm not all that good at getting things done on time.... oh well... Aurora doesn't know the difference, yet.

So, this was our Candlemas: rolling beeswax candles and a candlelit Pancake dinner... simple, but still very fun. We also talked a bit about Spring being on its way, and the return of the sun and why we celebrate those things with candles and pancakes. Aurora understood more of this than I had expected and commented that when Spring came, the bees would come, and we could thank them for our candles.... Oh, my sweet girl, you are always melting my heart :)

Rolling her first candle

Counting the candles... one for each of us, including Liam

Her first candlelit dinner

Our Candlemas table (we ate on our coffee/playtable, because our dinning table's covered with stuff at the moment)

And, for good measure, a picture of the babe this morning. I can.not.believe. he's going to be two weeks old tomorrow!!! His skin seems to be fairer than Aurora's and he's definitely more prone to baby acne and newborn rash... hence the redness in his face. His eyes are lighter, too, so I'm thinking they'll stay blue~ just like Daddy's :) Time will tell...

He's Here!!

Liam is Here!

January 22, 2010 3:01 pm

9lbs 4.5 0z, 20.75 inches

Of course, many many more photos to come;) And, also, a more complete birth story... but, too be quick... We were induced yesterday at already 4 cms, 80% effacement and the baby at 0 station. Pitocin was started on the lowest level, 1, at about 8:15am. They increased it to 2 at some point, but couldn't go any higher because I was contracting regularly at every 1-2 minutes. The problem was, they were the same type of contractions I've had all along... painless, and not building at all in intensity. But, I was contracting, so no upping the Pit. At around 11 am, my doctor ruptured my membranes and then things finally got started... Pit was reduced to 1, and then turned off as my body took over and did it's job. Less than four hours later, and after only 15 minutes of pushing, Liam was born. It was very intense, and my little guy is a bit black and blue from hurtling through his Mama's body at such a crazy velocity, but we both made it through (drug free, minus the Pit, as I had dearly hoped), and are already madly in love with each other. My doula, Rachel, was a godsend~~ it would not have been the birth it was without her!

Liam is doing great.... I'm still incredibly sore, but recovering. And, we are all looking forward to getting home tomorrow and exploring the new parameters of our family... now 25% larger.

For the birds

Watercolor and Salt Painting

We did this a little while ago, but I forgot to post about it :)

The idea was that where we sprinkled the salt, it would soak up the blue paint and leave an effect looking like snowflakes.

Aurora went a little overboard with the salt application, though, so it doesn't look much like a snowscape... but turned out beautifully nonetheless. I gave her 3 small dishes of salt- fine, coarse and rock- so she could explore the differences in each. It was such an interesting outcome... I imagine we'll be trying this again!

New Years and Epiphany/Three Kings Day

New Year's for us this year was kept pretty darn simple. We had some yummy (although store bought) pastries for breakfast, switched the calendars and Around The Year book over, lounged around and then Rory and I made this special candle. We will light it on the first day of each month, and then next January, use it to light the new New Year's Candle. The idea being that we will watch it grow smaller as the year progresses. We used clay punches to punch shapes from beeswax decorating wax strips and Aurora chose where to place them on the candle. Easy peasy and lots of fun.

And, today we celebrated Epiphany/ Three Kings Day for the first time. We took down all our Christmas decorations last night, and Aurora was none too happy to see the tree go... It helped that we had this small celebration to look forward to today. Given that I am ahem rather large with child at the moment (and contracting regularly, but not enough, apparently... whole other story), this celebration was kept pretty small as well. I had originally wanted to at least bake a tree kings cake to have for breakfast this morning... but last night, rather uncharacteristically, I actually recognized my limits and decided to skip any baking/further crafting, and stick to a paper crown and the three small gifts we had chosen for Aurora. And that was truly plenty for this year. It was a very sweet morning.

Looking Back....

December, 2008:

Such a little tiny bit of hair (that we were so excited about!), baby cheeks and diapers in the background that are now destined for a different little bum.

A jacket, too big then, and too small now

The thumb in the mouth has remained constant, though :)

And then, this sweet girl, just this morning.... grown up so much already:

Watching the magic of falling snow

Glimpses of Christmas

I'll share more pictures of the days leading up to Christmas soon.... The baby landed me on complete bed rest the last two weeks and I didn't have an easy way of getting pics onto Pete's laptop to post. But.... I'm nearly full term now and off bed rest, so there are a lot of catch up posts to do!

We had a wonderful Christmas---- it was very much a magical time for Aurora.

More pics to be found here

Advent Day Nine

Cranberry and Popcorn Garland!

A note about the lately sparse Advent posting: Santa really needs to bring some more memory for this old computer!!!! The computer has been acting up and so slow lately that I've dreaded getting on to post... because it seems that everything just takes so, so long right now. Hopefully this is something that can be fixed soon. I've also decided that really only the Advent activities and outings are post worthy, so I've left out the days that Aurora has just found a small suprise in her Advent cone... Christmas window clings, lip balm, her scarf etc....

So, anyway, our Garland: took way longer than I expected! I need to make more still for the rest of the tree. It's also much more beautiful on the tree than I had expected, so I'm thinking this is something that will become a tradition for us. I was surprised at how well Aurora did with the needle... she had a few pokes, but then quickly learned herself how to hold it more carefully and take her time. She did many, many cranberries all by herself!

Advent Catch Up

Snowflakes and St Nicholas Day!!

The snowflakes went better thank I had expected. Aurora's really into cutting with scissors right now, so I knew she'd enjoy it, but wasn't sure how much she'd actually be able to do. I had a few pieces of already folded paper, with a few preliminary cuts in them, and her scissors waiting for her in her Advent Cone for the day. She did really well.... as you can see from the flurry of snowflakes adorning our door!

St. Nicholas Day was very excitedly celebrated here for the first time last weekend. I used this very simple story to introduce him to Aurora and also painted a little peg person to look like St. Nicholas (which, I'm finding I never took a picture of!) to find the morning in her Advent cone the morning of St. Nicholas Eve. That evening, she set out her shoe with some carrots for St. Nick's horse and a note for St. Nicholas. She was very set in her mind that she needed to place her shoe at the kitchen door, and then St. Nicholas would move it to outside her bedroom door when he came. The note details these instructions for the good Saint. She also drew a picture of a fishing pole for him ;)
The next morning she found that St. Nicholas had come and left her a beautiful note on rainbow paper, a small bag of chocolate coins and a special ornament for the tree. She thought the coins were quarters for the laundry and was shocked (then delighted) when I showed her they were actually chocolate. Her special ornament for this year were ballet slippers to commemorate her first trip to the ballet.

Advent, Day Three

Downtown Tree Lighting!

Lots of fun and a very magical moment for Aurora when finally lit the tree.... I wasn't able to capture it with the camera, but her expression was priceless.

Advent, Day Two

Hot Chocolate and Christmas Stories before bed!

This equals one happy girl. Extra fancy hot chocolate with crushed candy canes and whipped cream and her first time hearing The Polar Express. Aurora was saying something about trains in her sleep last night... I think the book had quite an impact on her!

Advent, Day One

Planting Paperwhites!!

Aurora was thrilled to take down the first cone and find the bulbs inside... she loves to garden. Hopefully, we'll have some blooms for Christmas....

Preparations

Our Advent celebration begins tomorrow!! Aurora is super excited. It's looking to be a very, very busy month.... let's just hope this little guys stays inside me until after Christmas;)
We'll be adding some new celebrations this time around.... St. Nicholas Day, Santa Lucia, and Epiphany/Three Kings Day... but to start is our Advent Calendar which Aurora and I made out of cones of Christmas scrapbooking paper we had on hand. 24 cones pinned in two rows along the wall.... each cone will hold a small surprise or project or outing to do together.

Leftover scraps from the cones became refrigerator tangrams.... which have gotten much use already.

And, despite it still really only being Autumn, we started setting up our Winter Nature Table today.