Christmas Recap

So far the best picture of our tree I've ever taken. This years decor was still the "unbreakable" theme. I'm just not confident Isabel gets how much mommy would cry if she broke her vintage ornaments - so the foam balls covered in shiny string from Target made another appearance.



Every now and then I catch Brooke is her "eyebrows up" pose. I love that look. And I love how much Brooke enjoyed Christmas this year. Thanks to the pre-holiday sickness and seizures she was a happy little elf and unlike most years really enjoyed all the holiday hustle and bustle. It was the best gift I could have ever received and I enjoyed every minute of it. As of today the honeymoon period is pretty much over. We have an appointment on Wednesday to see yet another neurologist to get yet another opinion. I'm making it my mission to figure this out in 2009. I want everyday to be like Christmas for her.



Isabel started to get the idea of the holiday this year (and I know she isn't wearing any pants in the picture but we were in potty training mode and that was just easier - and speaking of potty training, Isabel pooping on the potty for the first time on Christmas was the second best gift I got. See how easy I am to please?)

My favorite Isabel story from this Christmas? When we first starting talking about the idea of Santa bringing gifts she said she wanted a computer (because her friend Lily has a Barbie one). This lasted for about a week until Jeff got a pedometer from school (some kind of fitness program I think). She thought it was the coolest thing ever and called it a "walker". So from that point on whenever you asked her what she wanted for Christmas the answer was "a walker". So we were going to visit Santa and I asked Isabel if she would help Brooke and tell Santa what she would like for Christmas too. I told her Brooke wanted a Pink Ipod Shuffle to listen to her music. So the big moment arrives and the girls are happily sitting on Santa's lap.

"What would you like for Christmas girls?" asked Santa.

"Brooke wants a pink shovel and I want a walker" replies Isabel.

Rest assured I helped interpret that for Santa but it will go down as an all time favorite Christmas memory.

And I leave you with this final shot taken on Christmas evening - maybe not the most festive but definitely one of the funniest. (And in case you don't recognize him from Target's Halloween display this past year - that is Domo. Isabel looooooved Domo - and no, I don't know why.)

Merry Christmas!

So we're a little late but we just wanted to wish everyone a very merry Christmas! Overall a pretty good day here - but really how bad can a day be when we all have matching pink bunny jammies? Well I should clarify that Jeff did not have pink bunny jammies.

Something strange happened to Brooke's hair the last two days - seriously I really did brush it before we took pictures (I busted out the conditioner last night so it's been a little better today). Isabel tried to help but still couldn't do a thing with it.


So a pretty quiet day at home for us this holiday. Brooke seemed to enjoy her idog - the jury is still out on whether or not it was the dog or just her favorite music making her happy. Since she really can't open presents or play with many toys we let the joy of her day be having the things she loves as much as she wants. So we pretty much listened to Ralph or watched Elmo the entire day. And ate lots of sweets. All of these things generally have a daily limit - but not on Christmas!

Isabel loves her Dora kitchen. She's been a very busy little chef - I love hearing her say "cook it" and making all her own little cooking noises. The fact that we have finally found a toy that kept her attention for more than five minutes was gift enough for mom and dad.

And the "girls" got mommy some very nice acrylic stamp sets for Christmas (even though they weren't supposed to get anything!). It really did mean so much to me that Jeff took the initiative to ask around to find out what I might like AND took Brooke shopping to get it for me. We promised no gifts this year (and even when we do it's usually the time honored tradition of asking what I want and getting exactly that) so it was a very nice surprise.

A Little Christmas Preview

There's been lots of talk on the RettNet (our online link to other families touched by Rett Syndrome) about Christmas. Mostly about how difficult it can be since our girls don't typically find the same joys in the holiday as other kids their age. There have been some great discussions about helping them find their own kind of joy. One of my favorite quotes is from a dad named Scott:

"Maybe the girls are still pure to the real meaning of Christmas and have not been corrupted by the commercialization of it."

As soon as I read "pure to the real meaning of Christmas" it made me think of this picture (one of many I took in my annual "attempt-at-the-perfect-Christmas-card" photo shoot. Although it didn't end up the final winner, I think it embodies that quote perfectly.

Anyway - I've really wanted to start learning how to make my photos look a little more artsy fartsy (but I'm too cheap to buy the actions to do it for me). So here I am up way past midnight playing around with this wonderful shot - enjoy!

This is the original photo:


These have what I guess is referred to as a little color pop - I just added the dark edges on the second one:


These are supposed to look vintage (again with the dark edges on #2):


So I guess I'm pretty happy with the outcome.

The tutorials for the original effects I found on this blog:

http://jessicabell-tutorials.blogspot.com/

The tuorials for the dark edge effect was from 2peas:

http://twopeasinabucket.kaboose.com/cg_display.asp?g=4&seed_id=21818

Thanksgiving Do-Over

Since Brooke was sick with the flu on Thanksgiving today was officially dubbed "Do-Over Thanksgiving" - also known as great-grandma's birthday party. There was ham instead of turkey but the cute Thanksgiving outfits Grandma bought for everyone were just as cute. And I'm teaching Isabel early about the wonderful world of scrapbooking tools. She caught right on to my favorite - the Revolution. Just need to add a little paper and she'll be on board in no time!

Elfed

http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=9556480250

Merry Christmas from the VanArnhem elves!!