December 19

And here we are, Level 12 of 2020!  It's hard believe 2020 has come and gone both so quickly and so slowly.  We continued to find ways to be safe and have fun, especially as we headed into the holidays!

We've had a really nice fall with Little Sweetie's Girl Scout Troop.  Keeping with the theme of outside fun, we headed out to do a nature hike at a local park.  It was the perfect day for a group of Daisies and Brownies.

A great group of girls!

 

Girl Scouts has been our only group activity this fall and we've missed the companionship of in-person Run Club, but we've been happy to log our miles close to home.

     

     

Love our running girl!

And we've thankfully been able to just have a lot of fun around the house!

      

Future accordion player?

Lots of building!

And beading!

And coloring!

     

The weather has been fantastic!  Enjoying outside time.

Trap-making is also a pretty big deal around here!

Ice cream sandwiches in the truck with Daddy (Momma would never allow such a thing, lol!)

     

This silly girl can always find some fun to be had!

And, as usual, we enjoy our time together cooking!

     

     

      

     

Homemade crescent rolls!

     

A fantastic cheese omelet!

      

Holidays are coming; time for some Christmas cookies!

And speaking of holidays, the first one up was Thanksgiving!  Mimi and Pop-Pop came over and we were happy to count our blessings together.

Chef Sister cooking up her famous cranberry sauce.

     

Hanging out and reading with Pop-Pop.

     

     

Forever thankful for these two!

And after Thanksgiving, it was time to get into the Christmas spirit!  We jumped right in, ready to embrace the end of this crazy year.

A drive-thru light park was just the ticket to socially distant, festive fun!

Counting down the weeks until Christmas!

We had an upstairs AND downstairs tree this year and Little Sweetie loved having Daddy's old Christmas trains out to play with!

Our elf, Pat, has returned!  He brought us a Christmas book each night and even "helped" clean up Little Sweetie's desk!

     

Thanks Pat!  It was getting kind of crazy in there! ;)

      

Loving our Christmas jammies and Little Sweetie was SO excited to finally have a Pajama Day at school!

Our neighborhood had a Santa parade this year instead of the usual Breakfast with Santa and it was a hit!

      

     

Some early Christmas celebrating with Little Sweetie's Godbrother!

       

     

Enjoyed some socially distant Santa pictures!

We went to Mimi and Pop-Pop's for an early Christmas celebration and had a wonderful time!

Gingerbread house construction success!

     

     

Presents!

Merry Christmas from all of us and Mimi and Pop-Pop's new puppy, Sky!

Height and Weight

Strong and wonderful at 52.4 pounds and nearly 47.5 inches.

Literally growing too big for her britches!

Personality

Giggles and fun so much of the time!  We do clash sometimes over meals and eating in a timely manner, but that really seems to be a control thing on her part, trying to be in charge of more of her own life.  Otherwise, she is silly and creative and so fun to be around!

So happy!

Developmental Milestones

This was a big month of accomplishments for Little Sweetie!  We started out by picking up her 3rd place trophy for her age division from her first triathlon.  So proud of her!

Our newest triathlete!

Then, she showed us her bravery by being the only girl in the first grade who volunteered to be in the Spelling Bee and came in second out of the first graders!  She was rewarded with ice cream for her hard work.

     

A sweet reward for bravery and effort!

And finally, she was recognized as the Monarch of Merit for her class for the month for the value of hope.  Even Uncle M got to come and celebrate this achievement with us!

     

Forever proud of this amazing girl and thankful for the gift she is to us!

Fun Tidbits

With Daddy working from home, we were able to surprise Little Sweetie with a ride home in the Mustang!  Only a booster will fit in the back of the Mustang, so she was very excited since we won't let her ride in anything but her carseat still usually.

Very excited for her special school pick-up!

As the year winds down, we are ready for whatever adventures 2021 brings.  Praying for continued health, happiness, and perspective!

Until next year, 

LSM

Little Sweetie's Momma

November 19

Well goodbye October and hello November, or, as we affectionally call it, Level 11 of 2020.  Thankfully, we've all been able to stay safe and sane while also being able to have fun.  Our fresh 7 year old is doing great and is enjoying Texas "fall."   She also loved helping the fresh 39 year old in the house mark her birthday!

The October girls!

We celebrated Halloween a little differently this year, but it was still a lot of fun!

     

Picking our pumpkins at a reservation-only pumpkin patch!

These Wild Kratts enjoyed both Trot-or-Treat (at Inspiration Ranch) and modified Trick-or-Treat with friends at a park!

Love our "pandemic pod!"

Some tired skeletons are ready for bed!

Another big event we had this month was our annual Purple Week for Sanfilippo Syndrome awareness.  We had to postpone it from May due to the pandemic, but were able to hold some events in connection with World Sanfilippo Awareness Day on November 16.  Little Sweetie was a great helper in painting the rock at Little Buddy's school and getting decked out in all her purple to hang out at all our events!

     

     

Purple Power!

Late evenings at a WILLPower Spirit Night might make you tired for a few days, however!

Otherwise, we've been keeping busy with our usual activities and any other low risk activities we can think up!  Running outside is always a top choice.

     

Logging our miles for Run Club!

Can't forget our cooking!

     

     

Carrot muffins!

     

Spooky Halloween cookies!

     

Mummy hotdogs!

We even tried out Top Golf with the kids!  With its individual bays and open air access, it was fit our low risk requirements.  

     

Little Sweetie really enjoyed it!

Little Sweetie also had Red Ribbon Week at school for awareness about making healthy choices.  It also meant that she got to dress up each day.  Camo day seems to have made quite the impression and now she just wants to steal Daddy's hunting clothes all the time.

     

Loving herself some camouflage.

One of our big moments this month would have had to have been someone's teeth...specifically the two front teeth!  Little Sweetie FINALLY lost her last front tooth, which she had left hanging for a thread, grossing us all out, FOREVER.  She's fine once the tooth is out, but the anticipation of it coming out is overwhelming to her.  Thankfully, it was by pure accident that it finally fell out when I was wiping off her mouth.

     

From agony to bliss:  all she wants for Christmas are her two front teeth!

Height and Weight

Hanging in there at 52 pounds and just a smidge over 47 inches.  Check out her awesome first grade picture!  

She chose the laser background!

Personality

Time change has seemed to help both kids feel more rested.  Happy to have time with this exuberant and fun girl!

All smiles!

Developmental Milestones

All has been going well with her schoolwork, but we've had to have a few conversations about not rushing to finish work and making sure to check work over when finished.  She continues to love art and science.  We've also been moved to see how she's using her skills to help her big brother.  

     

Some of her art work and her experiments!

         

Such a loving and patient teacher, helping him with his learning time and then, noticing he was looking at a book, sitting down to read it to him.  I couldn't even be mad that she'd forgotten to brush her hair; the moment was too moving.

Fun Tidbits

It was a crazy election week this month, with results from mail-in voting taking days to process and count, but the election was finally called for Biden/Harris.  I don't care what your political affiliation is, I was happy to get our amazing girl stay up and watch the acceptance speech of the first woman elected to the Vice Presidency.  

Don't ever let the world tell you that you can't.

We will see you next month, for Level 12, the last level of 2020.  

Until then, 

LSM

Little Sweetie's Momma