Happy Birthday!

December is obviously a wonderful month because of Christmas, but in our family it's twice as nice!  The month of December is the birthday month of my Grandma Mosher and my sister Toni, and now CJ too.  Yesterday, we drove up to visit Grandma for her 85th birthday.  It was a long, rainy drive, but it was well worth it.  We drove up to Arcadia and took Grandma out for lunch for her birthday.  We went out to lunch at Mimi's Cafe and then went back to the house to hang out for a bit before the drive back.  We all love Grandma Mosher and are so thankful for what a wonderful Grandma she is! 

I have so many fun memories with Grandma and Grandpa all growing up.  It's also really fun now to see her has Great Grandma Mosher with Bailey.  Bailey was completely obsessed with Grandma Mosher the entire visit.  She wanted to sit by her, show her everything, and had to hold her hand all the time.  You could tell that Bailey wanted to really impress her because she even went poops in the potty for Grandma.  She told me she had to go, so I went to show her to the bathroom, but she said, "No Grandma Mosher needs to take me!"  The ultimate sign of love--going to the bathroom in the potty.

Happy Birthday to the best Grandma ever!!

Oh Christmas Tree!

We got a whopper this year!  I'm not quite sure what we were thinking, but we about doubled the size of tree that we normally get.  As we were unbinding it, I was certain we were going to reenact a scene from Christmas Vacation.  Despite it's grandeur size, I think we pulled it off!  The corner is totally consumed by Christmas tree, but I love it!

Here's Bailey and Papa at the tree lot.  My dad was trying to convince her to pick his tall and skinny tree, but we went with the big and fat one.

Bailey's favorite thing was running through the "forest" and hiding.

Her favorite one was the beautiful pink flocked tree at the entrance.  By this point on our adventure, she, of course, has her mouth filled with candy--very typical Bailey.

This was the almost Griswold moment that we had.  I thought for sure that the tree's branches were going to burst out of the netting and break our sliding glass door.

She's ready for the finishing touch--the star!

Tada!!  She could almost reach the top.  We only broke three ornaments in the process of decorating our tree this year--two incurred irreparable damage (one by Bailey and one by me) and the third is still waiting to be glued back together.  A very successful evening by most standards.  Every day Bailey wants to rearrange her decorations and make sure that we have some candy canes on the tree.  I know that if I put more than one candy cane on the tree, they will slowly disappear and end up in Bailey's stomach.  This child would live on candy canes if allowed.  Happy tree decorating to all!

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun

I have a lot to post, but I just wanted to get this picture up.  My sister Keri, and CJ, and Ty came down last weekend for our family Christmas party.  It was tons of fun, but I must save that for when I'm not about to fall asleep.  One day me, Toni, Keri, and Bailey got to hang out and have fun.  We went out to breakfast and ate delicious food then enjoyed some Christmas shopping.  Bailey wanted to wear a tutu for the day and, more importantly, her legging warmers (her fabulous way of saying leg warmers).  She was so proud because she put them on herself.  She's getting so grown up everyday!  More pics and family fun to come once my field hockey banquet is over tomorrow.

Just Chillin'

I wish I could say that's what we've been doing, but it seems that we've been doing anything but just chillin.  I thought my life would be filled with care free afternoons that would drag out into lovely, relaxing evenings once field hockey season was over, but that hasn't been the case yet.  Here's Bailey on Thanksgiving.  I love this picture!  She looks like she's just hanging out (on the counter) loving her life.  We need to be like this more often.

Needless to say, life has been busy, but good kind of busy--busy planning, meeting, organizing, shopping, driving, working, etc..  This weekend is going to be so much fun.  It's our ward Christmas party on Friday, Toni's bridal shower on Saturday, and our family Christmas kickoff party on Sunday.  Keri and CJ are coming down, so we decided to cram everything into one weekend.  Ty flew down today, so I'm so excited that the whole family will be here!!  We are planning some super fun stuff for all of our parties this weekend, so I hope it all works out. 

Right now, it's way too late so I'm off to bed.  Here's a picture of me and Bailey on Thanksgiving and the kids at a park last weekend.  They can really get into some awesome quarrels when the three of them together, but they can also be really good friends.  We just shake our heads when they get really loud and think, "They'll all end up being best friends one day!"

Tis the Season!

I know it's still November, but I'm jumping full force into the Christmas season this week.  I'm off of school for the entire week, so I've decided to immerse myself into Christmas.  It's not really hard because I aboslutely love Christmas time!  Once I'm into it, I kind of want to stay all year.  I've been known to keep up my Christmas decor until February before, and I'm not ashamed to admit it.  Yesterday was some pre Thanksgiving day sale shopping.  Today was visiting Santa day!!

Bailey was so excited to see Santa!  She's never been afraid of Santa or any other giant character people dressed up at theme parks.  She's just very intrigued by all of it.  This year she completely grasps the idea of Christmas, Santa, and the whole deal.  Brian even started using the "I'm going to call Santa" routine to get Bailey in line.  He called Santa about 10 times on Sunday to keep her from crying, throwing a fit, or whatever naughty/negative behavior was being demonstrated at the moment.  He even found a picture of Santa holding a cell phone to show her when he's calling Santa.  I told him that it's a little too early to start that bribery, but it works.  I even used it today when she was not talking nicely.  I called Santa and right away she stopped.  Then she wanted me to call him back to tell him that she was being nice, so I did.

We met Becky, Hailey, and baby Chloe at the mall for the Santa event.  The thought was that if Hailey saw Bailey being friends with Santa, then Hailey would walk up and talk with him too.  The plan didn't work because Hailey clung to Becky for dear life and would not even be coaxed down by candy.  You know a kid is seriously afraid when they won't come down even for a piece of candy.

Here's Bailey trying to talk Hailey out of her stroller.

While we were trying to convince Hailey to see Santa, Bailey just ran right up and started chatting with him.  I wasn't even ready with my camera crew (Toni and Mom) to start taking pictures.  My child is fearless--sometimes a good thing, but sometimes a bad thing.  She just walked right up and had a conversation with the jolly man.  On the way over to the mall, she said that she was going to tell him that she wanted a dolly, some toy games, and of course candy.  Last year we saw Santa so many times throughout the season, that she thought Santa = candy.  I had to tell her that she wasn't actually going to get the presents today, but just ask for them.  I kind of thought she might think that he was going to pull her requested presents out of his bag right there.  She was okay with that idea as long as she got some candy.  He gave her a candy cane and then she sat on his lap and smiled patiently waiting for the picture.  She was so excited that her smile is extremely fake looking, but I kept it because that's how Bailey is.  She can be kind of a poser with pictures, which sometimes results in fake smiles.  But I'll take 'em!  Then she immediately wanted to eat her candy and like  nice little girl, she then waited again (there was now a line) to go tell Santa thank you for her candy cane.  She wouldn't want to miss out on any presents just because she didn't thank him.  Toni got in trouble for taking pictures with my camera in front of the fence, but who cares?  We bought the picture and then went on our merry way.

Seeing Santa the week of Thanksgiving is one of the best little Christmas tips that I know.  You can almost always walk right up; you might have to wait a few minutes, but nothing like the first year I took Bailey.  We took Bailey and the twins and we waited for about an hour in line.  By the time we got to the front the twins were so petrified that they wouldn't stop screaming.  So I learned from that first disastrous year and now go my week off and it's quite an enjoyable time.

Here's an artsy shot by Toni of Bailey sprinting up to see Santa.  Click on it to make it bigger to see the pure joy and excitement in her face.

This was when we realized that Bailey was up chatting with Santa.  I love that she's giving him a hug, but keeping a pretty close eye on that basket of candy canes.

Here's one of Toni's illegal pictures in front of the fence--way to go Toni!

Bailey is posing with her candy cane.  I love her little pose!

 

Here she is waiting patiently with Grammy to tell Santa thank you for the candy cane.

Just too cute to pass up a chance for a photo op with this girl.  It's funny to see pictures of her now without her glasses.

What a difference a year makes!  Look at how much she's grown and check out all of her gorgeous long flowing locks!  I do love her outfit last year with her red sparkle shoes, but this year's is pretty cute too.  It makes me laugh to think about last year all she knew was that if she went up to talk to this strange looking man, she would get a piece of candy.  She's such a good sport about most anything involving candy.  I also think it's funny that it's the same Santa guy.  I wonder how much he gets paid; he is very good with kids.  Crazy to think that in next year's picture Bailey will be that much older and she'll be posing next to her little sister!  I'm excited just thinking about the matching outfits right now!!  So here's to the kick off of our 2010 holiday season!

Some Halloween Lessons Learned

On Halloween, we went over to our friends Becky and Ammon's house.  Bailey and their daughter Hailey are best friends, or mortal enemies depending on the moment.  We thought that taking the two of them trick or treating together would be fun for them.  Becky and I decided that we'd go trick or treating first, then come back and eat dinner after.  We thought that if we left around 5:30 little kids would be out filling their buckets with candy.

Becky and I tried to get some cute pics of the two of them together before we headed off to get candy.  These are about as good as they get, but they're still cute!

Bailey is checking out Hailey's pumpkin to make sure she doesn't have any candy yet.

We started out with their neighbors, thinking that for sure the girls would be successful in their first attempts.  We were wrong!  The first three houses that we tried, we struck out!  The girls were so cute and walked up to each house, but with each house they became more certain that this trick or treating thing was a hoax!  They were really confused about why we were asking them to go up to each door.  We decided to head over to our friend's street where we knew we'd get at least one house.



Here's Bailey looking rather dejected at another empty house and her still empty bucket.

When we got to Kirstie and Brad's house the girls were about ready to give up.  When Kirstie opened the door, Bailey walked right on in and was ready to stay the night.  We had our first successful house.  Their neighborhood looked a little more promising, so we continued on.  We thought it was weird that there weren't more kids walking around; it was now nearing 6:00 and the streets were practically empty. 

We were the first trick or treaters at most of the houses that we went to, but that also meant that the people who opened the door were still friendly and happy to see two adorable girls standing at their door.  Some people were smart and set up camp outside their garage door, so they didn't have to keep getting up and down all night.  We all took turns walking the girls up to each new door.  The girls were very polite and said thank you at every house.

About five houses into our night, Ammon and I walked the girls up to the door.  It looked like it would be a success because of all the Halloween decorations out.  There were spooky lights lining the walkway and some pumpkins by the door.  By now they knew the drill, walk to the door, knock, wait for it to open and say, "Trick or treat!"  Hanging on this door was a spooky looking witch.  When we got close to the door, the witch started moving, her eyes lit up, and it was making creepy sounds.  Hailey just turned around and started running away.  Bailey started screaming, "STOP, STOP IT!!"  It was hilarious!  Both of the girls were shaken up and we had to make sure that the next house was nice and cheery.  I really wanted to take them back and video tape it this time, but I thought that would have been a little too cruel.

Here's Bailey with her favorite, "Arrrr me tatey!" pirate pose.

Half way through, Bailey started to realize that this was the greatest thing ever!  As we would leave one house, she would say, "I love the next house!"  She even got brave enough that she wanted to walk up by herself, with us close behind her of course.

Just as we were done for the night, the streets started to get filled with more little ghosts and goblins out trick or treating.  It was close to 6:30 and practically dark.  Becky and I were amazed that that was the time to start walking around; we apparently missed the memo on that one.  Despite our early start, our first time trick or treaters, and the few scares we had, it was a very successful night.  When we went back to the house, the girls were ready to eat their entire buckets of candy.  We got them to eat some real food, but candy was constantly on their minds.  We had a great night with the Sullivans!

Around 8:00 we headed over to my mom and dad's house to be their only trick or treaters of the night.  We had to stop by so they could see Bailey, and because Toni got real dressed up for the occasion.  Toni was a little bored and really excited to see Bailey, so she got into the full Halloween spirit! 

Bailey did not know what to think when they answered the door.  I'm pretty sure it was the first time she'd ever gone through the real front door too.  She wasn't sure who the crazy witch lady was until we went inside.

Lessons learned from Halloween:

1.  Trick or treating starts when it gets dark around 6:30ish.  Forget trying to be safe with the little ones.  If you want the candy, you have to wait until it's dark.

2.  If there's something scary hanging on the front door, it's probably meant to scare the little ones away.  Be prepared with video camera to catch all of the spooky moments.

3.  Probably do a test run at your own house so the kids don't think it's okay to walk into every door that opens.

4.  The lesson Bailey learned is that Halloween is the greatest day ever!  She asks about the Halloween decorations and trick or treating almost every day.  Now that she's old enough to get it, she loves it!



Baby Girl #2!!

We found out on Friday that we're having another girl!!  I, of course, was very excited because I really wanted to have two girls in a row--even though a boy would have been great too.  Now the girls will be best friends/worst enemies throughout their life, but they'll end up on the best friend side of the spectrum.  I was also excited because I now know that I get to use all of the clothes I have at least one more time!  If you knew how many boxes of clothes I had in my garage, you would understand.  I was also excited because, it's no secret, that raising boys frightens me!  Brian always tells me these horrific stories filled with blood, bruises, injuries, hospital trips, knock out fights, and more about he and his brothers growing up.  I think his stories scare me so much, that my body is now only programmed to make little girls.  I'll try to deprogram my brain if we get to baby number three so Brian can have a boy :)  I know that everyone keeps telling me that I have no say in the matter, but I'm pretty certain that I mentally and physically willed Bailey and this  little girl to be girls.

I wish I could reveal her name at the moment, but we haven't come to any conclusions.  I'm not one of those moms who keeps it a secret until she's born, so as soon as we decide I'll let you guys know.  Right now I have one in mind, but I'm not yet 100% sold.  We also can't decide if we're going to go with the B name theme or just totally awesome names that we love.  The one name that we're thinking about isn't a B name, hence the dilemma.  I might just have to google B names and see if one stands out.

So for now, the Bronson family will continue to live in the land of princesses, fairies, bow, dresses, and dolls.  It's actually a really nice place to live!

Too Many Treats = Bad Tricks

Last night was our ward's Trunk or Treat party.  Bailey has been looking forward to trick or treating for a very long time.  To get into the party spirit, we decided to decorate our pumpkins.  I bought a pirate pumpkin kit this year, and it was the best $7 I ever spent!  It's like a Mr. Potato Head kit with all of the pieces to just stick into the pumpkin.

Here's Brian and Bailey ready to start!

This kit was awesome because Bailey could actually help and it was no mess.

Here she is with her very own pumpkin pirate.  She was super excited.

After we decorated Bailey's pumpkin, it was time to get dressed for the party.  We were going to be a family of pirates!  It was at this point, that Bailey decided that she didn't want to wear her pirate costume; she had decided that she wanted to wear her candy corn shirt.  I told her that it wasn't an option; only pirates were allowed to go to this party.  That idea was quickly ruined when Brian decided that he wasn't going to be a pirate either.  I got dressed and then we headed over to my mom and dad's house to pick up her pirate skirt and vest. 

My mom and whipped up a last minute pirate vest to add to her costume.  It was the perfect touch to her costume.  Bailey was not in a chipper mood, despite her more than three hour nap.  Once I captured her and wrangled her into her costume, it was time to get a picture--whether she liked it or not! 

This is what she looked like during picture time, until I told her that only happy pirates could go trick or treating. 

After she heard that bit of news, she was back to her normal happy pirate self for the rest of the night.

When we got to the parking lot, Bailey was ready to go. 

At first she was a little hesitant to approach the dark cars with strangers, but once she realized that the strangers had candy and they would give her a piece she was into trick or treating.  She was really cute and would say, "Trick or treat!" to every car and then with a little prompting even exclaimed a cute, "Thank you!"  We met a few of her friends there--Eliza and Hailey--and we wandered around to the last of the cars.  I tried to get a good picture of Bailey and Hailey together, but it was really hard to get both of them focused on the camera and not all the crazy creatures and candy surrounding them.

After we were done with the trunk or treating, we decided to go to Ruby's to visit Toni at work so she could see her costume.  On the way over to the restaurant, she ate about four pieces of candy--sour licorice, lollipop, some M & Ms, and some gummy Lifesavers.  She had complained a little bit throughout the night about her tummy hurting.  I just figured that she was hungry and tired.  Once we got to Ruby's she was so happy to see Toni and to eat some real food.  She ordered chocolate milk and a corn dog.  She was really good and waited patiently for her food.  Toni brought her the chocolate milk and she proceeded to down it.  The food came and she ate a few bites of her corn dog. 

At one point, she kind of coughed.  My mom and I looked over at her.  I could tell that something bad was about to happen; I quickly told Brian to get something to catch what was coming, but he wasn't fast enough.  Bailey puked everything that was in her stomach all over her pirate costume.  She took a little breather, but I knew that round two was coming.  We had nothing to use as a container, but a ton of napkins.  Brian looked like her might puke himself.  I ran out to the car to get her some clothes and my mom volunteered to take her and her skirtful of puke outside. 

It was quite a pathetic sight to see a crying pirate wobbling over to the car with my mom.  I'm so glad that I had an extra outfit in the car to change her into.  Once we cleaned her off and got her dressed, she said she felt much better.  I knew that it was just a bad combo of too many treats, too much chocolate milk, and not enough real food.  But I did not let this moment slip by without taking time for the teaching moment.  I told Bailey that this is what happens if you eat too many treats; you get sick and puke.  I'm hoping that the lesson stuck because I know she's going to want to eat more candy today.  So it was an exciting end to a fun night!  Honestly, my biggest concern was that the puke was going to ruin her costume.  But I think it will all turn out just fine.  Happy Halloween!!

Here are some pictures that are too cute to miss from Bailey's super cute Sunday outfit last week:

Practicing to be a Pirate

Ever since Bailey's first trip to Disneyland, she's been in love with the pirates.  In August, Toni and I took her to Disneyland.  What was the first item on her list of things to see?  not the princesses, but the pirates!  She was of course excited to see the princesses and we stayed there for a couple of hours, but she was facsinated by the pirates.

Fast forward to September when I got her thinking about what she wanted to be for Halloween.  I know it may seem a bit early to talk about Halloween, but I like to be prepared.  I started listing different types of costumes that she could be: a ladybug, a princess, a ballerina, a fairy, a bunny, etc.  Just your typical two year old costume requests.  On her own, Bailey said, "I want to be a pirate!"  She already knew the song and knew that she loved them.  We'd talk about Halloween costumes every so often and every time she answered pirate, so a pirate she will be.

I've slowly been piecing together what she will wear: a random striped scarf for a belt (bought at Target in the dollar spot), some black pirate boots (another $2 purchase from the swap meet, although they are about 4 sizes too big), a black onsie from last year, an awesome pirate hat from Michael's, a pirate hook from the swap meet (for free), a skeleton bucket to collect her loads of candy, and my mom just finished her pirate skirt last night.  This morning we tried it all on to see if it works.  What do you think?

Since she's known for a while that she's going to be a pirate, we've been working on her pirate talk.  She learned the pirate song at Disneyland and the rest she's picked up along the way.  This is not her best performance because she usually says these things with a good pirate accent, but I wanted to get them on video at least once.  My favorite saying is, "Arrrr me tatey!"  It's supposed to be, "Arrrr me matey!" but I don't want her to change it.  I think it's absolutely adorable!  So if this video ever loads, then you'll be able to see.

Tomato Sauce & Subway

So it's been a while...two months in fact since I last posted.  That means that yes, I'm back in school :(  The other bit of news (probably old news to anyone who still looks at this) is that I'm pregnant.  17 weeks in fact!  and all I want to eat it something covered in tomato sauce and a delicious turkey Subway sandwich loaded with pickles.

We told Bailey that she's going to be a big sister.  Here are some of her classic responses as she tries to wrap her brain around this idea:

1.  As we were driving to field hockey pratice one night--"Mommy, I'm going to be a big sister.  I'm going to grow and grow and grow!"  So she thinks that she is just physically going to get really big.

2.  When I tell her that the baby is in my tummy, she wants to see it.  I tell her that you can't see anything yet.  She ponders that for a while and then says,"I want a baby in my tummy too!"  "Only mommies can have babies in their tummies Bailey," is my quick response to that idea.

3.  Any baby that we meet, that will be the name of our new baby.  When we're with the cousins, our baby will be named Josi.  When we met Hailey new baby sister Chloe, our baby will be named Chloe too.  I just makes perfect sense.

4.  She varies by the day, and sometimes by the hour, if she's going to have a baby brother or a baby sister.  I think she'll be fine either way because she's really into babies these days.  I think I have my Christmas present ideas all set for Bailey--lots of baby stuff for her to play with.

5.  I told her the other day that I was going to buy her a special shirt that said something.  She guessed it right away, "I'm going to be a big stister!"  She likes to put an extra "t" into the word sister; I don't correct her because I kind of like it.

Overall, she's very excited to be a big sister--whatever that means.  I'm done feeling sick, so life is pretty good right now; very, very busy, but pretty good.  So school and feeling super pregnancy sick are my two excuses as to why I've neglected my blog for two whole months.  I will do a quick recap through pictures only of some of the highlights of the end of our summer and life to this point, but later tonight.

For now, I leave with you with some pics from our latest excursion to the pumpkin patch:

 Here's Bailey as happy as can be!

 Showing off her super-human strength!

 What more can a girl ask for--a bag of candy in one hand, a bag of kettle corn in the other, a pair of fairy wings on her back, and riding on dad's shoulders.

Bailey's blue tongue on the way home from eating her candy stick.  Instead of sucking on it the entire ride home, she got in the car and chomped it with her teeth.  But at least she was happy!