The best things in life are nearest

I know I have to chronicle our Christmas, but today was kinda the perfect day and I couldn't wait to share it.  I love living on our little island.  Even more, I love having a husband and daughter that are oh-so-perfect for me.  But combining the two is a recipe for certain fun.  Bike riding, goofing off at a historical fort while learing about the Civil War, playing at the park, and relaxing at a beach-side restaurant.  All these things in and of themselves would have made today a good day, but sharing them with my two favorite people made it an exceptionally perfect day.  Everyday is a vacation with these two.  I kinda love them.

We started off our day by playing dress-up (I was Rayla and Lily was Aleena.  We were fairy sky queens.  We ate fairy cakes and drank fairy tea.  I bet you didn't know I was that cool, didja?).  Lily insisted that we keep the tiaras on for our bike ride.

Exploring all the fun, maze-like tunnels of the fort.

I know, right?  He looks good coming *and* going. 

Seriously? Can anyone wonder why I adore them so?

Our perfect day ended with all of us snuggled up on the couch watching Barbie Swan Lake, where we all fell asleep until I woke an hour later and put everyone to bed.  These are the days I will treasure in the years to come.  We didn't spend much money and we didn't go anywhere especially exciting, but it was perfect nonetheless.  Here's to many more.

xo

Merry Christmas

I just wanted to take a break in the holiday festivities to wish you all a Merry Christmas.  Thank you so much to those who supported me this past year.  I couldn't have gotten through it without you.  I have been somewhat reclusive and introverted for much of my life, but having so many new and wonderful people come into my life over the past few years has been an amazing blessing.  I am especially thankful for Ernie's family.  I can't describe how lucky I am to have them in my life or how amazing they all are.  Anyhow, Merry Christmas to you all.  May your holiday season be merry and festive.

Jolly Old Saint Nicholas

I have a lot to catch up on, but I really want to dedicate this post to a very special day for Lily.  This is the first year she has really gotten into the whole Santa Claus business.  Her first visit with Santa (which was actually her second Christmas) was disastrous (see here).  For her second attempt, she refused to get closer than twenty feet to the guy.  And last year, while she did sit on his lap (as long as Mommy was right next to her), she was completely mute and nervously clinging to my hand the entire time.  But this year?  This year, she is absolutely enamored with the man in red.  She wants to read poems about him, draw pictures of him, go talk to him.  She's gone a bit mad for him, actually.  So when she found out that Santa was coming to her daddy's Christmas Party, she was ecstatic.  For two weeks she woke up every morning and asked if it was time for the Christmas party.  Then, to start off an already thrilling day, on the morning of the party she got this special video message from the big guy himself:

I really wish I'd thought to get a video of her watching this.  It was the most adorable thing ever.  She was in awe that Santa would take the time to send her a video.  She was answering back to all his questions and waiting impatiently for the final outcome of the naughty and nice test.

After her video, she was even *more* excited for the evening's festivities, if you can believe it.  She wanted everything to be perfect.  She wanted her hair done just so and requested a special Christmas manicure with snowflakes and glitter on her nails (unfortunately for her, Mommy is not that creative so alternating green and red nails were the best I could deliver).   She looked so sweet and I wish I could turn back time and take a proper picture of her in her Christmas party attire, but I completely dropped the ball and forgot.  Maybe I'll get her dressed up again on Christmas and take a picture.

But I digress.

When Santa came to her party (Ernie's company set up a special "kid's only" Christmas party separate from the boring adult party), she was so excited.  She hoped on his lap without any prodding whatsoever.

Then she proceeded to have an extended chat with him.  Not about what she wanted for Christmas.  No, that would be far too ordinary for our princess.  She told him about what kind of cookies she was going to leave him and about the carrots she picked out for his reindeer. 

Then, of course, she told him how much she loved her video and did he really watch her all year long, and that she was very sorry for pouring out Mommy's nail polish remover into the desk drawer, but she cleaned up her whole room all by herself to still be on the nice list so could he please not leave coal in her stocking.  On and on she went until I had to remind her that there were other kids waiting to talk to Santa.  When we left the party, she was fairly vibrating with excess excitement and talking non-stop about her visit with Santa.  
I've always loved the Christmas season, but never so much as I do when experiencing it with my lovely daughter.  This has been one of the best Christmases in my memory.  Here is a quick peek at the rest of our Christmas festivities (let's count this as my catch-up, shall we?):

A Hamilton Family Reunion (more on this to come)

Picking out the perfect tree

Baking Christmas goodies

Tree timming party

Letter to Santa

Posing in front of the tree

Lily's first Christmas dance recital 

Mommy's grown-up Christmas dance party

Halloween Hallapalooza

From the costumes to the decorations to the celebrations, Halloween for us was very low-key this year.  Originally, the plan was to drive to Charleston and go trick-or-treating with the cousins.  Other than a small Halloween party with our family here, we did very little as far as decorating and celebrating.  And due to the outhouse fiasco, we didn't even have pumpkins.  I'm sure my neighbors think we are complete Scrooges.  But since we weren't going to be here for the holiday, I didn't want a ton of decorations to take down when we got back home.  Then Ernie surprised us by coming home early (hurray!!!) and all our plans changed.

Halloween morning, I took Lily downtown where she got to go trick-or-treating with some of her friends.  Since this was a "store" trick-or-treating event, I was expecting dum-dums and smarties to be the order of the day.  But no.  Lily got full-sized candy bars and a bucket filled to overflowing with chocolate.  Now that is *my* kind of trick-or-treating.

Lily was literally dragging me along after her.  I can't count how many times I heard, "Mommy, hurry up!"

Of course, it wasn't long before my little Halloween kitten was all tuckered out.

Last year we were in Louisiana and I didn't know anyone, so it was just us and Lily.  This year Lily definitely had more fun playing with Tiger Lily, Bella and the other kids.  So thanks, Sarah, for inviting us.

You probably can't tell, but this is a picture of Lily "grooming' herself.  She picked out her costume all by herself and was so excited about it.  I put it on her at 9 am and she did not take it off until 9 pm.

[ps:  this is my favorite photo of the entire day, but nothing I did would make it post correctly.  I can't very well leave it out, so turn your heads, please]

That night, after a dinner packed with lots of green veggies to make up for the candy free-for-all (or at least, that's what I told myself), Ernie and I took her trick-or-treating again in our neighborhood.

Before we could leave, I was a mean mommy and made Lily stop for a photo op.  She was practically bursting with excitement, which made the simple task ten times more difficult.

Yes, I dressed up too.  Ernie tried to get away with not dressing up, seeing as how he'd just driven sixteen hours to get there and was exhausted.  But Lily was having none of it.  So even he scrounged together a costume.

We discovered that there aren't many trick-or-treaters in our area.  Probably because most people around here are either young or old couples with no children in the house.  It turned out great for Lily, though, since everyone let her take fists full of candy.  By the end of the night, her bag was packed.  I'm really glad this only happens once a year.

Can you find Lily in this picture?  A downside of her costume was that she was almost completely camouflaged at night.  Luckily, her daddy had a reflective vest on to keep her safe.

We had fun.  There was very little preparation involved, and I ended up throwing out half of the candy Lily got throughout the day.  I think the best part of the holiday for both of us was having Ernie there to share it with us.  Even though he did mess up most of my pictures with his reflective construction worker costume.  I didn't get any family pictures, which I am bummed about, but oh well.  We hardly ever get the chance to have family pictures, since either Ernie or I are always *taking* the picture.  But we have two months with him before he has to go back to Texas, so do I have any volunteers to take a family picture for us?

Happy [late] Halloween, everyone.

Compelled by emergency

The week before Halloween a friend invited us to Conners Farm for a harvest celebration with a big group of kids.  I always enjoy opportunities to teach Lily about the importance of agriculture without actually having to *live* on a farm myself, so I jumped at the chance.  I loaded her up bright and early and made the 45 minute drive out to "cow country", as Lily dubbed it.

We started our agricultural adventure out with a corn maze.  We had a choice.  Either the advanced twenty minute maze, or the easy ten minute maze.  Having a group of toddlers and preschoolers with us, we opted for the ten minute maze and excitedly began our journey, confident in our superior navigational skills.

Half an hour later, we were still wandering around a field of corn, struggling vainly to find the exit.  I'm sure we'd still be there if we'd chosen the "advanced" maze.

The people who run the farm were very relaxed.  They let the kids interact with whatever animals they came across.  Lily's favorites were the horses.  When it was time to leave, Lily was being so stubborn that I had to pull out the "Lily Victoria" card and insist that it was time to leave the horses.  To which she responded, "Mommy Elizabeth, I'm not done yet!"

I was laughing too hard to reprimand, so instead I gave her five more minutes.  It's important to reward creativity and independence, right?

After she got her fill of the horses, we went on a hayride.  At first my little Miss Priss was not having anything to do with the dirty bales of hay.  But once she got into the spirit of things, she had a blast.

Especially once these guys came up and started eating the hay.  Lily was absolutely thrilled.  For the rest of the day she kept asking me why those cows were eating our seats.

After the hayride, we went to the petting zoo where Lily got to feed the animals.  Now, let me stop here to explain something rather...um...delicate about the set up at Conners Farm.  You see, being a farm and all, they did not have normal toilets.  Outhouses were set up around the farm, though.  Lily, who had to use the restroom after the hayride, took one look at the inside of the outhouse and insisted she could wait until we left.  But after thirty minutes in the petting zoo, she was dancing from one foot to the other.  I asked her if she wanted to leave and find a bathroom somewhere else, but she said no, she could wait.  Then I tried to "force" her to use the outhouse, thinking if she just did it she would see it wasn't so bad.  But as soon as I opened the door she started arching her back and screaming and pulling away from me.  Deciding I didn't want to traumatize her, I gave up and we went on to the portion of our trip she was most excited for.  The pumpkin patch.

Unfortunately, by the time we got there the situation was so dire that she couldn't stand still long enough to pick out her pumpkin.  So I made an executive decision and we left the farm to find a normal toilet.  Sans pumpkin.  Fortunately, she was so preoccupied with her *need*, as it were, that she didn't offer a single complaint.

I found a McDonalds just down the road and when Lily walked into the bathroom stall her entire face lit up into a  relieved smile.  Then she said, "Thank soooooo much, Mommy, for finding me a clean toilet."

Next time we go (and we will be back, since they have all sorts of things going on there from strawberry picking to farmers markets to farm tours), I will stop at that McDonalds and make her use the restroom before we get there.  But bathroom emergency aside, we still had a great morning.