horsey outfit to school

haley wore her birthday horse outfit to school today --
horsey sweater, brown skirt, white tights, pink jacket & cowboy boots-- she was the talk of the center!

national harbor and ICE - Shrek

we decided to spend the night at national harbor to enjoy the gaylord hotel evening chritmas tree show and the dreamworks ICE event. we had a great time, and the show was excellent.  they had a lights and water show coreographed to the siberian orchestra's christmas song and ending with an indoor 'snow fall'.  haley was a little scared at first with the loud music and shooting water, but soon enough calmed down and really enjoyed it.  it lasted about 20 minutes. 

haley got to see santa clause and tell him that she was a good girl and exactly what she wants for christmas!  she did so good - was a little apprhensive at first when she sat next to him, but warmed up to him after about 1 minute.  :-)  luckily we had to stand in line a little, so trey took her up close so she could see him and get used to him.  the only downside was he was in 'pajamas' and not the normal christmas gear.  oh well, she was still super excited.  and she got a mini candycane from him. 

we also went swimming at the hotel's indoor pool monday morning, which she really enjoyed.  so, a fun minin vacation! 

here are some pics from around the hotel, the light show at the hotel, and the shrek ICE show.

it was 12 degrees inside the ICE tent, so we had to wear special blue jackets over our clothes (which were very effective!) about 98% of what was inside the tent was made of ice blocks or ice carvings. the first section was all about shrek, but the end had a beautiful nativity scene and angel carving out of ice with a nice christian message.

hotel lobby was lined with these trees

exterior of the hotel

national harbor tree was gorgeours

this gives you an idea of how big it was

these are pics from inside the gaylord hotel's atrium, during the christmas tree lighting show.  the great thing about this show is that it's indoors!

the tree was suspended from the ceiling

 

this pic includes some of the water fountains

this is a view from two stories above the atrium after the tree was lit

outside the ICE tent

the start of the ice show

everything was made of ice

standing in the ice outhouse

there were even 6 ice slides!

the beautiful ice nativity scene

the ice angel

potty update

haley has done SOOOO well with going to the potty the last week and half!  she has gone on her own without us reminding her, not having accidents while we are driving but going on the potty right when we get home, using her travel lid (thanks aunt sara!) to go in public places or other people's houses, going several times a day at daycare and rarely having 'accidents' anymore...and even going a little poo poo two times the same day (once at school and once at home)!  the poo poo was a one-day occurrance...she has been too afraid to even attempt #2 on the potty since then.\, for some unknown reason.  but her peeing has been excellent!  we are so proud of our big girl!

2 yr stats - Oct 15, 2012

i'm a lot late at posting these, but better late than never!

 

Haley had her 2 year apt Oct 15 with Dr. Baugh. She did SO good, cooperating with the nurse to get measured & weighed and laid down when the dr asked her to. He was very impressed with her language and coordination skills during our visit.

She measured 37 ½ inches, which apparently is the avg height of a 3-year old!! and

she weighed almost 30 lbs, in the 75^th percentile of 2 yr-olds. The dr said that was a good balance of height and weight and recommended we move off the whole milk.  She’s now cleared to eat any and all foods barring they are not choking hazards. Since she’s so tall, he recommended we move her to a toddler bed so she doesn’t break a wrist trying to crawl over the side of her crib.  you wil see from my last post that we did that nov 10.  :-) 

She got her MMR shot & Hep A round #2, and of course cried but not for too long. Before the shots, she wanted to put her pants back on and leave, but we told her we had to wait because the nurse was going to bring her 2 band aids! She was SO excited about getting bandaids, but I don’t think she expected the prick along with the band aids. J But, we gave her some m&ms as her reward for good behavior so I think it was worth it. She was still excited to see the band aids the next morning when she woke up.

BIG GIRL milestones - big girl bed & potty @ 26 mos old!

haley is getting to be such a BIG girl.  she's wanting to do so many things by herself and really starting to have a mind of her own.  following dr. baugh's advice from her 2 yr appt, we decided to convert haley's crib to the toddler bed setting.  we chose the weekend G&G were in town in case the nights were rough....so the first night in her new bed was Nov 10.  She's been in it for 2 weeks now, and overall has slept through more nights than not.  the first week was a little rougher - with about a 50/50 rate of sleeping thru the night.  so i followed aunt sara's advice and started unplugging haley's nightlight when i went to bed.  and since then she's slept through 7 of the 8 nights. :-)  so success. 

given the long weekend with thanksgiving holidays, we also decided to give potty training a good solid effort.  she has been sitting on the potty several times a day at daycare (albeit only to get M&Ms) and has shown interest.  she talks about it a lot and seemed to show signs of readiness.  so, we opened the potty watch and she was so excited about it.  we set it for every 30 mins, and the times we were at home thursday & friday, she was bare-bottomed.  she would sit on it when the watch went off, but that still did not inspire her to go.  she just held it until naptime or until we left the house and HAD to put her pullups on.  :-)  smart girl.  the third day she ALL OUT refused to even sit on the potty and to wear the potty watch.  the fourth day, today, we kept her bare-bottomed all morning, and she drank a LOT of milk & juice.  she was so squirmy and was asking for a diaper but we held firm and kept reinforcing that she could just sit on the potty if she needed to go.  we even pushed back her naptime by 30-45 minutes because we KNEW she needed to go.    finally she just went into the bathroom all by herself, and was messing around with her stickers.  suddenly, she flung open the potty, sat down and VOILA, she went pee pee!  she was so excited and we all celebrated with cheers and claps and high fives.  and of couse, she got about 7 or 8 m&ms!!  we called grandma & peepaw and they congratulated her and tried to call G&G, but had to leave a message.  it was a big celebration. by that time it was 1 pm, so we had to wind down so she could take her nap as a BIG GIRL! 

******UPDATE******
After haley's nap, she went THREE more times, all by herself, without me taking her to the pot!  no #2, though, but what a successful day!  she was SO proud and we were too!
********************

here are some pics in her converted bed and right after she went potty!

posing in her newly-convered bed on day 1

actually sleeping in the bed 2 wks in...

excited after intentionally going potty for the first time!

 

 

These two  pics are of an outfit  from K&R that she's wore for the first time to church last night, so i just wanted to post as well.

kitty towel

haley got a new kitty towel, and it is SO cool.  it has a cool head with eyes and ears, a pink collar, little pink pockets for haley's "paws", a tail & hind legs, and a mouse stitched on it.  thanks russell & kerrie!

lollipop package

haley got a package today from kerrie & russell.  giving her new cuddle puppy a hug...

included in that package were two huge lollipops!  it was her first-ever lollipop, so i took a short video of her tasting it after dinner this evening, and some pics too. 

her tongue turned blue after the first lick!

all good things must come to an end.  after she tasted the round lollipop, she wanted to taste the tall, skinny one.  it was already late in the evening, so i told her she had to eat the round one first and could taste the tall one when grandma & pawpa come over in a few days.  well, that sparked a LONG meltdown, so i had to include a sad pic to complete the story! 

flinging her arms around in frustration...

i took a video of her opening the package and reacting to the goodies inside. unfortunately it was a little out of focus compared to the second video of her tasting the lollipop.
 
opening the package (this one may take a few minutes to load - it's a large file)

eating the lollipop

FALL leaves, 2012

well, with hurricane sandy, most of the fall leaves are off the trees. LUCKILY, we were able to take some pics at a great spot near the houes with beautiful red & yellow trees/leaves on the bright green grass.  it was after haley's daycare halloween parade, so she's wearing her costume and her white tights, which got FILTHY by the time we finished.  but we had a blast!  oh, and daddy showed her how to roll down the hill so i posted a short video clip of  her practicing.

rolling down the hill

yes, she sat in the ONE dirt pile she could find, while wearing her white tights!

end results of her tights! 

 

ticonderoga farms fall festival

we found an AWESOME fall festival/farm today!  it was 30 mins from our house and had all these amazing activities -- cool slides down the hill that were fun even for trey & i, a huge air pocket that was like a moon bounce, farm animals, jungle jims, pumpkins, hay rides...etc, etc, etc.  there were a ton of people there, but it was so big that it didn't feel crowed at all and we barely had to wait in line for the air bounce or slides.  haley had so much fun!  here are a few pics and video clips.  

going down the slide all by herself!

mommy right behind

this was a huge air buble we could jump on!

haley about to do a seat jump on the right side

looking at the peacocks from a distance (she ran away when the came to say hi!)

trying out the see saw

posing with a baby pumpkin