The other night just before bedtime, I walked in on this:

Britta just finished an Itty Bitty Basketball course over at our community center. It was for kids 3-5, and they got to go 6 times for $33  total. How awesome is that? Living in Utah is really great when you’ve got small children because there are so many fun programs for kids. It was so great for her to get just a small taste of the sport. It was so cute to see her play. She was so enthusiastic about all of the stations that they had every day, and she particularly loved doing her team cheer. I loved watching them play their real games. Britta was usually the first one down the court standing in front of the net with her arms raised high to block the opponent. You could always count on Britta to be doing what she was supposed to be doing. That’s so her. Dependable. Here she is on the last day, playing a game! Unfortunately, you can’t see it all, but she scores a basket at the end! Go Britta Go!

Every so often, Jocelyn decides that she wants to go potty all by herself, just like her big sister Britta. She absolutely insists that she does every single part of it all by herself without ANY help. So the other night she comes out of the bathroom, beaming with pride that she “went potty” all by herself (who knows if she actually did anything or not...). I just couldn’t stop laughing at her totally soggy wet diaper hanging out over top of the elastic waistband on her pants.

Her determination to do this whole thing independently has sure proved for some funny moments. We call this next one, “The Princess and the Pee”

When Jocelyn was just a few months old, I remember frequently making the joke that I felt she was a bit of a drama queen. When ever she would cry she would contort her face into the most pathetic and expressive pouty face you’ve ever seen. And her eyes were like little water faucets. She could produce tears in a fraction of a second.

Here we are almost two years later, and she’s still as theatrical as ever. Whenever she wants something, she’ll plead that she, “weawy, weawy, weawy, NEEDS it!” If it’s something like a fruit snack she’ll say, “But mom! I never even had a fruit snack ever, so I weawy, weawy, weawy NEED one! All the time mom! That’s why!” It’s pretty funny.

Check out her talking about how her favorite song The Itsy Bitsy Spider came on while we were in the car. I didn’t think to record her until some of her excitement had died down a little, but you’ll get the idea. Check out her hands! Hilarious!

Today Jocelyn and Britta got to wear new matching dresses to church. Grey corduroy jumpers with a pink ribbon and bow across the high waist, and a white poodle on a loopy leash across the front. They looked darling! (I wish I had a picture to go with this, but I’m still a novice blogger and am not accustomed to such extensive documenting.) As I was admiring Jocelyn in my lap during sacrament meeting, I noticed her dress was a little bit bunchier in the front than in the back. I lifted her dress to see what was up, and just bust out laughing. The little pink bundies (those diaper covers things that match your dress) were still attached to her dress with those clear plastic connector things they use in stores, and definitely weren’t on her bottom. In our rush to get out the door, whoever dressed Jocelyn didn’t even notice them in there.  I think the people behind us got a good laugh too.

In other news, Britta went to her very first day of real Primary today. She has fabulous teachers, and was so excited to go. I peeked in on her a number of times to make sure that everything was going okay. I got such an emotional swell of pride from seeing my little girl sitting there with all the other big kids, doing hand motions to songs and listening attentively to the speakers. I was so proud of her for making the transition so smoothly. She looked like a natural in there. She’s definitely growing up!

Amanda came. Amanda coming to our house is quite literally equally as exciting as having Santa come. It’s a big deal. The only picture I got of her quick stay here was of the girls playing “Beauty” with her.

We made treats. Sorry, they’re all gone now.

The girls got doot-de-doots from Great-Grandpa Huntington. (Or, as he’s known in our house, Grandpa doot-de-doot)

We got Christmas pajamas. Britta was so excited about hers that she took them and gently laid them out on her bed before getting in the bath. 

We lounged and ate chocolate.

We made sugar cookies are Grandma’s.

We saw family (they were all significantly less blurry in person)

We participated in the Nativity. Britta as Joseph, Jocelyn as a puppy.

We shared gifts. (If you look closely, Britta is giving her cousin Brynne a hug for her gift.)

We admired baby Jesus up close.

And we had fun.

Oh, and we took a carriage ride to see the lights!

Although the above picture doesn’t prove it, Jocelyn was all about the Christmas lights! It didn’t seem to matter how many Snowmen, Santas or Christmas Trees we saw, they were all equally exciting, and all equally deserving of a greeting. Check it out

And I know this video is extremely similar to the one above, but I like it because it wasn’t until my second time watching it that I realized that the second thing she points out is a “necklace” in reference to the string of lights draping the large tree.

Just a week before Christmas, Jocelyn figured out how to peel a Christmas orange. Perfect timing! With one finger pointed in the air and eyebrows raised high, she would declare to everyone,

“I go get orange, okay? Stay here, okay? I go get orange.”

Then she’d run into the bathroom to get her little stool. She’d set the stool next to the counter where the bowl of oranges sits, and just barely be able to grab one. For the next five minutes absolutely nothing could distract her from the all consuming task of peeling that beautiful little orange. It made it all the cuter that we have one of those toe-tap garbage cans that she would kick with her little foot to open the garbage for every. tiny. little. piece.

It was cute.

Here she is in her Christmas dress with a collection of Christmas oranges. All of which she peeled herself.

On Monday December 19th, we did our own Christmas celebration with just our small family. The girls were beyond excited. We went to IHOP that night for dinner. Classy, I know. But can you imagine anything more exciting to a 3-year old than going to a restaurant for Chocolate-chip pancakes? When we walked into IHOP, Britta gasped and said,

“Mom! This is the coolest place I have ever seen in my whole LIFE!”

After dinner we went to Wal-Mart to let the girls pick out a toy for the Toys-for-Tots bin. Before we left the house, Billy had explained what we were going to do to Britta. He told her about children that need toys for Christmas because they don’t have any money. Britta got so excited and said,

“Dad! We could give them some of our money! We have lots of money! Look! Right over here!”

She ran and grabbed a little tin I have tucked away in a drawer full of change. So, to the dismay of the people behind us in line at Wal-Mart, we indeed let Britta pay for her toy with quarters and dimes.

The rest of Christmas was a smashing success, of course. However, if I were to do everything over again, I would have revealed The Cottage on Christmas Eve so that I would have a video of Britta yelling,

“Mom! This is the coolest place I have ever seen in my whole LIFE,” about The Cottage instead of The IHOP.

Instead, what we got were some seriously over-stimulated girls trying as hard as they could to process their final gift of Christmas. As you can see from the video, Britta is almost confused about it all, and doesn’t quite know what to make of it. Oh well, it’s one of those gifts that will only get better with time.

On the weekend of American Thanksgiving (November 23rd) I talked Billy into an “easy” project. I wanted him to cut a hole in the wall leading to the empty space under our stairs in the basement. He would have to frame the hole, and then together we would install carpet, and possibly paint the inside if time permitted.

Luckily, Billy had a couple days off of work for Thanksgiving, and his dad Bill happened to be in town too. Well, with the combined ideas of the two visionaries, multiple trips to home depot, and a couple of nights working until 3 a.m, our “easy” Christmas project quickly turned into an artful masterpiece.

Should I just jump right into the pictures? I think I shall.

Introducing “The Cottage”

The split door has a peep hole with hinges!

The shutters on the window open and close too, and reveal a stained glass window. The rose is roughly based on the rose from the Disney movie Beauty and The Beast. I made the window with a hot glue gun, craft paint, and plexiglass.

This cute little mail box has both their names on it, and is roughly based on the mailbox from the Disney movie Up.

When you open the front door, you can see the exposed beams that give it an especially cottage-like feel inside. That open crawl space to the right of the post used to be solid wall, but Billy cut it out to make everything more open.

The pictures on the wall are from a Little Red Riding Hood book, and are in frames that Billy and I made when Britta was just a couple months old. We cut out pieces from some of the pages and mod-podged them to the frame to make it look like an extension of the picture.

If you were to open the full size door on the other side of The Cottage, this is what you’d see. The white board was a last minute addition, and is only meant for them to display their art work on, not for actually using white board markers. I didn’t want all of that dusty stuff down there.

DaNae came and joined in all of the fun with her Vinyl cutting machine, and came up with some really cute additions! Check out the sun around the light which is just like the one from Tangled.

And little vines throughout

And a darling little mouse hole. There are also two smaller mice hiding in different places in the cottage, but I didn’t get pictures of those.

You might say our girls are spoiled rotten, and you just might be right. But really, it was a labor of love, so who cares? We had so much fun every single step of the way!

The Hurds have a surprise, and we’re letting you in on it. Check out what we have ready and waiting in our basement:

If you check back later this week, I will post the reveal and some more pictures. By writing this now, it means I’m committed to doing it, right? I will, I will, I will.