Winter Wonderland

Weather
The winter weather has definitely been upon us here in Greenfield so far this year. I've had a school cancellation, a delayed opening, and an early dismissal. Originally today we were only supposed to get 2-4 inches of snow, but I think we will end up somewhere in the 5-10 inch range. At least that is what the weather forecaster is saying, it looks closer to the 10 inch mark than the 5 inch mark though. School was dismissed at 1:30 today so that they could feed all of the kids lunch, there was probably already 3 inches of snow on the ground when I left at 1:45. I wanted to get home quickly so Barney could go to work. We did not send Kaitlyn to daycare today. I had no desire to go back out in the snow. It should stop snowing by the time Barney comes home.

Hopefully there will be school tomorrow. It's only a half day (teacher inservice) and if there is a cancellation then we have to make up a full day. They now have a new automated phone service in Greenfield where our principal makes a call through her computer and announcements go out to everyone if there is a delay or cancellation. It's good because we don't have to rely on the phone tree anymore. Also, all of the families in the school get a phone call so there should be no confusion around delays or cancellations.

Holidays
On December 2nd we took our annual trip to Wood's tree farm to get our Christmas tree. It was freezing cold!! We started out with breakfast at one of our favorite spots, Denny's. There Kaitlyn got a hold of the camera and took some crazy shots :)
So many of the trees had already been tagged so we had to walk out quite a ways to find our tree. It's a little short this year, but it looks beautiful. Usually I put a gold ribbon around the tree as it shimmers in the light, but I didn't do that this year. I still haven't found the perfect tree topper and the tree skirt I want is out of stock. I'm hoping to find ones I like right after the holiday. For now we have a purple towel to the bottom of the tree, very festive! We saw Dawn, Matt and Carlie at the tree farm as well as Kevin, Melissa (they work with Barney) and their son Noah. Kaitlyn was a huge help carting the tree back to the car.
This year I am still a little unsure of my holiday plans. I think this will end up being the first year I do not see my family on Christmas Eve. I am upset about this but it is more important to me that Kaitlyn be home with both of her parents on Christmas morning. I just wish I lived closer to my family. My mom and Kathryn were going to come up for the weekend and my cousin Kristin, her daughter Kerry, and my Aunt Sheila were going to come up on Sunday so we could go to Yankee Candle and have the girls picture taken with Santa, but now the weather looks terrible so those plans have been cancelled. My Aunt Sheila is having a holiday party at her house next Sunday, but it's 2 hours away and Barney has to work, so I'm not sure if Kaitlyn and I will make it.

Barney's family is having Christmas at 10:30 on Christmas Day so we will not have a lot of time to be together before we have to head over there. It is just crazy. Usually we do an afternoon/evening thing but people have to work on Christmas Day, including Barney. So I will make a coffee cake and probably something else. I've almost finished all of my shopping. Kaitlyn asked Santa for a pirate ship so I am excited to see her open that gift. I also got her Mickey Mouse wrapping paper for her gifts as she loves him. This weekend we are going to go and buy our toy for the Toys for Tots campaign. Kaitlyn will then bring it to the bank drop off site. I want her to learn that Christmas is about giving to others. Our Christmas cards have come in and hopefully we will drop them off at the post office tomorrow.

The House
The wall paper is all down in Kaitlyn's room and the walls have been sanded. The good thing was that there was no paint under the wallpaper, just plaster, so we did not have to worry about lead paint. Hopefully tomorrow night we can prep the room for painting and get started. We need to get the ceiling painted and put some primer on the walls. I got a couple of colors to try out for the wall color. Kaitlyn really wants a blue room and I so don't want her to have a blue room. I'm not sure what room we will tackle next. I would like to paint the walls in our bedroom, I'm not a big fan of the white. Then probably taking down the wallpaper in the upstairs hallway and replacing the light fixture.

Kaitlyn
What can I say, she is great :) Last week she ended up with roseola, just a nasty virus, and her temp went up to 103.7. I was so paranoid, but the Tylenol brought it right down. Even though she was sick she was still happy. Then she ended up with a rash over most of her body, that's how the doctor knew it was roseola. I was worried about the baby but my doctor wasn't that concerned and said most likely I had an immunity to it from childhood and therefore the baby would not be affected. (Although I did end up with a nasty virus and had to miss 2 days of school) Kaitlyn is very excited about Christmas. Everyday on the way home she wants to see the Christmas. She just loves the lights. Hopefully we will get a chance to bring her to Bright Nights, she will love that. She has done a great job staying away from the tree. She knows she can touch her tree in her playroom but not the big tree. She is constantly rearranging the ornaments on her tree! Kaitlyn is keeping busy with her swimming, gym class and trips to the library, as well as playing with her friends at daycare. She hasn't been too thrilled with the playgroups lately and will ask Barney to go home. I think she just really likes spending a lot of time with her daddy :) The toilet training is still going on. We try and have her in underwear as much as possible. Hopefully we will be able to keep up with it more once the new baby comes and we are homebound for a few weeks.

The New One
Well, just under 9 weeks until my due date, It hasn't been the easiest pregnancy emotionally. At least my back has not given out. Just a little bit of hip and leg pain. The baby is VERY active. Constantly doing somersaults and kicking, especially my bladder!! I've been going to the doctor's every 2 weeks for a month now. My next appointment is on the 19th. They will do an ultrasound around 35 weeks to check the positioning and make sure the baby is head down. If the baby is head down then we will go for the natural birth, but if the baby is breech we will have a c-section. I don't want the doctor to try and turn the baby. Barney and I have finally started thinking about names, or rather I tell him names I want, so nothing set in stone yet! We will go to our birthing class the second weekend in January, or rather I will go if he cannot take the weekend off. I feel we need to go if we are going to have a natural delivery as we never made it to the class for our first baby, she came a week before the class. Maybe my mom will be able to come up that weekend and go with me if Barney can't make it.

Happy Holidays everyone!