NYE

The Ehlerts hosted us for NYE this year. It was a great way to end 2011 and ring in 2012 with friends! Sylvie was Loving all of Haylie's fun"girl toys."

Guess who the photographer was here?

Jenny had planned to have a kids' toast @ 10 PM, but amazingly they made it all the way to midnight!! At first we counted down @ 11 b/c poor Sylvie had been saying, "My tired. My go home?" (she says "my" for "I") since about 10. So we counted down and toasted the new year. But then our extended goodbye (which happens with all good friends) had us not actually leaving until after midnight...so we all really did ring in 2012 together! Awesome! Way to go, party animals!!

We took a fam foto before we left for the party. Yes, Sylvie's wearing the same cute fuzzy shirt she did last year! :)

Kid Cave Castle Construction

Brett has decided to relinquish some of his man-cave space to the kids. The back-room is officially theirs now. This week the Luhrings boys (Brady, Daddy, and Papa) built a two-story castle fort thing that the kids are Loving!

Safety first! Our pajama-clad helper (I told you they didn't get out of their jammies this week) dons his safety goggles from the builder set Maya got for him while supervising Daddy's jigsaw work on the castle battlement.

The prince and princess are quite pleased with their new digs!

iFound Wheezy Picts

I found these picts on my phone and realized I forgot to post them. The kids have each been on and off sick the past week or so. (It's typical...we're always in the dr office for their "wellness checks" for their birthdays and they're usually sniffling or coughing.) At Brady's appointment last week, Dr. Kim noticed he was developing an ear infection. So when Sylvie woke up this morning and told me her ear was "bwoke," I took her in. I didn't really think she had an ear infection (she's never had one and she really didn't seem in pain, plus no fever). But she's never said anything like that to me before and she consistently pointed to her right ear when asked. So we saw Dr. Hong today. Turns out her ears were just fine, but the doc detected some slight wheezing in her breathing. She indicated that there was a virus circulating this year that caused kids to wheeze. So she gave her a breathing treatment in the office and we wrote a script for albuterol. I think I would have been horrified about the breathing treatment if I hadn't heard about it from other friends. Sylvie was fine for the first 30 seconds...even laughing over the mask. Then she started crying and freaking out (which I had previously read was fine b/c they just inhaled more medicine). So she looks sad and then super sad in these picts, but really she was just fine...just a little drama. :)

Grandma and Sylvie

Brady was on my lap so I couldn't take this picture, but the view from where I was sitting was nothing short of precious and I wanted it documented! Sylvie crawled on Grandma's lap and asked for "peecool monkey yunchbok" (Preschool Monkey Lunchbox, the toddler app on our iPhones). Grandma had no clue what she was talking about (crazy toddler dialect aside!) :p They wound up watching the Jack and the Beanstalk book. Sylvie was just pushing her finger anywhere she could on the screen. It was so darn cute to watch the two of them together-

Transitioning

At four years old, Brady is (sort of) transitioning out of his nap. He still takes one at school from about 1-3 but I think that's b/c it's scheduled and everyone's doing it. Of course, due to that nap on weekdays he's up until at least 9:30 PM (and then sleeps until after 8 AM). When he's home with us, he hasn't been taking a nap...especially when he can play ball with Daddy rather than rest! Subsequently, he is wiped out by 8 PM and is totally ready for bed. So either way, it's not a bad deal, I guess. Still, there other days, he just passes out wherever he is. That's still amusing to us b/c he used to not sleep anywhere but his bed. Today he crashed (I mean literally- like legs half off and all...out cold!) on the ottoman for a little over an hour.

Golf Pro

It's another beautiful day near 60 degrees and we went outside so Brady could practice golfing with his new clubs. They are the cutest, btw. Look at the mini golfer all ready to go-

I wish I had brought the camera outside with me so I could have recorded all of this. But I did get the tail end of Brady's advice to me on video. I grabbed one of the clubs (that honestly I thought was a putter...that's what mini-golf putters look like!) and said, "Just putt b/c we're near the house, ok?" He looks at me with this wiser-than-his-years look on his face and says, "Mommy. That is Not a putter," and pulls another club out of his bag, "This is a putter. Mommy, if you're nice, then I could teach you." I'm laughing at this point, and I say, "what?" He continues, "I could teach you to play golf. Then you practice and when you grow up, you can play real with me, and Daddy, and Papa." That's when I ran in the house to get the camera and tried to get him to tell me that again-

It's Getting Late

Brady: (as we're playing "spy guys" his latest game inspired by a Christmas gift from Aiyee) "Hey, Spy Girl, we gotta go. It's getting late."
Me: "What time is it?"
Brady: "It's 30 0'clock!"
Me: "Oh my! That is late!" :p

At another point, I asked Brett what time it was and Brady answered, "I'll tell you what o'clock it is." lol!

Merry Christmas!

Santa arrived just after midnight-

Waking up on Christmas morning-

The first present we let them "open" (or that we revealed to them) was their new play kitchen from the grandparents (which Papa and Daddy assembled last night).

I didn't request a fam foto this year- b/c most of this crew stayed in jammies all day today! (and I can tell you b/c I'm back-blogging- that that's how we spent most of the week...in jammies! See below- 4:46 and still in jammies- playing with the new Little People nativity set. Apparently the sheep, a wise man, and a few camels took their cue from the angel perched atop the manger- and hopped on top of the trees and tents. Indeed it's a wild birthday party! :p

Later this evening, the grandmas continued the tradition of assembling a gingerbread house. This year's was a train.

The walrus and his mouth-full-cheese-stick sidekick approve of the final product! :p

We added candles to our coconut cream pie (and lemon cream pie for Grandma) and sang "Happy Birthday to baby Jesus."

Sylvie made sure JC was represented at his birthday party by bringing her baby Jesus from the Little People nativity set to the table. (Although truth be told, again since I'm back-blogging...she's taken baby Jesus Everywhere- in her crib for naps and sleep, at the table for meals, in her purse or shopping cart when she's playing. It's so cute to hear her say, "Where da baby Jesus?"

Merry Christmas to all!