Every year we are invited (along with Grandma) to a mother-daughter tea before the holidays hosted by the Doht family (whom we've known since I was in the second grade). Lulu loves to get dressed up to go to this party, especially because they have a very neat dollhouse to play with in the guest bedroom. (Karlyn, the younger Doht daughter who is my age, has two young children of her own close in age to the Bean and the Bear).

Here is Lulu in her holiday dress next to the front door. (Evidently, I ask her to stand next to that door on a regular basis for photo ops, as she now finishes my sentences for me when I start to ask her...)
Grandma made her a cape to wear with her dress, a true labor of love. It has a red satin lining and very soft faux fur around the edges. Grandma said she must have inhaled half the fur while trying to sew it all together. It made quite a mess in her sewing room.

Here is Bean in her complimentary and coordinating holiday dress and shoes, too. My mom had bought this dress in a size 12 M and I could barely get the buttons buttoned at the back. She's a broad and barrel chested Bean!

For those of you who are not aware, Eddie controls the weather. Prior to our getting married, everytime he visited Portland, the weather was always gorgeous. The running joke in my family was, if you were having a party (and wanted to assure having good weather) invite Eddie.

Winter of 2008, he is to blame for the massive, two week snowstorm Portland suffered in December. He uttered the words I've never let him live down since: "When is it going to just snow in this town?!" The next day, two inches. Two weeks later, the snow in our backyard was up to above our knees in depth.

Tonight, upon returning home from the Children's Museum with the girls (he gave me the best gift ever, five hours at home alone...) it was beginning to snow outside. He confessed, he'd been hoping it would snow before Xmas. I told him, if he has done again what he did December 2008, we can't afford the bills the city would inevitably be sending us for the cost and expense of dealing with this kind of a snow storm.

Our neighbor, Bella, makes the best of the situation and preps her front yard snowman while the rest of the neighborhood waits to see how much snow we get...

12-7-2007

Lulu models her snowman sweater from Grandma.

Backview...

Nice smile!

Bean, wearing same sweater, December 2010.

Pensive...Maybe she remembers she didn't turn the iron off?

And in a flash, she's gone.

Yesterday, Bean's activity paper said the following:

"She's our new assistant. She's right behind us if we give someone a bottle. If they put it down, she brings it right to us. If someone spits out their binky, she picks it up and puts it right back in their mouth. It's too cute!"

Two days ago, her teacher told me that she is the first to finish her snack normally, no surprise there, and that she knows to throw her napkin away in the garbage. However, she went around that day and started taking all her classmates napkins to throw them away, even though they weren't finished, yet.

They also shared, that Bean has figured out how to open all the child safety locks on the lower cupboards in her room. Evidently, she is the only kid in her class who can do that. (These are the sliding locks that loop around booth door knobs.) Also, she makes it her business to open all the childproof locks and then buckle up all the high chair seat belts every day.

Our dear friend Rebecca (who follows our antics on the blog) used to have a gig a few years back where she was a nanny to a family with young children. It was around the holidays, and they had one of those Elf on the Shelf dolls that one hides in a different spot around the house each night after the kids are asleep. The story is, the elf goes back nightly to Santa at the North Pole and gives a status report on the kids behavior during the day. Rebecca would regale us with funny stories of the power of the elf and the kids being on their best behavior. If they even started getting out of line, she could tell them that she was going to tell the Elf of it, or even just tell them the Elf would report on their naughty behavior to Santa that night. She'd tell us, "You should see the kids, they'd be begging the elf not to tell Santa something and promising they'd be good...It's hilarious!"

Back then, we didn't have kids. Now we do, and I can report, the power of the Elf is very, very true.

My mom gave us an Elf. Lulu instantly named her Ellie, after the "Ellie the Elf" song some kids performed in the summer recital (Ellie the Elf is the imaginary person who is assigned all the blame for the mischief the kids do as told in the song...). Every morning Lulu puts Ellie someplace for the day before going off to school. Meanwhile, I follow behind and move Ellie to a different spot once Lulu has left for school. Then, when we come home that night, I feign complete and total surprise when Lulu discovers that Ellie had moved and trys to see where she had re-positioned herself in the house. It's also really good fun and let's me work on my acting skills on a regular basis...

If Lulu starts being stinky, we just have to remind her that Ellie will report on it to Santa and most of the time, that threat works. We had a few instances where Lulu has still been a bit defiant and we've faked our claim of seeing Ellie start to leave the house to head on back to the North Pole. This usually sends Lulu into frantic hysterics. She does NOT want Ellie to do that! The power of the Elf really is amazing...

But like Curious George has a hard time not being a naughty little monkey, it's hard for a 4 and a half year old to not be a defiant and naughty little girl with her parents. However, there are nine more days for practicing good behavior. It's more a one-step-forward, four-steps-back with her.

When I pick the girls up from school at night, we drive past a BBQ restaurant with cute pig neons in the windows (see above).

The other night, we were waiting in traffic next to the restaurant...

Lulu: That's the restaurant with the barbecue!

Me: Yep, that's right.

Lulu: I don't like barbecue. But if we go there, I'll have cheese sticks.

Me: Cheese sticks? How do you know they have cheese sticks??

Lulu: See the pig [sign]? It says 'cheese sticks' underneath him. [Very matter-of-factly to me] O-P-E-N spells Cheese Sticks.

Me: (I try to keep from laughing out loud too obviously in the car...)

Lulu at her holiday dance recital yesterday afternoon. This is after the recital was over (though she still has her tap shoes on...).

First off, we got her hair cut on Saturday. Eddie and I were both tired of the ongoing daily battle to get her to let us brush her hair so she didn't look like a ragamuffin. And then she wouldn't tolerate barrettes or ponytails to the side to get her hair out of her face. Which is why she now sports bangs...

Smiling for dad showing off the nosegay Grandma made for her for her stellar performance!

A better view of the flowers. Lulu told Grandma later that this is what she wants her flowers to look like for her wedding. I gave Grandma the cliff-notes version on Zach...

Post-recital, while waiting in line to see Santa Claus and get a candy cane, Lulu doesn't disappoint in the Christmas Ham category.

Here is a silly face...

And another version of it.

Lulu does her best unintentional Batman "Joker" face...

And this time, for the camera.

Bean, meanwhile, sees her opportunity and makes a break for it.

Gone!