I have two weeks off for Christmas and we are spending the first week in Corvallis (Shauna, Colin and Winter are visiting Corvallis too). Then, we will have a week off in Bend.
Lily is getting the idea of Christmas down: Santa, presents, “Merry Christmas”, “Christmas Trees”, cookies, family, ice cream every day, Barney, snow, lights, the works.
Lily is growing so quickly. Her vocabulary is exploding. Some days she greets me after school by saying “Hello beautiful Mom” and it melts my heart. She loves to “cook mum mums” (make food and coffee for everyone in her play kitchen), pretend to drive the car to “shop mum mums” or to go to Jamba Juice, read books, watch “Diary of a Wimpy Kid” or her new favorite “Racing Stripes”, and to draw.
We just got a membership to the Athletic Club of Bend. I took Lily swimming yesterday — she loved it. She loves to jump in off the edge and watch Mama blow bubbles. She pretends to blow her own bubbles, but won’t put her face close enough in the water to get much to happen 
What else? Lily, Andy and I spend time in the bedroom most nights winding down. Usually Andy has a chance to catch up on some computer work (his standing desk is in our bedroom right now since we don’t have space for an office) and Lily and I have a chance to shower, play, watch a movie, and just do whatever while we can all enjoy some time in the same room. Lily is so well behaved while I am in the room with she and Andy, even if I am not paying 100% attention to her. But… the second I walk out of the room to do anything, she will get into mischief.
For example, the other night, Andy was on his computer and Lily and I were playing. I decided to take some dishes downstairs to the kitchen and bring up a snack. Well, within 3 minutes of being downstairs, Lily begins to scream bloody murder. Andy immediately begins to look for her, calling out “Lily, where are you?” Since I am downstairs, I have no idea where Lily is so I bolt upstairs to see what has happened. Andy is frantically looking for Lily, who is wailing. We try to follow the cries — they are obviously coming from our bedroom. Where?? Under the bed of course. Somehow, Lily has squeezed herself under our bed. She obviously does not fit under our bed, hence the bloody murder screams. How did she get under there? Andy lifted the bed and I pulled her out. In her hand was a nerf football. Through her tears and sniffles I asked her what happened:
“Mama go wash dishes, Lily get football, Lily stuck in the bed, Lily cry, Mama come.”
That answers that.
She then ended that same evening by jump jump jumping on the bed, and falling off head first. Sigh. It was a hard night.
On a happier note: we are loving Bend so far — the snow is beautiful (such a nice change from rain, rain, rain).
Whenever my dad sees Lily, he says “Hello the Biggs!”
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YouTube Direkt- Hello the Biggs!
I don’t know how to spell exactly what it is that Lily calls my dad…. Poppa, Pop-pob, Bob-bob, Pop-pop or some combination.
Regardless of how it is spelled, Lily missed them both very much tonight. She decided to cook them some food:
Beans, rice and smoothie
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YouTube Direkt- Beans and Rice
Very hot, cool it down
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YouTube Direkt- Beans and Rice
If you ask Lily how much Nama loves her, this is her response:
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YouTube Direkt- How Much?
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YouTube Direkt- How Much Love?
We have had a few snowy days, a few rainy days, a few thunder days, but mostly clear skies! Can’t complain! Snow is forecasted for the weekend. It has been getting colder and colder here during the days.
Here is some compiled video footage that Shauna took of Lily and Winter while they were visiting (around October 6th)…
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YouTube Direkt- Lily & Winter
Luis is amazing.
