Wren's hair

Wren's bed head is, on occasion, picture worthy.

One day, she woke up with horns...or wings...whatever you see here...

It's the kind of hair-do that makes you giggle a little every time you look at her.

No Wren, brushing it will not help, but if it makes you feel better...

By the afternoon, I may be kind and wet it down. Recently I tried doing some pigtails to see if her hair was long enough yet. It kind of worked.
She also insisted on wearing my scarf around the house.

She seemed to feel very important/grown-up/stylish/proud to be wearing the scarf. She could have cared less about the pigtails. The spoon? She likes to have a...sceptre/staff/wand/something-to-bang-on-stuff to carry around with her all day long. Today it was a spoon.


I present to you, the Queen on her Throne...

Christmas Eve and Day

An eventful couple of days can go by, and picture opportunities can be easily missed. I missed about 98% of those opportunities, so here are a couple from the past few days.

You know, dressing a kid up for special occassions is somewhat pointless. Wren stayed in this outfit for maybe the first quarter of the day, and then she ate a meal. Enough said.

But the toque always kills me, it's just so cute!

We spent a cozy Christmas Eve at my parent's house. So many goodies, it was nice to just hang out and basically watch Wrennie play. What else does a group of adults do when a child is in the room?

Aunty and Wrennie play with Abby Cadabby and the magic wand. Now Wrennie has her two most favourite dolls, Abby and Elmo!

This year I put together a photo book of Wren's first year for both of our parents. I made it on our computer with the iPhoto program, and it turned out amazing. My parents were beside themselves...in happiness! I was going to put up a photo of Kenton's parents opening their book, but Kyle got in the picture and he was only wearing a nightgown...no one needs to see that! ha!

Christmas 2010 family photo. I can't even find a family photo from last year to give you the comparison.

Wrennie also received a baby dolly. All she really wanted to do was bite it's toes. Maybe we will have to reintroduce the dolly at a later time...

Then we spent Christmas Day at Nana and Papa's. We brought Wren's little chair to sit in and enjoy opening presents by the fireplace.

In this picture, Nana is holding an Elmo tree ornament that talks and has music. Wren is playing with her blocks that she got from her uncles. They may be in her top 3 of favourite gifts, as she loves to knock down towers made from them.

 Nana and Papa also bought her a sled for going on winter walks. Fun!

Sadly I did not get any more pictures from that day...maybe someone else did and they want to send them to me?
After spending the morning at Kenton's parents, we went to his aunt and uncles in St. Albert where the rest of Kenton's relatives were for games and food. A few of us girls even took Wren for her first sled ride down by the lake, which she seemed to enjoy although it was hard to tell as her expression did not change throughout the ride. The lake is also part of a dog park, and Wren is terrified of dogs...like...convulses and cries. I am not exaggerating! So every so often when a dog came bounding near us, we had to move on pretty quick!

All in all, we had a great couple of days, and now Wrennie is played out. She actually has the flu...but hey, now all the festivities are done and we can all bum around home :)

Until next Christmas...

Ouch

A little shiner, right before Christmas. 

Wren's first "Haircut"

I finally gave in and gave Wren a "haircut". It wasn't really a true haircut...I only trimmed the super long bang hairs that she had since birth. They would always hang in her eyes, and I thought I could avoid this by putting a clip in her hair. After finding the clip in her mouth instead of her hair numerous times, I gave up.

But let's be serious, it's not like you can see a difference.

I had to leave her blonde streak alone though...I couldn't bring myself to snip that long blonde strand away.

"Um okay Mum, is this over now?"

Toilet paper!!

Christmasy things!

Okay, okay, okay! A new post is here! 

Last year Wrennie slept through 99% of Christmas. This year, she is tasting baking, helping put up the tree, un-wrapping gifts, staring at Christmas lights, and dancing to Christmas music. 

I decided to do some baking this year. Kenton's bosses have been really good to us, and we wanted to say thank you with some Christmas treats. I decided on gingerbread and shortbread cookies, candy cane fudge, and to try and replicate Judy's amazing nuts & bolts recipe. 

Wren tastes some gingerbread for me, my little guinea pig...There was none left, so I think that was a good sign.

I got this recipe off of the Martha Stewart website- www.marthastewart.com. It produced the perfect cracked tops!

This shortbread cookie recipe is my mom's, and one of my favourites. As I beat the butter and icing sugar together, I had a hard time not eating it by the spoonful. My favourite part of the cookie is the candied cherry on top.

This year I bought Wrennie her special tree ornament. Anthropologie had a ridiculous amount of cute Christmas ornaments this year.


Speaking of great ornaments, Nokomis had some too. We went for a couple for our tree. They are wooden and handmade, my favourite!

I think my mom got Kenton this ornament last year, sort of reminiscent of his favourite childhood comic hero.

And yes, we attempted popcorn garland for that homey, hand-made look. I can't lie, it's totally painstaking. Kenton and I had to wait until Wren was asleep for the night to even think about doing this- could you imagine her with popcorn everywhere??

I found this poinsetta at the farmer's market this year. I also bought a real wreath, but it is sitting in the snow in our backyard...The lady selling them informed me that since it is real, it will be fresher as an outside wreath. We have been a bit slow on nailing it to the front door, and then the huge snow dump hit and well, I don't know if we will find it now...oops..

I can't go to the mall without all the Salvation Army donation collectors offering me a candy cane for Wren every time we pass. It's nice of them, but people, she is too little!

Classic Christmas stories. Kenton's is Charlie Brown, mine is the Grinch, and this year Wrennie got Twas The Night Before Christmas at her birthday. I love watching the original cartoon movie of the Grinch Who Stole Christmas. I laugh so hard at his little dog, poor thing. We have already tried watching some with Wren, but she is a Sesame Street kid through and through and can hardly muster up the attention span for anything else.

I have always liked watching Christmas movies with my family on Christmas Eve. The year we watched Elf was memorable, and so were my parents laughs!

And here is Wren, relaxing again in her comfy chair, "reading" a Sesame Street book.

Now she eats, and puts it in her hair. It's like she needs to give herself a scalp massage at the end of her meal once her hands are good and full of food.

Bath time with baby Santa Claus...

Here is our tree, and yes, we noticed it's missing a strand of popcorn in the middle. Needless to say, we haven't found the time again to finish it...

For the second year in a row, I have tried to do dried orange slices on the tree. For the second year in a row, I have burned them. How is this possible??? Anyway, this year I managed to salvage enough to cover the part of the tree we look at.

Pretty!

I have posted a lot of pictures of Wren eating in this post. I haven't taken many pictures of her lately. I thought this one was kind of funny, she has an orange coloured lasagna beard.

My next post will probably be of pictures from Christmas, so if I don't make it on here before then, Merry Christmas everyone!

My Sweetie Wren

Do they come any cuter?

Wren's Holiday Gift Guide

I have seen a lot of cute things online for kids. Here is some of my great findings...


A company called Wee Waldorf on Etsy has very cute handmade toys.

Or this handmade, fake felt-food, looks good enough to eat of course!




This lady makes the cutest baby booties.

A company called Clementine Art makes all natural art supplies for kids. So cool!

Cute wall decals for a baby bedroom.

Every kid needs a pair of Padraig slippers as they continue to grow..and grow...

All kids should be reading Todd Parr books. 

Cute!

Amy's Holiday Gift Guide- for Herself :)

If I had to make a wish list for Christmas, like I used to when I was a kid, these are the things I would choose.

I will start off by telling you that my list will mostly include anything from Nokomis, my favourite store on earth. And I really really hope I don't get in trouble for using their blog photos, but I thought it would give you a better visual to know what I am talking about....

At Nokomis, they have these pillows. They are white with a bike screen printed on them. One is grey, and one is...orange I think? Both would look good in my living room that is hurting for some pillows on the couches. Um, neither are in the photograph.

Second, tea towels. All of them are nice, and would look good in my kitchen.

Third, slippers made by Preloved. Our floors get pretty chilly and sometimes guests would like a pair to wear when visiting.

Fourth, Toodlebunny earrings and necklaces. They are all beautiful, and whether it's silver or gold, in the shape of a feather, bird, or heart, I like them all!

Fifth, and not really for me, they have kids t-shirts,
all of which would be cute on Wren. I wonder if they would make one with a "W" on it if you asked?

So, actually my entire holiday gift guide was from Nokomis. If you are Christmas shopping for a female on your list this year, she will probably appreciate a gift from here. Just saying.

A Happy Birthday Party

One year ago a little Wren was born. Today we had a party to celebrate!

We had some chocolate cupcakes...

Some tissue paper decorations...

And sang happy birthday with a candle...

A whole year old!

She really liked the icing with coconut and delicately picked it apart.

After we had some food, Wrennie played with her guests...

Her best pal, Isla, was ready to party...

And Oliver came to play with Elmo...

A new rocking chair!

She is playing Peek-a-Boo, or otherwise known as "Where's Wren-Wren?" in our house.

There she is!

After only a couple of hours, the Wrenster was exhausted and needed a nap. Thank you so much to our family and friends for coming! We had such a fun time and Wren (and us) say thank you for the gifts :) It was a really fun party!

After dinner and a bath, Wren decided to try out some of her new stuff. This evening she just wanted to relax and watch some Sesame Street in the comfort of her new chair, thanks to Uncle Kyle and Uncle Jordan.

Oh, and cuddles with Elmo of course...

Hard to believe this day happened a whole year ago...