Giivng Thanks

Last weekend we were able to spend "Thanksgiving" with some of my family in Philadelphia. The Saxtons, Mom Hayhoe, Grandmom Gidjunis, my Aunt Donna, Uncle Mark, and Uncle Joe, enjoyed some turkey, football, and fun.


Noelle enjoyed some toys from the 1950's at Great Grandmoms

Since we didn't have a lot of time or money to travel for the actual holiday, we spent Thanksgiving Day with some of our favorite friends, the Hollywoods. It was a great day filled with way too much food. In fact, I am just now recovering 24 hours later! Nicole went out of control with 5 appetizers, and then we had a 12 pound turkey, 8 pound ham, macaroni and cheese, collard greens, green beans, rolls, apple cranberry pie, chocolate pie, and ice cream. We decided not to even cook the potatoes we had waiting. That's because, wait for it, this was for 4 adults and Noelle. Now Ellie can take down some food, but this meal was even too much for her! But it was a great day, and we were especially thankful that we didn't have to drive up or down 95, given the news of 6 plus mile back-ups at some of the tolls!

We thought we'd take this time to give a little thanks! First, having Noelle this past year has been amazing! We are so lucky that she is a healthy and happy little girl and love watching her grow! It isn't always easy with us both working long hours and not having our families around, but we have some great friends here (and afar) that have really supported us through the good and hard times over the past year. We are so lucky to have a few close friends who live nearby who we really love and trust. And of course we are thankful for our families! We wish we got to see you more, but love every second we get to spend together and perhaps distance makes the times we do get to spend together even more special! We are thankful for our new house and neighborhood. We have loved getting settled and feeling finally part of a community. And we are thankful for our little family of four (yup, Maddie will always be our first child!)



We truly thank God for all of his blessings and hope you have had a great Thanksgiving!

Decks Finally Done!

About a month ago we finally finished the deck project. My estimate: Over 100 man hours. Next time, we'll definitely be hiring someone!

Before


During


After

Storyville Part Deux

My mom came to visit this week for a day and a half before we headed to Philly for the Gidjunis Thanksgiving celebration. We spent Friday at Target (a thrill for my mom who lives an hour from the nearest Target) and then a visit to Storyville to show her the free fun for the little one. This time the grocery store was the big hit. This was the one area we didn't get to at all on our last visit, and now it will be our staple on future visits. Noelle loved filling her basket, weighing her goods, and operating the cash register. I told her she could continue to be amused by the cash register until after college, but then I hoped she would be a physicist or something more exciting! Here are some pictures of our little explorer!

Building:


Grocery shopping:






Three Little Pigs puppet show:




Reading with Grandmom in the playhouse:


Climbing through the log in the forest:




I still can't believe this place is free. And it has great books in each area which Noelle will love more and more the older she gets. We'll be back again soon!

A New Morning Routine

Yes, we are fully aware Noelle just turned 15 months, not 2 years. Even so, we have recently begun starting our days with a trip to the potty. In total, I think she has gone number 1 four times, and number 2 once! We don't expect our little one to be potty trained by 18 months, but since she is excited about using the potty every morning, and occasionally during the day when she tells us she needs to go, we are going to go with it! Maybe we'll be one of the lucky ones whose baby is out of diapers early. Or maybe we are in for a lot of heartache and mess. Either way, we're guessing our way through this new routine! We just ordered a baby toilet from amazon since the big potty is a bit too large and in charge for our 22 pounder, so we'll see what happens. They say girls are easier than boys on this one so we'll cross our fingers and hope our diaper money can be used elsewhere before she hits 2!

So my child doesn't hate us later in life, there will be no potty training pictures on the blog or elsewhere. You can breath a collective sigh of relief!

Having a Good Hair Day

Noelle has pretty awesome hair. I'm not going to lie, it pretty much rocks. And it is even more awesome when she sleeps on it and then takes her bows out. While her daddy was gone, she was having a particularly great day.


Back view


Front view


Noelle's hair in all it's glory!

Storyville

Last Friday, Noelle and I decided to take a trip over to a place we had heard lots about from fellow moms, Storyville. This is basically a series of play areas for 0-5 year olds at one of the local libraries. I had been a bit hesitant to head over there, as it isn't in this nicest of Baltimore area neighborhoods, but the great reviews pushed us over the edge to try it out.

Good call! While the neighborhood was a bit sketchy as expected, the clientele wasn't sketchy at all. We met a few moms from our group, headed inside, and were immediately impressed by our surroundings. Over the next two hours, Noelle and her new friends played in a pretend tree house, a theater with musical instruments and stage backgrounds, a kitchen, a construction and building area, and a reading room. We built with blocks, ran around with fake food, read books, climbed a tree, rocked on a bear, grew flowers, and played music. There was a pretend house, an area for babies not yet walking, a store, a post office, and a life size house to play in that we didn't even make it to during our first visit. This place was really great, and the best part of all was that it was free, We will certainly be back, and hope to make our next trip next week when my mom comes to town. Here are some pictures of our excursion:

Wins and Losses

This is my 6th post in 7 days - pretty impressive I think! Don't get too excited by it, I'm pretty sure it is just because Bryan is away and Noelle goes to bed before 8 leaving me with lots of time for such things. Even so, I'm going to call my recent flurry of posting a big win! Which is good, because I need to upset a morning loss.

It is day 5 of Bryan being gone. Day 3 of Noelle and I spending all day together. And I love my daughter with all her heart. But she has to nap. For her sake, for my sake, for everyone's sake. Unfortunately, over the past 2 days, she napped a total of 90 minutes. 20 in the car, 30 on a walk, and about 45 minutes in her crib after I let her shriek for 20 minutes yesterday late afternoon. Babies need naps. When they don't nap, they are grumpy and mean and like to bite and cry when they don't get there way. Despite being exhausted, the thought of going to her crib had Noelle in tears. She wouldn't even lay down. When I laid her down, she just climbed right back up, sobbing as if she was in pain. Normally when you let a baby cry it out, the tears become farther apart and quieter. Not my little angel when it came to nap time the past few days. So I gave in. I handed my daughter a pacifier, she laid down, curled up, and shut her eyes. I'm declaring it a loss in the parenting wars, but a victory for my sanity!

Here's to hoping that the return of her daddy (who she is affectionately calling B now after hearing me talk to him on the phone) tomorrow, as well as the completed cutting of her 9th tooth, means the pacifier can go missing again!

Halloween!

Bryan grew up not really celebrating Halloween. For the past 5 years, we have had a quiet Halloween, either turning the light out and not celebrating at all, or handing out candy quietly to a few neighborhood kids in between watching some TV. It was really important to me that we do Halloween this year with Noelle, and B was willing to give it a go, so I got her a costume, bought some candy for the crowds of kids I heard would come to our house in the new neighborhood, and picked a pumpkin for carving. We were supposed to start the holiday off with 50 moms, dads, and kids from the more low key mom's group I found here in Catonsville. Unfortunately, Noelle's cold and fever Friday and Saturday kept us from that event, but our little one was well enough Sunday to join in on the festivities. So we began by carving our first ever Saxton family pumpkin. It was a joint effort by B and I, and I think it came out rather well!



Then, at 3, we headed to the neighborhood parade. We weren't so sure how Noelle would do with her costume, not to mention all the others, after the debacle that was her reaction to the Disney characters, but surprisingly she had no problem with her monkey outfit and ran around happily in it for quite some time. As you will note from the pictures below, she was clearly a girl monkey, with the bow in her hair! Ellie was definitely the youngest neighborhood kid there for the parade, and as she insisted on walking we definitely brought up the rear, but she had fun as she strolled down Hilton Ave with her new friends. We were so far behind we missed the treats at a neighbor's home, so we went back to our street to play with Maddie in the leaves. Our little ladies had a great time!








A few hours later it was finally dark and we were ready to trick or treat. House 1, success. Ellie even reached into the candy bucket and took 1 piece which she dropped in to her Halloween bucket. House 2, again great. House 3, perfect! She was a hit. At house 5, there was a slight problem. First, the house owners had no dog. As the "puppy" at each house was pretty much the only reason she wanted to walk up the driveway, this did not bode well. Second, the owners had really gotten in to the spirit of things and had on costumes. Our neighbor, Paul, actually had on a pretty scary mask. He removed it immediately as soon as he saw Noelle start to tremble, but the damage was done, no candy was retrieved, and we moved back down the driveway. Thankfully, the mommies and daddies nearby were out in full force ready to tell Ellie how cute she looked in her costume. Never a girl to shy away from a compliment, she came back out of her shell. Plus Earl, the puppy up the street still needed to be seen, so we got a few more houses in before calling it a night!



All in all, I think we are calling the first Saxton Halloween a success!

One Last Day of Magic

We impressed ourselves by getting up early, finishing packing, getting checked in for our flight and checking our luggage, and making it over to the Magic Kingdom by 7:45 for our final day of fun! As the park opened early just for those staying at Disney resorts, in the first hour we were able to do Peter Pan's flight, Pooh, and It's a Small World, and Noelle and B did the Carousel and Buzz's Lightyear again while I hit Space Mountain. It was an impressive opening for us! For the next hour or so we did a few more rides and took in our last look of the castle before finishing off our trip at Epcot.







We again hopped on the monorail and since I was feeling much better, I ran over to ride Test Track while Bryan got Noelle in the park at a more leisurely pace. It is funny when you ride rides alone - everyone wants to be your friend, probably because they think you are a loser at Disney by yourself! So Test Track was fun, and ended up being my final ride of the trip, since we decided to spend the rest of our trip hanging out at World Showcase, having lunch, listening to some of the performers, and sampling a few last minute options from the Food and Wine Festival. It was a relaxing few hours before we headed back to the resort to pick up the shuttle back to the airport.







We had about 30 minutes to spare when we got back to Pop Century!, our resort, so we let Noelle get some of her energy out! She loved the round windows and running back and forth from our spot in the empty cafeteria.



We had hoped that between Noelle being exhausted, and the 7 pm flight time being so close to her bed time, that she would sleep on the flight home. Instead, Noelle decided she was clearly unhappy to leave the magic behind in Florida as she alternated between fussing and wailing most of the flight home. I couldn't blame her, I was said to leave it all behind too, but finally, about 5 minutes before we landed she fell asleep. And so ended our 5 day jaunt to Disney with a 14-month old. Were we crazy? Probably. But for the most part, until we left Florida at least, we had a great time. And we'll always remember the smiles on our little ones face when she rode the carousel, played on Main Street, and saw the parades. And the cute pictures we got, especially those with her cousin are pretty priceless too! So, are we bringing her again? Of course, some day, but we'll probably fly solo until she meets the height requirement for Space Mountain!

Four Parks in One Day

Bryan and I are Disney fanatics. Most people who know us, know this. Do you know, however, that we subscribe to a Disney planning website? Or that we pride ourselves at being at park opening each morning? Or even better, that we have the maps of each park emblazoned on the backs of our eyelids so that we can walk around with our eyes closed? Yes, we are psycho. And to prove it, we decided that a little thing like a teething 14 month old would not stop us in partaking in our Disney World tradition. That's right, in true "Park Hopper" style, we would hop into all four parks in one day. Why you ask? Because we could, that's why. Now, when the childless Saxton's hopped to all 4 parks, we liked to do it with style. So our goal was not only to do all 4 parks, but to do the biggest attractions, aka the "thrill" rides, in each. We decided this probably wasn't doable, but we still wanted to go on record with our hopping success! So here goes our adventure on the day before our Disney departure.

We started the day at Disney Studios and our mad dash for the one ride that was brand new since our last visit to Disney - Toy Story Mania! This was crazy. The ride holds way fewer people per hour than they thought it would so when we got to the attraction 2 minutes after the park opened they were already predicting a 50 minute wait. If you don't get a fast pass by 11 am, they are all gone for the day! Thanks to Bryan's mad dash we got a fast pass for around 10 so we were able to leisurely explore the Studios for an hour. This gave us time for a quick diaper change and Muppet Vision 3-D, a not to be missed attraction for any Jim Henson lover! After double checking with the cast members that it wouldn't hurt Noelle's eyes if she didn't wear her 3-D glasses we enjoyed the show in an almost empty theater. Noelle loved it!



We headed back to Toy Story Mania, and I have to say, it was pretty cool. You ride through what is basically a 3-D arcade filled with Toy Story characters, and compete with your carmates as you shoot at different bullseyes. It was great! Noelle didn't enjoy it quite as much as I did, as the vehicle moved pretty fast from station to station and she didn't weigh enough not to be thrown back each time we stopped. Putting her on my lap helped that problem, but I'm pretty sure she caused my loss to her daddy in the arcade game competition! Oh well - the things we do for our kids!

Noelle was ready for a snack and a nap, so we headed over to do Tower of Terror and Rock and Roller Coaster again. When the coaster broke down before my ride, Bryan and I looked at each other and decided that was a sign we needed to switch parks. So off to Animal Kingdom we went!

A quick bus ride later, we arrived! Because of Noelle's slight grumpiness the day before, we didn't get to do everything we wanted to do at AK. So we grabbed fastpasses for the Safari since that had been a hit, had lunch, and then each rode Everest one more time. We then did the Tiger Jungle trek before heading over to Safari. We saw the cute baby elephant again and lots of other cool animals. Next, we took the train over to Rafiki's Planet Watch. We had heard the area was great for kids and had never made the trek before. I have to say it was only ok. They had a petting zoo which Noelle liked a lot (although she called everything there a puppy - her favorite word!), but I had higher expectations of what we would see. After the return train ride we knew we were done with the AK for the trip, and Noelle would soon be ready for another short nap. Magic Kingdom here we come!





The bus to the MK actually dropped us off at the ticket and transportation center so we had to take the monorail. This was fine with us as I love the monorail and we wanted Noelle to have a chance to ride it. We hopped on and took the short ride through the Contemporary Hotel over to the MK.



As we were entering the MK, we took the chance to take a few pictures of the fall and Halloween decorations. Everything was super cute! We also saw Pluto, and again our daughter was terrified! Not even reminding her that he was a Puppy made her feel better! We headed in to the park determined to go on the Haunted Mansion (Noelle had slept through it Monday), do a few coasters, and enjoy a snack. On the way down Main Street though, there was a marching band that Noelle thought was super cool. She danced and clapped along for 20 minutes, and besides the carousel, this was definitely a highlight of the trip for her!







When it came to the Haunted Mansion, Noelle was a bit scared (death grip on mom and dad!) but getting back in to the sunlight made her feel better! She and daddy played while mommy went on Big Thunder Mountain, and then she decided to take her nap finally as we stopped for some root beer floats (yummy!) and some time at Space Mountain and the People Mover again! As it was getting dark, we had already done a little of Fantasy Land earlier (had to get our carousel fix in!), we took advantage of our still sleeping beauty and headed back to the monorail for the final park, Epcot!







The monorail was so much more awesome than the bus as we could just roll the stroller right on in - amazing! It was late by the time we got to Epcot so we headed over to the Land to feed Noelle dinner and so we could have a snack before we hit rides and World Showcase. We did Spaceship Earth again, and headed over to Test Track for Bryan to take a ride. I wasn't feeling so hot so didn't partake and instead enjoyed an after sunset stroll around Epcot with Noelle. We then walked around World Showcase for a bit before calling it a night and heading back to the hotel. We were exhausted, still needed to pack, and the MK was opening up at 8 am the next morning for resort guests so we had a long day ahead!



We were super pumped to have done all 4 parks in one day, but you have to be truly crazy (or Disney fanatics like us) to attempt it with a toddler! Noelle was surprisingly awesome with the whole thing though, so as long as your baby girl will sleep on the go, and you are prepared to speed walk like crazy, go for it!

We Interrupt The Disney Posts for an Important Message

Really two messages.

First, today marks the beginning of Bryan's solo trip to Florida. He is down in south Florida for a work conference. I keep forgetting the exact name, but it is basically a whole bunch of commercial real estate lawyers and shopping center leasing people meeting. Fun, right? Bryan will be gone for 6 days, first at the conference and then visiting with Kevin, Tracie, Rubie, and unborn baby Saxton for a few days since they live nearby. So while Noelle and I have been away from Bryan before, we've never done it on our own in MD (we always have hung in NC with family in the past) so please wish us luck! We miss B already and he just left this morning!

Second, the Sunday we got back from Disney we went cold turkey on Noelle and removed the pacifiers from her life. And let me tell you, this has really been a game changer! Now, you may recall that Ellie has never been a fabulous sleeper. She didn't sleep through the night until she was close to a year, and even then, we'd often wake up for a few minutes of comfort time. When it got cold in early October and blankets were added to the crib mix, wake-ups became common again, as Noelle would wake up, not be able to find her pacifier among the blankets, and cry until we came to give her one. While I truly believe the pacifier can be a life saver (and it was awesome at Disney for her when she was starting to get a bit grumpy) I was ready for some all through the night sleep. Besides Disney, Noelle had just been using the pacifier at bedtime, so we decided at 14 months, we were going to see what happened if we just didn't give it to her anymore.

Results: It has been great! The first night she cried for a little less than 10 minutes when we put her down for bed and didn't give her a pacifier. But then, she slept the whole night through. Not a peep until after 6 am. Night two, only 3 minutes of crying at bedtime. It has been a week and a half, and with the exception of Friday night when Noelle had a fever and cold, she has gone down for bed and stayed down all night. I am not going to lie and say we are all now well-rested (who is when they work, have a house to clean, and a 14 month old?) but for the first time in about 2 years, I have slept multiple nights in a week and not woken up a single time. It has been amazing!

So here's to hoping Bryan's trip goes well, Noelle continues to thrive without her pacis, that I continue to get some good sleep, and that we all survive the next 6 days!

We'll be back to our regularly scheduled Disney posts shortly!

On Safari with Mickey

Tuesday-Thursday the Maryland based Saxton's were on their own in Mickey's playground. Tuesday, we started the day off at Animal Kingdom. We had a great plan involving Bryan speed walking for Safari fast-passes while Noelle and I leisurely made our way through the opening crowd so we could ride twice, but due to a small communication glitch, we ended up losing one another and starting off with a tour on one of the animal trails until our fast-pass time was ready. It actually worked for the best as there were hardly any people and lots of animals. Noelle was particularly enthralled with the fish and gorillas!



We then went on safari, and soon Ellie was ready for her morning nap, so B and I took turns watching our Disney princess and riding Everest, a great roller coaster in the park! After two turns each, we headed over for lunch, I took a detour to see It's Tough to Be A Bug since I love the 3-D films!, and Noelle woke up just in time for a yummy BBQ lunch. As we were walking to our next ride, we came across a line for Pooh, Eyeore, and Tigger with less than a 5 minute wait! Perfect opportunity to interact with the characters since they were my favorite, and Noelle was well-rested and fed. Disaster struck! We confirmed that they terrify our little one, and that it wasn't just that she was tired and grumpy the day before. Oh well!





After a ride on some triceratops and a short visit to the Bone Yard to run around, we headed over to our favorite show at Disney, Festival of the Lion King. This is a great live performance that we love and thought Noelle would love to. Unfortunately, our little one who had been angelic for most of the trip up to this point wasn't excited about the performance. We made it through but it wasn't at all enjoyable for the three of us. Thankfully, we didn't really disturb those around us. It seemed Noelle was hot and tired again, so after the show we decided to head out and over to Epcot for the rest of the day.



There we had our first real taste of the Food and Wine Festival around World Showcase. This is a series of about 25 booths from different countries that are out special for a month and a half in the fall. Each booth has tastings (tapa sized portions) of specialties from their countries. You have to pay extra for the food and drink (just as you do for meals at Disney) but this gave us an opportunity to have some new treats. First up, we grabbed some margaritas, and then watched the bridge near Mexico go up to allow thee firework boats through for the night. She was ready for her 2nd nap of the day so we were able to cruise around the lagoon doing some tastings while she slept. We talked to a nice couple (who discussed the awesomeness of Disney's Vacation Club with us!) near Belgium and took the opportunity to relax a bit. When Noelle woke up, we hit a few rides, listened to a band in Canada (Canadian Celtic Rock!), and then split up so I could use the fast-pass I'd grabbed earlier to ride Soarin' - one of my favorite rides. Noelle and B made some new friends in the aquarium in the Living Seas and then we headed home for the night after a busy day!