Christmas day

I feel like this picture should be on a greeting card or something, look how big her eyes are and how excited she looks!  Christmas day was a very long day for us, but SO fun.  When we woke up we opened presents at our house.  It was a very simple Christmas at our house this year.  Colton and I decided we weren't going to exchange gifts and for Korbyn I took four boxes and stuffed them full of her toys that she already had and let her open them.  I know it sounds awful that we didn't even buy our daughter anything for Christmas but she's ONE!  She has absolutely no idea what Christmas even is so we couldn't justify spending the money on something that she's not even going to care about.  Do I feel guilty?  Maybe a little bit, but I guarantee she was just as excited and happy as every other kid on Christmas morning. 

I don't know why my videos aren't loading right, but I had a really cute one of Korbyn opening her first gift, hopefully I can post them soon.

 Then we went to Colton's mom's house for lunch.  Korbyn got so many gifts and she got the opening presents routine down perfectly!

 Santa brought her cousin Avery a pink guitar and she brought it along to memaw's.  It was so cute watching her play it, even Korbyn wanted to try it out.  Avery is showing her how to play it.

 Waiting patiently as daddy opens her new babies.

 I don't know if you know it or not, but Korbyn has this funny little addiction with soft things.  Any blanket, pillow, or toy that is soft she wants to lay on it and cuddle it.  Memaw and papaw made her a blanket and pillow set that is super soft and she immediately was in love!  The poor girl has been at home with an ear infection the last couple of days and she has become SO attached to this blanket.  I eventually had to take the pillowcase off the pillow and let her carry that around because she kept dragging the blanket and tripping on it.

 Then for dinner we went to my nanny and papaw's (my dad's parents) house.  Our family continues to grow so they moved their Christmas out to their garage this year.

Then when we got home we all crashed because it had been such and exhausting, but wonderful, day :)

Christmas Eve

She got this coat and hat for her birthday and I've been chomping at the bit for Christmas to get here so she could finally wear it!  Every time she would put it on I would call her my little Russian.  It's an 18 month so it's a little big but I know the 12 month would have been way too small.  So this way she can wear it all the way through winter, I'm so excited!

Colton and I both snagged a picture with Korbyn before heading off to church on Christmas Eve.

I don't think this was on Christmas Eve but I wanted to get a picture of these shirts that they made.  The reindeer is actually supposed to be in front, but when her teacher made it none of us were paying attention to how high or low we were putting her hand and footprints, we were just worried about the paint getting everywhere!  So when we finished we soon realized that she probably wasn't able to wear it.  Uh...not this momma, if I bought it she's wearing it (I bought the onesie for them to paint on).  So I just turned it backwards and she wore it to her class party at daycare.  I had to unfortunately cut the reindeer's nose off because it would have looked like something was in her britches if I hadn't.

Friday Christmas

 I have several "Christmases" to post so bear with me.  Our first Christmas this year was at memaw and papaw Beisert's house, it was on Friday evening.  Memaw had made sugar cookies and icing for the kids to decorate their own cookies, it was so cute.  Korbyn of course had to supervise.

 We set her on a stool next to the island to watch them decorate.  She kept pointing to the cookies and the icing so memaw gave her some on her finger to taste and from then on she kept swiping her finger across a cookie to get a taste of the icing.  My nephew finally caught on to what she was doing and he said "eww, Torby (that's how he says Korbyn) I not eating that one!"

 She finally just grabbed a cookie and started munching on it herself.

 Then we always have to take a group picture with all the kids before we open presents.  I have to say, even though none of them are looking at my camera it's a pretty good one this year.

Along with our gifts to the kids we put a punch balloon in each of their bags.  They all wanted them blown up of course when they saw them.  So for a while it was chaos as they were all punching them in one room!  Then they got bored with them and moved on to another toy so Korbyn decided it was her turn.  She can actually punch them and make them go back and forth, it was hilarious!

My nieces put together a "production" of Christmas songs.  They were so cute.  They even were calling each other the day before telling who to bring what from home.  They did several songs and I have the cutest video of them singing and Korbyn eating it up, she even started clapping for them when they started.  But I've tried loading this video several times and it won't load right so I'm giving up on it, maybe I can post it later.

I just had to throw this one in here because she looks so adorable in glasses!  I hope she never has to wear glasses or contacts of course, but we couldn't resist taking a picture of her.

My sister-in-law made a birthday cake and we sang happy birthday to baby Jesus after we opened gifts. 

Then as the night went on we all got a little silly.  My mom had a box of some of my baby stuff out and we were trying on some of my old dresses on Korbyn.  The frilly dress just doesn't suit her!  Even my sister-in-law said that it just doesn't look like Korbyn!  But I actually took home a couple of my old dresses because they were some that had already come back in style...not the green one though :)

Christmas lights

 We went to the Lights of Tejas with Doug and Loranne Tuesday night.  It was pretty neat, I'm definitely looking forward to taking Korbyn next year because I think she would enjoy it more then.  As soon as we got there we thankfully caught the hayride right before it was about to take off.  During the hayride Colton and I looked at each other and both decided that we were pretty disappointed at what they had to offer.  Let me clarify because I know that sounds really mean.  The tunnel of lights that we are under taking the picture is really all they did with the lights, the only other lights they had displayed were wrapped tree trunks...and that's it.  I'm very thankful that so many people took their time to put this together (because I know it was A LOT of work), but I guess with the heavy advertising they did for so long we just expected more.  Granted they did have several bounce houses, a light maze and a light show (also just tree trunks) so I know for older kids they would have had a blast.

Probably the best thing they had for us was the dining hall where they were selling drinks, dinner, and the free hot chocolate I won!  They had the entire hall filled with lit Christmas trees and they had music playing and the trees were flashing to the beat of the music.  It was really neat and also great because Korbyn loved it and was able to run around and stay warm.  So we probably spent the majority of our time in there drinking our hot chocolate and watching Korbyn.  It was fun and I definitely want to go back next year!

Ponytail

 Korbyn's hair is finally thick enough to put in a little ponytail!  Her teacher put one in her hair probably 6 months ago and I had such a hard time getting it out (because they had to wrap it so tight to get what little hair she had in it) that I didn't put one back in until now.  I'm just always afraid that it hurts her head so I put it in really loose and try not to do it too often so I don't damage it too bad.  The barrette clips are by far our best friend.  They actually stay in her hair.  She's still pretty good about leaving bows in, but if she remembers that it's up there she'll reach up and try to pull it out, while making sure I'm looking at her and smiling of course!

Usually as soon as we get home I'll take the ponytail out and her hair will stick up like this until we get in the bathtub!

Understanding us

Korbyn now loves to carry around bags!  I looked into her purse the other evening and these are all the things she managed to stuff down in there and our tv remote was at the bottom, I probably would have never found that thing.  And it doesn't matter what size, she will try to sling it over her shoulder and carry it around.

We've also realized that we need to really start being careful what we say around her.  The other night we were in the living room and she was playing with her toys and I noticed one of her house shoes had come off of her foot.  To myself I said "oh shoot, now where's her shoe?"  She looked up at me and said "shoe" and walked around the corner into the kitchen and brought me back her shoe to put it on her!  I just stared at her in amazement and at the same time thinking...o crap.  Then another time Colton had something in his hand and Korbyn wanted it but couldn't have it so he put it on the coffee table and said "no, that's trash."  She then picked up what he set down and walked over to the trash can and tried to put it in!

I've noticed too that she's trying to imitate almost everything we say and do.  She can say mommy, daddy, hot, hi, shoe, more and sign for finished and more.  She can somewhat point to her hair, ears, nose, eyes, and mouth when asked where they are but she still gets a little confused.

Day at the farm

 Last Saturday Colton, Korbyn, and I went out to Fedor to help my dad burn some brush piles.  Now that the burn ban has finally been lifted, for a while anyway, everyone is trying to burn what they have before they set another ban.  It was so funny the day after the ban was lifted, you could look in any direction and see smoke everywhere.  A friend of ours who works in College Station but drives back and forth everyday said it looked like Indian territory coming into Lee county!

I wasn't planning on going out with Colton but at the last minute he said we should come along since it was a pretty nice day and that would give Korbyn to run around too.  She LOVED it.  We weren't really restricting her on anything that she could get into or go, she mostly played in the dirt the entire time.  She also was caught playing in some cow poop!  It's ok, it was dry and we washed her hands.  The girl played so hard and got so dirty that I had to clip her nails just to get the dirt out from underneath them and she got straight into the tub when we got home, but it was so good for her to just play in the dirt!

 She also loves papaw's tractor.  She thought it was a good idea to check the tires out before they went on a ride! 

She wanted so bad to get on it, so papaw took her on a short ride to go check the hog trap.  I was a nervous wreck with her sitting on his lap and I know it's not the smartest thing to do.  I kept telling him "don't let go of her for a second!!!"  He just laughed and was like, Abby please.  Well they weren't gone but maybe five minutes and we could see them the entire time.  When he started heading back I got my camera ready because I wanted to see her reaction.  The girl fell asleep before they even started heading back!

Tractors have never made me nervous, but I guess the first time you see your baby on one is a little gut wrenching.  Heck my dad threw me on one when I was about 9 and told me to figure it out...literally.  I remember it vividly.  We were in our driveway and he put me on it and said he's going to teach me how to drive it.  Well he didn't sit up there with me, he just walked beside it and told me what to do while I was so nervous I was in tears.  But he wouldn't get me down, he knew that I could figure it out and eventually I did.  The same thing when he taught me how to drive a stick.  I was in the process of getting my license and he wanted to teach me how to drive a standard.  We got to a stop sign and I was trying to take off and I kept dying out and I couldn't figure out why!  I was getting so frustrated and embarrassed because the line of cars that were behind us were starting to go around us!  But he wouldn't tell me what I was doing wrong, he just kept saying "Abby, take your time and look what you're doing wrong."  Come to find out I was trying to take off in second gear and in his old truck you HAVE to take off in first.  I always loved that about my dad.  He was so patient and he wanted me to learn by figuring things out on my own, not just having someone tell me what I was doing wrong.