Disney World, Halloween, Christmas

I never recapped the end of last year.

We went to Disney World between our collective last day at work and Brian's first day at school. It was fun, but insanely hot. I implore you, DO NOT go to Disney World in late July/early August. It felt like we were swimming in humidity. I was really thirsty the entire visit, and they never warn you that the water at all the Disney properties (except Hollywood Studios, actually) tastes like sulfur.

We still had a good time, but I feel like we need to go back sometime soon when the weather isn't so hot.

Brian started school and I started plowing through 60-70 hours a week working at a giant insurance company during open enrollment. We still managed to squeeze in a trip to Halloween Haunt at Kings Island and a trip to the Halloween party at the Louisville Zoo. Eliza also had two different costumes. She was a Renaissance Princess for Halloween Haunt and Foofa from Yo Gabba Gabba for the Zoo party and Tick or Treat. She'd be cute even if she'd dressed as Glenn Beck, so she was all set.

I feel like I missed the entire 2010 Christmas season. My work hours were such that I left the house at 5:40AM and didn't return until 7:00PM. Luckily, my last day at work was the week before Christmas, so we had lots of time to spend with family for Christmas. The annual trip to Mayfield yielded lots of Christmas cheer and togetherness (and so many presents for Eliza that we nearly couldn't get everything into our tiny KIA). We had a fantastic time. Thanks to everyone for the fun.

We spent the New Year at home because I was sick, sadly. We still had a good time watching various New Years Rockin' Eves. Eliza didn't even want to stay up until midnight. She asked to go to bed at 11:15. What a good girl!

We thought 2010 had been a pretty challenging year until we actually stopped to look back on it. We had lots of adventures and tons of fun!

Potty time!

Inspired by a Blues Clues bedtime book in which Blue goes to the bathroom before she goes to bed, I decided to let Blue wear one of Eliza's pull-ups today.

Tonight, Eliza seemed to have potty envy when I put Blue on the potty to demonstrate what going to the potty really means. I even decided to sneak in a little water so Eliza could see what pee pee was supposed to look like.

Eliza decided she wanted to take a turn and VOILA! She went to the potty for the first time.

YAY KID!

Okay, so we haven't posted since Eliza's birthday...

I'm a bad blogger, I admit. Toward the end of last year, we had too much going on. I was working insane hours and Brian was finishing his first semester in law school.

Right now, though, I'm taking a little break from work and Brian is cruising along with school. I thought I'd catch you guys up on the goings on.

Eliza is so verbal. I was so worried about her being physically behind when she was younger. It never occurred to me that she was just going to be less physical and more verbal like her parents. She loves to sing and tell knock knock jokes. Her fun party trick is singing the commercial jingles she picks up from TV. Sometimes I think people are taken aback by how well she communicates. A couple of months ago, she started requesting specific things by putting "I need" in front of it, and it's just adorable. She's like a tiny little adult.

She's so good with shapes and colors. Books, puzzles and Sesame Street have been great with teaching her advanced shapes. We went to a friend's house and drew some shapes on a piece of paper and she correctly identified a pentagon, octagon, etc. Our friend was terribly impressed and I was so proud.

When you can get her to focus long enough, she can count by tens. Usually, though, she'll say 30, 40, 50, 60, ONE HUNDRED!

The next thing we have to tackle is potty training. I have to admit, I'm not all that interested in starting too early. I don't think it's worth putting us both through complete misery when she's isn't showing signs of readiness. She won't even be 2 and a half until March, so we may revisit the issue then.