a quick photo of jasper

I have holiday post coming up but I wanted to post a quickie of Mr. Jasper. He is perfect and the family is settling in just fine! The first photo is blurry but his cuteness shines through.

meet jasper

he is more squeezable than charmin
(side note: i think my my hair resembles an octopus)

OK, more to come when I have some time to sit down and organize photos. Later!

lottie sue screamed at santa, matt had a birthday & the conchords are back

Lottie Sue met Santa last weekend and it didn't go very well. There was kicking, screaming and crying involved.

we gave her a cookie before going up, but that didn't help at all

i was holding back laughter, does that make me a bad mommy?

Children's Hospital Rehab Center (those peeps are near and dear to us) hosted the Holiday Party with Santa. Lottie Sue's physical therapist, Deidre (love her), helped Santa pick out the perfect gift for Lottie Sue - a baby doll! LS was crying and when I took her off Santa's lap I said "thank you" and she screamed "DAY YOUUUU" (her thank you) to him - it was hilarious. At least she has manners.

these photos are of ls after we stopped her beeline
toward the mountain of stuff animals - she was MAD

Here she is opening her present, she got very excited when she saw the baby doll.

thank you santa (and deidre)!

Matt celebrated his 35th birthday last Sunday (whoa, somebody is O-L-D...). Just kidding...not. I have no room to talk as we are only a month apart. But Matt will ALWAYS be older than me. Hee.

lottie sue helps her dad open his birthday gift

Matt made a special birthday dinner for himself (me no cook) that started out with his delicious french onion soup. It's the best I've ever had - YUM.

ooh la la

And here are a few random photos of Little Miss for your enjoyment...I must mention that Lottie Sue is just a wonderful little girl. She is so sweet and funny, this kid has a lot of spunk.

our happy happy kid

And here she is climbing on some of her Christmas presents.

yee haw!

OK, time for me to do some type of house something. Lottie Sue woke up at 5am (why oh why) and I've been quite slow today. I am way impressed that I got this post out. I hope it's not full of typos, if so I'll have to fix when my brain is working again. This Friday night we have the annual Mowrer Pajama Party Christmas and I am WAY excited. We eat Gramma's delicious homemade pizze and we'll play games, then the next morning we're doing presents and croissants (did you order yours???) It's going to be a BLAST!

I leave you with the premiere of Flight of the Conchord's second season. This show kerrrr-acks me up.

nerd alert on high & npr rocks the holidays

Cera will be here on Monday and I AM SO EXCITED! All I want for Christmas is to see Cera! Only FIVE days to go!!!

And please know that I have another post coming up later today. Lottie Sue saw Santa Claus the other day and it wasn't pretty....

I'm pasting a passage from an email MaryAnn (Megan's mom if you are unaware) sent. But first let me tell that in person MaryAnn is one cool lady. But if you look at her Netflix queue she is the biggest NERD.

See what she's watching now? She does this for her own enjoyment, I would watch this if it was school or something. I've made fun of her before, but if you ask me she's asking for it watching stuff like this.

Here's a portion of her email:

"I have been watching "The First Churchills", based on Sir Winston Churchill's history of his ancestor, the 1st Duke of Marborough (see attached photo and link). This was based in the 18th century, and male fashion tended toward poodle-style curls in long wigs past the shoulders, bows featured on clothing, tights, high heels, etc. The King carried a little dog around with him all the time. This was filmed in 1969, and I read in Wikipedia it was a BBC production done on low budget".

nice hair
(if you want, you can click on this image to read more about him)

See? Nerd.

NPR Music asked 10 stations to send them 10 of their favorite holiday songs, they then mixed them up and created a festive stream of songs by everyone from Bach to the Ramones to Louis Armstrong. Take a listen HERE. If you need some comfort viewing this afternoon, I recommend betamaxmas.com. They compiled a bunch of retro holiday TV clips from YouTube onto a retro television screen. Ah, it really takes me back. I've had it on this afternoon and it's making me feel old. But in a good way.

The network blood in me is making me post this mid-season network grid. You can watch a holiday show every day!

Miss Piggy (LOVE HER) is on the Today Show right now and Lottie Sue is giggling and saying HI HI HI HI HI over and over to her. She is enthralled. OK, more photos coming at you later. Stay tuned...

harlan is NOT a fan of the sc & if the shoe fits

Becce sent this last night and I saw it this morning, it cracked me up and started my day out with a giggle.

santa claus? not a fan

It is so COLD here, I personally like it. I like to wear fleece and bundle up. I can't believe it's December 8th! Where does the time go??? Oh well, here are some photos of Miss Thang playing with my shoes. Lottie Sue loves to play on the bottom step, I find her there with her babies (two baby dolls, two monkeys and a puppy dog that she calls gog) a lot. It's adorable. She is all about babies right now, she calls all of her brood "babies" and they are always close. Right now she has Big Monkey in her rocking chair and she just gave him a kiss. I'm telling you, she is such a sweetie pie! Oh yeah, back to the shoes...

the girl has taste

all girl

Remember the boa? I forgot how much Kevin LOVES anything with feathers. The boa has caused some tension between these two...

i think lottie sue won this one

And here is LS coloring in her giant book. She loves to color and gets very excited, sometimes she gets so crazed about it I have to put it away and let her do something else.

coloring = excitement overload

OK, that's all I have for now. We are about to brave the cold and head to the store. Talk with you later!

books, booties to die for, smart girls & nuts

FYI - no Lottie Sue photos here, I'll post some tomorrow or Thursday. Forgive me. Please. I will tell you that right now she is playing her piano with a measuring spoon while laughing diabolically. She is absolutely cracking me up.

So here's a very random post, enjoy:

Here's the New York Times' list 100 Notable Book of 2008. I am always looking for a good book and I look forward to the lists that come out (here's amazon's bestselling books list along with their editors' picks for 2008). I read through them and then add them to my list at the library. They'll send any book to my branch and when I'm done I can ask for the next one on my saved list, I love it. Easy and free (my favorite part).

And since it's gift-giving season, I thought I would share a lovely that I will never purchase due to the extremely high price (which is fine, I DO NOT need them but I like to look at them). These are Christian Louboutin booties and are GORgeeous.

you don't even want to know how much these cost

Having a little girl makes you worry about, well - being a girl these days. I was happy to find this online show, Smart Girls at the Party! Thank you Amy Poehler and friends! Here is one episode, I watched the shows and they really are delightful.

cameron, a 10-year-old writer

And it is possible for you to watch a holiday special/movie every day until the 25th. Follow this handy guide and you won't miss any of your favorites. Tonight I'm going to watch The Polar Express, I have never seen it (don't ask me how). My favorite Christmas movies are Scrooge and White Christmas.

Here's an easy and delicious recipe for holiday nuts, trust me - you won't be disappointed. Becce started making these a few years ago and they are now a staple in our house. It's from Nigella Lawson and they are called "bar nuts from union square cafe" - your taste buds will thank you.

OK, here's to a happy Monday. Later taters!

a kissing fool, miss claire & caught brown handed

We didn't take many photos of the holiday, oops...but we do have a few I will share with you. I hope everyone had a nice holiday. We ate a lot, shopped, went to the game (in the rain - die hards) and saw the Carsons (and met Miss Claire!).

We stopped by to visit with Grandma on Thanksgiving before heading up to Johnny and Judy's house for lunch. Grandma has this giant bear and LS is in love with him. She gives him LOTS of hugs and kisses. See?

huggin and a kissin

She also gave Grandma lots of kisses. This baby is one kissing fool I tell ya.

m-wahhhhh

Friday afternoon we drove up to the mountains to see the Carson clan. They had a house for the week and had all sorts of family with them. The house was gorgeous! We don't have any photos so take my word for it. But the best part was meeting Miss Claire - say hello to this precious child!

snuggly sweet

Here's a photo of Harlan wearing the racking bar while a game of pool was going on.

fashion forward (?)

And speaking of fashion forward, check out the hat and boa - ooh la la! Lottie Sue really likes looking at herself in the mirror wearing this. We decorated the tree tonight and this is her very own cupcake ornament for this year.

a sweetie for a sweetie

how fancy can one little girl be?

Oh yeah, I'd like to thank Kevin for ruining this shot. It would have been very good. Jerk.

kevin strikes again

Lottie Sue helped Matt put the star on the tree.

ta da!!!

OK, now I just have a slew of random photos for you. I meant to put these up last week but it didn't happen... Matt made crème brûlée recently and I took a few photos. It was as good as it looked, he's mastered this dessert.

it was yummy yummy in my tummy

Oh gosh, this is a photo of Lottie Sue in a terrible state. She is so grubby here. I don't know what happened. We hosed her down after dinner.

yucky but happy, good enough for me

Right, now I can thank Kevin AGAIN for this one. He has been digging out the dirt in this plant recently every morning. We get back from the gym it's like this. I didn't clean it up in time one morning and Lottie Sue decided to get her hands dirty. She does not like stuff on her hands (more evidence of that fact: birthday cupcake icing) and was getting upset. I hosed her down after this as well.

caught brown handed

This photo is of Shon after she asked LS for a kiss and her reply was "NO" - I told her to not take it personally...

regected

I leave you with this, Tommy modeling one of GranRay's OLD OLD OLD jackets.

ut's new davy crocket? who's with me?

Have a great week, I'll post again soon. Toodles!

in honor of chicken little

This past Saturday we held Kat's "Chicken Little is Coming!" baby shower. Kat looked just GREAT and everyone is so excited for Kat and PJ - and not to mention the mounting excitement over finally meeting Chicken Little. Here are a few photos of the lovely event...

one hot mama

one of the centerpieces

kat's friend anya pinning on the corsage

these are the party favors (i stole the idea from becce,
she made bags like this for my baby shower - too cute)

these are the cookies we made to fit in with the theme -
they tasted as good as they looked (shout out going
to carrie for baking these guys)

more desserts (these cupcakes are delicious, here's the recipe)

allison, patterson and kat chit chat

here's cutie pie lila

ooh, and another cutie pie - megan

a shot of the room (please notice the flag garland -
i made it myself and it was adorable squared)

carrie posing

Once I saw this photo, another photo of Carrie flashed in my head due to the same exact pose (minus the footed pajamas). I just had to share...

this photo never gets old for me

OK, back to the shower...

here is our beloved shonnie bear

yes, lottie sue was there to "help"

kat opening a gift while lottie sue patiently waits to hold it

kat received many wonderful items

this is one of the six onsies carrie gave kat
(she admitted to a onsie addiction)

shon, carrie, kat, moi and patterson
(notice p-dub's baby belly there, due in april!!!)

allison, kat, anya and brit (she is also having a baby, whee!)

I should get more photos from the other camera there so I'll share with you later. Here are some shots of the behind-the-scenes action.

we all decorated the cookies, these were part of the goody bags

these cookies were out for the shower, they were so delicious

and here we have carrie icing her cupcakes

we made tie-dye onsies for chicken little

The onsies really faded after I washed them, but we sure had fun making them. We had fun doing everyting really, we love Kat so much and are so thrilled for her! Yay! We have just about one month left until he's here, I seriously cannot wait!