MJ's First Christmas

Merry Christmas to All!
Jared, MJ and I had a wonderful and busy Christmas. MJ is completely spoiled and received a ton (almost literally!) of presents.
On Christmas Eve, we had my mom and brother over. We ate Monte Cristo sandwiches (yum!!) and played some games while MJ slept so that Santa could visit.
Jared was so excited for Christmas that he hardly slept and got up early to put together a kid-size table and chair set for MJ. MJ was only vaguely interested in opening presents. She would tear the paper a little bit and then get distracted. Needless to say, we had to help her out a lot. I think she was overwhelmed with all the toys and books she received. She didn't know where to start to play.
After opening the presents for our family, we headed over to my mom's and launched into the massive pile under her tree. It took us all morning, but we got through and ate breakfast around noon. MJ got this super cool kid-sized rocking chair from my mom (a.k.a. Santa), among many, many other things. It took us 2 car loads to get everything home!

Christmas Eve

Christmas Morning- Trying to play with the ornaments.

The first present MJ opened.

At Grandma's House. We thoroughly enjoyed sticking bows on MJ's head.

In her new rocking chair.

On Saturday, we traveled up north to see Jared's family. It was great seeing his brother and sister-in-law, Jeremy and Trisha and their family. We haven't seen them for 2 years. We had a great time until MJ woke up in the middle of the night and refused to go back to sleep. After 3 hours of trying we finally took her for a drive and she immediately zonked out.
The next night Jared's entire family came over, and while it was great to see them, MJ couldn't sleep due to all the noise and excitement. Our poor little girl was soooo tired, grumpy and just screaming for about an hour and a half. We finally decided to just cut our losses and drive home that night. We missed out on seeing Jared's family a little bit more, but at least MJ was able to get some much needed rest.
Over the New Year's break, we will be cleaning out our house. I know, we're really exciting people... I'm also hoping to finish some paintings for MJ's room. And then, next week Spring semester starts and we're back to running around like crazies!
Wishing you all a wonderful and happy new year!

Schools Out!

Finally, Fall semester is over! It's so nice to have a break for a few weeks... though, Jared is already complaining of boredom.
Final grades posted this morning. Jared received all "A"s. Go babe! I got two "A"s and a "B" in my business calculus class. Which I think is quite an accomplishment considering this was my first math class in over 7 years. Slowly, but surely, we're getting finished with school.
MJ is now 8 months old! We don't have an accurate scale at home- so we think she weighs between 17 and 17 1/2 lbs and is 27 inches tall. She's not slowing down!
MJ now loves to play peek-a-boo, wave bye-bye and walk around with someone supporting her. She's making progress with crawling. She will now push up on her hands and knees and rock her body for a few seconds before collapsing back on the floor. Mostly she just pushes herself backwards each time. But, at least she's moving!

Here she is showing off her push-up skills.

I have a lot to finish up before Christmas, but I can't wait. It'll be fun to watch MJ open presents. Until then.... Merry Christmas!