highlights!

here are some brief highlights of what's been going on in the past little while - an abbreviated version of the adventures of (super big kid) Molly-Moo! (above wearing some of the gifts she got for her bday from her friends at her bday party, shown below)

Molly turned 4!




for Molly's big day, Grandma Nancy once again came to town and we went to the beach, flew a kite, made some sand castles and celebrated!







she was a Super Dragon for Halloween!

she spent lots of time with her old friends and made some new ones, too!







no, we did not get a hamster, but we did hamster-sit Wilbert over Thanksgiving and it was awesome!

she got ready for Christmas and wrote a letter to Santa and son!





this year, because Santa was so busy, he sent his son, Nick Jr to the local toystore and Molly got to meet him and deliver her letter. and because she was such a good girl, she got exactly what she asked for!



we spent a wonderful Christmas in sunny Arizona with the Feeney clan.

she went to sniper school at the neighbors.our fabulous neighbors the Mitchells watch Molly for us, and on one occasion she got to play with Keeton's nerf guns. they let me know that she giggled with absolute delight. like father, like daughter i guess. :)

she continues to be very creative in her art, sculpture, dress and play!
[sorry about the very abrupt ending! but it was too cute not to post]













and most recently, she very much enjoyed a magic show with her school friends!




so there you have it, five months of Molly at lightening speed! hope you've enjoyed, we sure have!

it's the most wonderful time, of the year...

so much happened last month. Molly met Santa, good friends came to visit, we celebrated Zero's birthday, we watched Portland's famous Christmas ship parade, and to top it all off, it snowed!

let's start at the beginning. the day after we got back from our Thanksgiving trip to Arizona we found out that Santa Claus was in St. Johns at our local toy store, Grammy and Nonna's (the best toy store ever!). our timing was perfect and just as we headed out the front door to see him, so did all our neighbors and the Charleston Ave gang went to see Santa. Molly had been talking about it all morning, but when we got to the store, well, she basically crawled into my coat and refused to come out and even look at Santa, much less sit on his lap. honestly, it makes sense to me, i don't want to sit on the laps of oddly dressed, hairy men either. either Grammy or Nonna (can't remember which) suggested we write Santa a letter and come back the next week (Santa came to St. Johns twice, cuz we're so cool!). a couple days later, Grandma Nancy sent Molly a snow glob Santa, and so all week Molly talked to "Santa" and grew more confident. the following Saturday Molly dictated the following for her Santa letter,

Dear Santa,
I would like a candy cane. I would like a panda and a robot.
Merry Christmas.
Molly

and we headed back to the toy store. this time, she was willing to hand him the letter, get her candy cane (which i think was the real driving factor here) and have her picture taken next to him - success!! [please note, our Santa has a gold tooth - you gotta love St. Johns!]

the next weekend our friends the Englehardings came up from Eugene. dad Jim, mom Terri, Skylar and Paige all came and stayed with us (Skylar, Paige and Terri pictured with Molly to the right). it was so much fun having friends come stay and have a sleep-over. we went to the park, we played with play-doh, we all went out to breakfast and Molly showed off her favorite toy store to her friends. it was a really great time!

the next weekend was Zero's birthday, i won't tell you how old he turned, but we'll just say next year is a BIG ONE. we had a nice day together, and Auntie Shani came over for dinner and we had cupcakes. Molly helped daddy blow out his candle, very thoughtful! normally at this point we'd have a picture of Molly next to a 5 pound Hershey bar (see here) but the catalog went missing, so we'll skip 2009. but i think i can safely say, she would totally dwarf that candy bar this year - you know it!

and that brings us to Christmas!

we got our tree a week or so before xmas. we had big plans to go cut down our own but ran out of time, and thankfully there was a lot right down the street. we even got a discount because it was the display tree (and covered in tinsel which we had lots of fun picking off by hand, but $5 is $5!) i totally forgot to bring a camera, but thank goodness for cell phones. i got a quick pic of zero and Molly carrying it home. and here is a little slideshow of tree trimming with Molly, at first sporting her Santa gloves and hat (she loves to pretend she's Santa) and then donning the tree skirt as cape. we wouldn't want the tree wearing anything we wouldn't wear ourselves! :)



you'll remember that Molly asked Santa for a panda bear and robot. i'm not 100% sure where these gift ideas came from. we do have some favorite books that star a panda bear named Stillwater (i highly recommend these books!) and we also have a book on saying please that has one scenario where a small boy really wants a robot. a combination of those two could be it.
or, way back on that first trip to see Santa, I believe our neighbor Mishya (who you'll remember from many past postings) may have said she wanted a robotic panda for Christmas? i don't remember Molly being in on that conversation, but if she heard that that was what Mishya wanted, well she would want it too! but no matter where the idea came from, it's what she asked for from Santa, and Santa being the super cool jolly ol' elf he is, brought her exactly that. check out the photos to the right, this is the scene Christmas morning before and after Molly came out to see what Santa brought - in the top one you can see panda and robot on the arm of the chair next to the tree. she also checked for the cookies she helped make for him (she did all the sprinkles, and cut out some of the shapes) and she was very pleased to see that he had eaten them right up! and we read the note he left her. that Santa is a good guy!

of course, Molly has a ton of "Santa's" in her life and as you can see in the above pictures, prezzies from friends and family were overflowing out from under the tree. she got stuff for her kitchen, art supplies, books, puzzles, clothes and so much more. here is a slide show of Molly opening, playing with and listening to some of her presents. notice how in some of the shots she is completely surrounded! it took us four days to unwrap everything!


on christmas day, after a couple hours of nonstop unwrapping, we all stretched our legs and went for a family walk. we could not have asked for better weather. sunny, crisp and dry. here you see Molly taking Harley for the walk. she does a very good job of holding the leash. i sometimes wish Harley was a bit younger, so that she'd maybe feel more like playing with Molly, and they could be friends for many years to come. but at times like these i'm kind of glad we have a 16-year-old, 20 pound dog for our daughter to learn with. not only has Harley taught Molly to be very gentle with dogs (because Harley has very little patience at her age) i also find it works well in learning how to take a dog for a walk. i've seen kids dragged down the street by exuberant labs and giant retrievers - with no control over the pooches. and though Harley can still be quite sprightly when she wants too, there is very little chance of dragging Molly down the street when she outweighs Harley by close to 15 pounds! they are a good team!

we even managed to get in a nap, though it was much later in the day then usual. but that's to be expected on Christmas day. we had lots of lovely invitations from our friends on that day, but after all the hustle and bustle, it was a bit too late for much visiting. so we put on our party clothes and ran down for a quick visit at our neighbors house where i had a delish lemon drop and the kids (this includes Zero) ate christmas cookies and danced around. what fun! check out the party clothes! you'll note that we are wearing our Fancy Nancy tutu and ruby red slippers from Grandma Nancy, and that Mr. Bacon and Monsieur Tofu are coming with us. Bacon and Tofu were a favorite gift from the Feeney/Hancocks.

we made delish homemade Mac and Cheese for dinner (two kinds!) and steamed some green beans. forget roast beef or turkey, this was the perfect Christmas meal! after dinner, on our way to bed, i remembered we hadn't taken our annual family Christmas photo! so we pulled it together and gave it our best shot after our big day, with Molly already in pjs after her bath (she got lots of fun bath toys, and we had to play with them!). as in past years, it can be hard to capture a good shot with a young person and a dog in the mix. not to mention that i'm sometimes still in motion as the timer takes the picture before i can fully run back and get settled. because it was evening and i dislike using a flash, the lighting is a bit odd in these. and then there was Zero with his melancholy expression. he assures me he was not bummed-out, he says he was "content". those of you who know him well, get it. :) so with all those caveats, here are our attempts at family xmas photo 2009...

the one that turned out looking almost sepia, was probably the best one of the four of us, but the color was terrible. the first two we took were really the best, and this one, the very first one, is probably what i'll go with for this year. so, Merry Christmas everyone!


shortly after Christmas, we got our snow! last year we had a very white Christmas and i was worried we wouldn't get any snow this year, but then Mother Nature came through. unfortunately for me, she came through while i was at work, but Zero and Molly met up with the neighbors and made snowmen, had a snowball fight and topped the whole thing off with hot cocoa and marshmallows. what could be better!

so as you can see, December was a fun-filled month! we are very fortunate and thankful, and we are excited about 2010 and what it holds in store for us. of course, in the case of the smallest member of the May/Feeney clan, ms. Harley-poochie, it's all very exhausting!
happy new year everybody!

gobble, gobble!

this turkey day we took a "jet plane" (as Molly likes to refer to it) down to bright and sunny Arizona to be with the Feeney half of the family.

Molly was, once again, an amazing traveler. we got up at 4:30 a.m. to make the flight and ended up having to sit in the plane, at the gate, for an hour while they decided about the safety of a dent in its side. Molly played and read and pretended to be the pilot and never once complained. did you know those buttons on your armrests do more than just move your seat back? Molly explained to us they actually help the plan take off and land - maybe that's why they don't want people messing with them during takeoff and landing. Molly of course is an experienced pilot so everything was ok!

as a special treat, we got her a big bird as a surprise for the trip and the minute she laid eyes on him she lit up like i've never seen before. she explained to him all about the airport and the jet planes and going to see Grandma and Erin and Ryan and on, and on. big bird was filled in and ready to go! here they are relaxing on the plane together...

Molly had been asking for weeks about "going to see Grandma Mike?", so when we arrived in Phoenix and she actually got to see her, it was very exciting and there was much waving at Grandma's car.

we stayed that first night in Phoenix at aunt Erin's and when we got to the house we saw cousin Sara (who Molly kept calling aunt Erin, but it all got worked out eventually). Sara is almost 16, has her learner's permit and talks about which colleges she's going to apply to...this freaks me out. i knew her when she was smaller than a bread-box, and now she's talking about college majors. where does the time go? i know that too soon Molly will be wanting to drive a car and go to a college on the other side of the country and i just can't handle that. nope, i've decided, she will live with us forever! :)

that evening we got to see our friends Dan, Mary Jane and Faith again. we went to their house for dinner where Faith was a most fantastic hostess! she is a beautiful, smart, gracious little girl with a wonderful imagination! i wish Faith and Molly could see each other more often. Molly and Faith played, us grownups talked, and it was a really lovely time. and to top it all off, Molly had her first ice cream sunday with sprinkles. delish! here are the girls smiling for the cameras (plural).

the next day we took our time getting started for the day and Molly got to see cousins Ryan and New Year - whom she adores! Ryan showed Molly around and let her play with all his toys. Molly especially liked the little playhouse in the backyard (to the right). and when we took Ryan to preschool later that morning, Molly was very upset she didn't get to stay and go to school with him - there were many tears! back at the house New Year played with her and helped her make a sticker book. she is very good with kids and Molly really enjoys playing with New Year (and i feel safe knowing i can step away and do some things and Molly is in good hands).

once everything was re-packed, dishes were cleaned and we were all dressed - it was time to drive up to Payson to Grandma's house. it is a beautiful drive to "Rim Country" with many saguaro cactus along the way. the minute we arrived in Arizona Molly was shielding her eyes and exclaiming, "bright! so bright!" her daddy and her have an aversion to sun (which is why Portland is the perfect place for them to live!) but personally, i was loving it, and the drive was breathtaking with blue skies and desert landscape. but in Molly's case, we were very glad to have a pair of Ryan's sunglasses (with spiderman on them no less!) to help with the brightness factor. plus, she looked stylin'! check out the shot to the left of our arrival in Payson...what a cutie!

by the end of the day, everyone had arrived. Grandma Mike's house is so spacious that we all had a room to stay in and our own bathroom. plus the kitchen is big enough to handle all of us in there chatting and cooking. it is the perfect place for holiday get-togehers! (and it's for sale, so if you know someone looking to move to the desert, let's talk!) that night we stayed up late, catching up, and i went ahead and threw together sweet potato casserole for dinner the next day (Zero's favorite). i really enjoy being part of the Feeney family, they are really, really good people. people make jokes about in-laws, and i just thank my lucky stars that i hooked up with the most perfect guy and his totally awesome family. and i am very thankful that these are Molly's people! to the right is a shot of Molly with most of her cousins (Declan and Sara were elsewhere). you've got Sinead, New Year, aunt Erin and Ryan all surrounding Molly on the couch. what fun!

Thanksgiving day was a blur (though it was the first day we got Molly to take a real nap, which was nice). everyone was hustling and bustling, cooking and caretaking and having fun. Molly got to watch part of the Thanksgiving day parade. when she saw Kermit the Frog floating by she totally knew who he was and screamed it out. very cute. and she like Pokemon, though she kept referring to him as the bunny. and whenever they showed a marching band or singers or dancers, she of course danced around. Sara, the young lady who is growing up way too fast, is an amazing cook. she made several things for Thanksgiving dinner including an amazing (vegetarian!) roasted pumpkin and leek pasta dish with goat cheese, and some amazing desserts (pictured here). her goal is to become ridiculously rich, but i think she should become my personal chef instead. the pay is bad, but i'd be very, very appreciative! :)

we also got a visit from the Thanksgiving superhero, Super Molly and her sidekick, Bikini Panda. here is a little slideshow:
the mask was cousin Ryan's, the panda belongs to Sinead, and the little bed is for New Year's American Girl dolls. what a combination that made!

after Molly managed her second good nap in a row, we took some time to walk around and check out the beautiful views from Grandma's house. here is one spectacular view from deck leading out from the front door. did i mention the house is for sale?:)

dinner time came and the table looked amazing. friends and family came together and we had a wonderful feast! there was butternut squash soup, the most amazing potatoes you've ever eaten, and for the meat-eaters, a beautiful turkey with cornbread stuffing. for dessert there was pumpkin torte and chocolate-covered cookie dough balls (my new obsession). and so much more! we were all very happy and very thankful!

the next day aunt Beth, Erin and cousin Sara were brave and got up to face "Black Thursday" at the Payson Walmart, and we all went and toured some houses in Payson that Grandma Mike likes. the day flew by and before we knew it, we were back in the car heading to Phoenix for our flight back to Portland. uncle Sean and New Year drove us back and we had a great time singing together in the car. if only i had a recorder to capture the entire car singing the theme song to Sesame Street with a certain special inflection of the word sweet in the line "where the air is sweet" - kinda reminiscent of sa-weet! what fun!

we got to the airport with time to spare and got to watch the planes taking off and landing, one of Molly's favorite past times! Molly was such a big girl, she walked up to the ticket agent and handed her her ticket, and marched down the jetway. she even stopped to chat with the pilot! and once again, she did a great job on the plane (though we have to remember lollipops next time, because her ears seem to really be bothering her on landings). we got in early this time, and made it home without a hitch. tired, but so thankful for our wonderful trip.

we hope your Turkey day was wonderful and that you're enjoying this holiday season. big hugs to everyone!