We celebrated Grandma's birthday today. We had brunch at Westwood and then went to Grandma and Pops's house for ice cream and cake. We took some nice family pictures. We were missing Catherine, but maybe we can Photoshop her in there. :-)

The Ferina Family

The Nix Family

Pops, Grandma and Claire bearGrandma, Pops and all the kiddos!
My favorite one, though, is the one I took at the end of all the festivities as we were leaving Grandma and Pops to go home for a nap. Look at my sweet girl! She is posing...she knows she is cute! She is such a ham!

Claire the caretaker...

On Sunday Mommy had a lot of grading to do once we got home from Houston. So Claire and Daddy were able to spend a lot of quality time together. We played outside, went to the grocery store, read books... the usual Sunday afternoon at home for Claire whether it's with Mommy and Daddy or just one of us. Sunday evening after Claire's bath and when it was time to go to bed, I shut the door to her room so we could start winding down. This is when Claire decided that she was going to help fix Daddy's hair and put it in a bow. I was a little reluctant but then she said "lay down Daddy, lay down" in her very demonstrative manner that she has recently found. So I proceeded to lay down in front of her as she sat in her big girl chair with her brush and bow ready to get to work on Daddy's hair. I put my head in her lap as she brushed through my hair and would trade off working the bow into my hair then switching back to brushing my hair. If I dared to turn around and look at her or move she would tell me to "turn around Daddy." At one point, she bent over and looked at me and said "Daddy so pretty." My heart melted. This is what Mommy and Daddy say to her when we get her dressed each day. This lasted a good fifteen- twenty minutes before I realized it was WAY past bed time. I will always remember this night and it brings a smile to my face each time I think about it. Such a sweet little girl we are so blessed to have.

Got rid of the mullet!!

Miss Thang took over a year to grow hair, so you can understand why we were reluctant to cut Claire's hair. The dilemma became, though, that our sweet Claire bear refuses to wear bows or clips as soon as she realizes they are in her hair, and our darling dear pulls out a pony tail the minute she feels it. So we have a child with an overgrown mullet who looks as if her parents don't take care of her. Trust me, we brush and comb her hair every time we leave to go anywhere. We always dress her in a bow to match her outfit and the works. It just doesn't last long...

Daren didn't want Claire to get her hair cut because he didn't want her to look like a boy and because it took so DAMN long to get hair. Mommy just wanted to trim around the edges to give Claire's hair some shape...try explaining that to a man. Needless to say, Daren reluctantly gave in.

Here are the "before the hair cut" pictures:


And, after the hair cut:




Mommy is very pleased! Claire can wear her hair with a bow, with a clip, in a pony tail and still look like a girl OR she can just let it all hang loose and it looks like she is well taken care of.

Our big girl is growing up...

Life has brought a big change for Claire. Let me clarify, Claire has brought a big change for Claire. :-) On Saturday, Claire woke up from her nap and when we went to get her, she was sitting on the floor!! We thought that it had to be a fluke and that there was no way she would climb out of her crib again. Boy, were we wrong.

On Sunday, we put Claire to bed. She was quiet and we thought she was sleeping. Then all of the sudden, we hear a thud and a LOT of crying!! We race to check on her and she had climbed out of her crib. Rest assured, she was fine-- no scratches, no broken bones, nothing. We were lucky! I guess we are slow learners, because once we realized she was okay...we tried again. You see, Daren and I were in denial. We thought we could keep Claire in her crib until after the baby was born. Again, Claire proved us wrong!! So, we watched on the video after we tucked her back in bed again. She put her thumb in her mouth and PRETENDED she was ready for bed. As soon as Mommy left the room, she stands up and starts her climb. We saved her from this and put her in bed with us for the night while we processed what to do and how to handle this. Of course, we can't leave her in a crib that she is climbing out of or she will end up with a broken bone or something horrible like that?!

So, we took the front off of her crib, bought the guard rail, and dutifully stood on patrol last night outside her door. We put her to bed lovingly and decided that anything after that, we had to be tough so that she learned that she needs to stay in bed. Daren and I took turns rotating in and out of her room every time she tried to get up. We would sternly put her back in bed, tell her that we don't climb out of bed and leave the room. She would cry and it broke me to pieces. But it only took four trips in to her room and then she was asleep! YEA!!! But it also made me sad...I am not ready for my baby girl to be a big girl. She just proved to me once again that she is ready to be a big girl.

Elmo saves the day!

Mimi and Papa gave us a web cam so they can chat with Claire bear from Houston every now and then. We have only used it a few times, unfortunately, but Claire is really starting to love it.

Today, she was fussing to go in the study. I couldn't figure out what she wanted because we don't spend much time with her in the study at all. In fact, we keep the door to the study closed most of the time because it is definitely not "child proofed." This was our conversation:

Claire: "Watch Mimi?"
Mommy: "Mimi isn't on the computer right now, but Mimi loves you."
Claire: "Watch Papa?"
Mommy: "Papa isn't on the computer right now, but Papa loves you."
Claire: "Watch LaLa?"
Mommy: "LaLa isn't on the computer right now, but LaLa loves you."
Claire: "Watch Elmo?"
Mommy: "Sure, Elmo is on Sesame Street right now. Let's go."

Thanks Elmo!! Claire forgot that she was upset that she couldn't watch Mimi, Papa or LaLa. So we went in the bedroom for a little episode of Sesame Street. For those of you who have never seen Claire in action with Sesame Street on, it is quite a show. Believe it or not, she just started watching it not too long ago. She is now obsessed!! Prepare to get up and do everything that Elmo says to do because not only does she do it, but she expects us to do it too. We get strict, bossy instructions to "stand up" and mind Elmo. She counts with Elmo, makes animal noises with Elmo, claps with Elmo, dances with Elmo AND so do Mommy and Daddy. :-) You'd get a good laugh, I promise.

Eyes of Texas

If you know Daren and you know him well, then you will understand this video. If you know us well, you know we would start Claire early with the Horns stuff! Enjoy!

A few new tricks

Claire's latest trick is that she loves to say "Ready, Set, Go" before we do anything. The funniest part of it all, though, is that she can't wait until "Go" so we never actually say "Set." In case you are confused, it goes like this...

Mommy: "Claire, let's go outside. Ready...Set...Go."
Claire: "Ready...GO!"

She just learned to jump, so now we jump a lot in addition to "Ready, Set, Go!" We jump instead of walk so Mommy gets a good workout in while we go places. :-)

Another new trick is that she likes to put Mommy and Daddy to "Night, Night." Claire leads us to our bed then says "Night, night Daddy" and "Night, night Mommy." We lay in bed and pretend to sleep. Sometimes we pretend to snore to which she says "snor-eeeng." She lays in the middle of us and loves on us. Every now and then, she sits up and says "Night, night Daisy" or "Night, night Sadie," but she never really wants the dogs to join us. We repeat this until she wears herself out with it. The trouble is that she NEVER wears out of this one!! :-) We play "Night, Night" at least twice every morning before work and we play "Night, Night" every night over and over again until it is time for the bath. She loves being in charge!

Time Out (take two!)

Well, Miss Claire bear has definitely hit the two year old stage of testing and pushing for limits. She is a sweetheart and it hasn't been that bad, but she certainly has her moments. Daren and I are not believers in physical discipline so we are attempting "time out."

The other day, Claire was spitting on me. She thought is was pretty funny, but Mommy doesn't want a little girl who spits. Mommy said, "Claire, if you spit one more time, you are going to time out." Sure enough, she spit on me again. So I put her in time out. She cried hysterically. But, she obeyed and stayed in time out for her allotted time. At the end of the alloted time (no more than 30 seconds), we talked about why she was in time out, kissed, hugged and she came out of time out.

The two year old returns...As soon as she got out of time out, she turned and looked at me and spit on me again. I guess time out wasn't so effective the first time. So, back to time out she went. We repeated the same process all over again. This time, Claire sat in time out successfully and came out of time out successfully. No more spitting since!! But, boy, she was testing the waters... I guess Claire wanted to see if Mommy could stand her ground. I think I passed.

I like Jesus

My nephews, Chris and Charlie, are now definitely old enough to understand church. Christi called me to tell me this dinner conversation and I laughed hysterically.

Chris: Mommy, I like church.
Mommy (Christi): I am glad. What do you like?
Chris: Snack time!

Then later that same night,

Charlie: I like Jesus. Jesus is my friend.

Christi calls Pops.

(Charlie on the phone with Pops)

Charlie: Pops, does Jesus play baseball?
Pops: Yes, Charlie, he is on the traveling squad. He is with you everywhere you go.

WHOA!!!!!!!!!! LOVE IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I haven't laughed that hard in a while.

Valentine's fun!

Claire's Valentine's Day was action packed and full of sugar! We went to Claire's school party which was very cute. They made boxes to exchange cards and then we all dug in to cupcakes. Claire was definitely not afraid to dig in.
Daren and I then decided we better go run off some of that sugar with Claire at the park so we slid and climbed around until Claire was begging for dinner.
We met the boys, Christi, Corey and Grandma for a Valentine's dinner on Friday night.
Then on Saturday night, we celebrated with the Ferina family at their house. They played all night until Claire was collapsing. Her cousins are so sweet to her and they teach her lots of neat things. They gave her a pony purse that Claire carries all over the house. She loves it!>
Claire carried her cards from Grandma and Pops and Catherine around all weekend. She would say "Ga-Ma card," or "Pops card" or "Caffrin card." She had a special day.

Baby Dos!

Claire is going to be a big sister! We went today and saw the baby's heartbeat and the little feet kicking around. It is such a miracle. Baby Dos is due in September and we can't wait. Claire will be a wonderful big sister, I know, and I can't wait to watch her with a baby. :-) Mommy feels okay...tired and vomity but it is all worth it. It seems easier this time so I am thankful for that. Daren and I decided to be surprised by the baby's gender this time which I think will be lots of fun.

Count to Ten!

We have a new trick, friends! Claire can count to ten! Now, we need to work on making sure Claire will keep her ponytails in her hair so we don't end up with a 'fro. Don't worry...we don't take her out in public with her hair looking like that.

Playground time with Mommy and Daddy

We spent the early evening at the park. Claire had a blast! She loved the slide the very most. She rode on her belly, backwards, forwards, etc... She loved it the most, though, when she got to say "Mommy slide" or "Daddy slide" and one of us slid down with her. She thought that was big fun.

Ponytails!!

Those of you who know Claire bear well know that she has spent most of her life bald or close to it. As of lately, we have finally been able to get pigtails in her hair!! YEA!!! Don't tell her, though. As soon as she finds out that she is wearing a bow or a ponytail, she rips it out and we end up with an afro of sorts.

4 AM adventures

Claire woke up at 4 AM hysterically crying for Mommy. I run in there and she says, "Mommy, Claire yogurt." She was starving! She ate a yogurt, a Cutie (that's what she calls a Clementine orange) and a banana and then she was ready for bed. Must be a growth spurt! Well, we snuggled, sang our songs, said our prayers...the whole bed time routine. By the end, she didn't want Mommy to go back to her own bed. So, Claire joined Daren and I in our bed. She was exhausted but there was lots to see. Every 20-30 minutes, she would sit up and say "Hi Daddy." Daddy's reply was usually terse and sleepy "Claire, Daddy is night, night." Little did Daddy know that Mommy was laughing hysterically at this. Then, Claire would pick up the sheets, find Daisy and say "Hi Daisy." Again, Mommy thinks this is pretty funny. This went on until it was time to wake up for work. I was tired at the end of it all, but Claire was a hoot. I especially laughed because Daddy was so out of it, trying to talk to Claire but also trying to talk her in to going to sleep. Claire is a great sleeper. She never does this, so Mommy just enjoyed it! She snuggled up with me, sucked her thumb, sang songs, and talked to Daisy, Sadie and Daddy whenever she was worried they were sleeping too hard. Hopefully, this doesn't turn in to a habit, but for one night it was fun!