On the 3rd Post of Christmas - Holiday Portraits

To make our Christmas cards, Shelley took the girls to a studio.  What you'll see below are some of the shots -- the good, the bad, and the ugly.  This post will just be lots of pictures without much commentary; and being honest, you come for that, not my witty editorials, anyhow.

The 12 Posts of Christmas. . . or Maybe a Few Less

So, lets get caught up from the last time I posted, prior to yesterday, over 5 weeks ago.  I have to confess, I've been traveling a great deal, which is what has kept me from updating.  It has provided a large supply of pictures, however, so I'll have material for at least three different posts.

The family is doing well;  we spent a week in Florida with Shelley's family, which may have been the coldest week on record.  The girls were great on the plane and it was nice to see everyone at one time in one place.  Harper has taken after me, it seems;  when she was done with family time, she simply would crawl to the door.  Finley kept trying to steal this pink sand shovel from her cousin Amy, while Harper kept trying to steal her bottle of milk - Amy had to keep her head on a swivel to avoid losing stuff left and right to the Weinstein girls.  Baby cousin Teddy, who will be one in two days, was also there, but was able to avoid the tormenting that Amy stuff was subjected to;  perhaps boy toys already have cooties?

On with the show - all of these pictures were taken since the last post and are in order.  Remember, if you'd like to see it bigger, just click on it and if you'd like to save it, right click on the picture and then click "Save Picture As."

Other than their coloring, we think Harper looks pretty similar to Finley at the same age.  However, the one area she hasn't caught her sister is hair.  The attempted top pony just doesn't look the same, but Harper is smiling none the less.

 When Shelley takes the dogs for their walk, the girls go, too, of course.  Which requires a lot of bundling up, as you can see above.  Getting into the snowsuit is not Harper's favorite thing, although she loves the walks.

 Still smiling, though!

 Now, Harper smiling is sort of a theme and like all Weinsteins, and Hoscheks, of course she is going to be smiling while she's eating.  That said, she remains an incredibly happy baby;  one, that for now, at least, is a Daddy's girl.  Shelley has had to concede that Harper's first word is "Dada."  Of course, Finley was once a Daddy's girl, too, but now is all Mama, all the time.

 As I've mentioned before, Finley hasn't tried to outright kill Harper yet, which is a good sign.  While it still causes physical pain to Finley if she sees Harper playing with any of her toys, they can play nicely together.  Of course, Finley makes it clear that while she is on Santa's Nice list, Harper most certainly is on Santa's Naughty list - and will then run down Harp's litany of crimes.

Finley helped Shelley put up the Christmas tree;  I believe this is when she was caught trying to steal a candy cane from the tree.  

 This is my favorite series of pictures - Finley at dance class.  While she also takes gymnastics once a week, I love the girls in their outfits.  I have not been able to see Finley at class, yet, as they go on Wednesday mornings, but it is one of my resolutions.  Finley is a pretty good student - as far as three year-olds go, she pays attention pretty well.   I would even call this rapt, if grading on the curve.

 As you can see, Finley is doing one of the activities.  Of course, she was probably supposed to be over by the teacher, along with the other girls.  So, she is still really, really stubborn.

 With the picture taken at an angle, it makes Finley appear to be the tallest girl in the class - I can assure you, it is an illusion.  She is the only one working on her pointe in the toddler class, it seems.

Their little graduation ceremony. 

Again, she does a nice job of listening to the teacher when they are about to do something new.  While I haven't seen it is ballet, she does it well in gymnastics. 

 She also tends to work her way to the front of the line.

Again, full attention.  As I said, not the tallest, but not the smallest either.

On our flight down to Florida.  Harper didn't cry at all, Southwest kept the plane well pressurized, so their ears were fine.  Harper wouldn't sleep, though, so we had to entertain her for all three hours of the flight.  Finley just stared out the window at the lights when we were taking off and landing. 

At the "resort" in Florida;  Harper hanging out with Baby Cousin Teddy (Finley used to include "Baby" and "Cousin" when she referred to both of them). 

While we were down in Florida, we were able to meet up with Papa Joel and Grandma Liz;  they were down about an hour south of us.  As you can see, my father didn't let the record lows stop him from getting his sun.  Of course, you are also see windburn, in addition to the suntan.  You can see it here, but Harper was caught steal french fries from Papa Joel's plate.  We didn't notice it at first, but after a few minutes we wondered how she always had a new fry. 

The girls riding the Christmas train at the mall after lunch - it was Harper's first train ride since Lambs Farm back in Libertyville. 

Most of the pictures from the Florida trip are on my Blackberry, so we don't have a lot here - I'm sure the event will also get some coverage at the other two "Hoschek" blogs.  As I mentioned, the girls kept Amy on her toes all trip.  Here she is passed out from exhaustion, but she's got her bucket, and shovel, along with her bottle of milk, clearly in her sights.

We had a teacher at Finley's preschool stay at the house with the dogs while we were out of town.  While they loved being at home - I can't imagine what poor Dixie would be like after a week at the kennel, Monty obviously missed her pack (I don't know why "while" is highlighted and I can't turn it off - editor).  Since we had to leave the condo in Florida at 6:00 am, Finley was pretty tired.  She didn't fall asleep as we drove back from the Buffalo airport until the last 10 or 15 minutes, so we just carried her to the couch when we got home.  Monty just assumed her normal sleep position like we'd never left.

And finally, Harper has begun to climb (we have a couple of really good pictures for later this week about this) and here she got up into the chair.  What is impressive is that she was able to do it will still clutching her maraca, which she was shaking in this picture.

To close out, a video of Harper.  Shelley was trying to take an action photo of Harper pushing the little walker that Uncle Brian and Aunt Kelly sent Finley a couple of years ago.  As you'll see, it doesn't go according to plan, but it is a cute video that shows some of Harper's personality.

So, as I said above, this is the second of what I hope will be three or four more posts over the holidays.  We had a great Christmas with the girls, so I hope your holidays were equally spectacular.

It's a Christmas Miracle - A Blog Post

As  you can imagine, I have a great deal of pictures from the last month - and even this morning.  Here is a sample video to tide you over until the full Christmas morning post.  This is Finley coming down the stairs to see if Santa came last night.

Odds & Ends

Growing up, TV series seemed to get lazy at least once a season and do flashback episodes that didn't really advance the story line. Since we haven't taken many pictures this week, we aren't going to recycle old things, but rather just put something on that YOU haven't seen before.  All are over the past 3 weeks or so, including a couple of videos from the past week that I took on my Blackberry, since our other camera's memory card was full.  Here you go.

If you recall, Finley used to love to eat lemons as a baby.  We were at dinner last weekend and it appears that she still does.

Finley said she needed new pajamas, since she had outgrown her others.  In the background, Harper is living large in her sister's chair.  Finley said Harper needs one, too, in Harper's favorite color, which is green.  Finley has assigned this color to her.

We won't bore you with EVERY video we have from Harper's first birthday.  Here is another one, in addition to last week's, showing Finley's help in opening the cards.

Finley still loves to dance and is doing really well in her weekly dance/ballet class.  As you can see in the video, however, she is trying to specialize in hip hop.  This should leave you no doubt that she is entirely self-taught.

This picture is important, as Jack occasionally caught sleeping like this.  We call it, "Jack is #1."  That is important for the video below.

Finley has all sorts of little parlor tricks.

We'll try to take some more pictures this week so you have something new to see in the coming weeks.  

Happy 1st Birthday Harper (and Halloween)

Our little Harper turned one today.  She has been as easy a baby as we could hope for, which I'm sure means she will pierced, tattooed, and in a biker gang by 13.  Until then, I am hoping that she is the Daddy's girl that you always hear about.  Little Shelley, or Finley as you know her by, is really starting to warm up to her sister.  Of course, at this age, that is a moment to moment thing, but she hasn't shoved any small objects down her throat - yet - so that counts as love at two and a half.

Before we kick this off, here is a quick video of Harper's birthday cupcake.

Our camera's memory card filled up, so you'll have to wait to see more of Harper's Birthday Blowout Spectacular when I can sync my Blackberry.

On the the rest of the show.

 Finley was adamant that she have the silly pumpkin, while Harper has the. . .



 . . . yes, the "spooky" pumpkin.  It was VERY clear which pumpkin belonged to Finley.



At gymnastics the week of Halloween, the girls got their faces painted.  Finley, if you can't tell, is Monty's mortal enemy, a bunny. 

In previous posts, I've mentioned how Harper is really using her awesome upper body strength (which she got from her father) to pull herself up.   She's now working on curls.

"Nobody knows the trouble I've seen.  Nobody knows but Jesus. . . ."  We baby proofed parts of the house last week, or as I see it, created confinement pens for Shelley's piece of mind. Here prisoners 001, 02.5, and 010 are in general confinement. 

 Finley was pretty excited about Halloween.  Finley couldn't contain her glee in being Strawberry Shortcake and she really wanted Harper to be a Flamingo.  Or a bunny, which is the costume she's holding in the picture.  To prove Shelley and I are well into middle age, she is a cowgirl.  Nope, not a "trampy" cowgirl, just a plain, ole cowgirl.  Or, maybe, based on her eyes, a devilish cowgirl, which still isn't as good as trampy, but it would explain a lot.

 Sorry, dogs, your costumes didn't get lost in the move.  Nor, with two little two-legged mannequins, did Momma get sick of dressing you, also.

"Handsome" Jack doesn't look so handsome now, does he, Finley?  Maybe I'm a little closer after all.

This is why we don't see Dixie in a lot of pictures -- she knows nothing good can come when the camera is out.  Looks like the flamingo is on the prowl.

Yep, nothing good ever comes of it for poor Didi.

Peas in a pod.

I went as a fan of the World Series winning Chicago Cubs.  On Halloween, you can go as whatever you want - reality is suspended for a night!!

This is Monday, the day after Halloween.  Kid you not, they were still tired from all of the barking they did the night before.

Now she's working on her calf raises.  Shelley and I really believe Harper is training pay Finley back for all of the toys she rips out of Harper's hands.

A nice moment where the girls are having a tea party.  You don't see a couple of minutes later when Finley rips the teacup away from Harper, which led Harper to start doing push-ups.  Payback is a comin'. . ..

This was today for Harper's birthday.  Finley was "helping" frost the cupcakes.

Baking seems very, very messy.

Because Finley is such a little helper, she is opening Harper's cards.  Meanwhile, Harper is locked into something.

And here's Finley putting them on the table.  It looks to me, however, that she palmed a $5 in the picture for her efforts.  Harper remains locked onto the target.

She REALLY wants it.

I know it looks like we are parents of the year, but her hand was well away from the open flame.  No children were harmed in the making of this blog.

Just to provide added value to this blog, a bonus feature, which is a behind the scenes look at the girls and their jack o lanterns.

Hope everyone had a great Halloween and thanks for checking the blog.  Many, many, many more happy birthdays, Harper Paige.