MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!

Alyssa LOVES Santa!

I wasn't sure how she would react to Santa when she saw him or when we asked her to sit on his lap. I know most two year olds scream their head off once they touch Santa's lap. I was anxious to see her reaction.

This last weekend we went to the Melconian's (family friends) for a Christmas party. We got there at about 7pm. Santa arrived around 7:45pm. Much to my surprise, she LOVED him! I guess she has seen enough of him around - decorations, TV shows, books, etc...she was completely comfortable to be sitting on him! In fact, she wanted to keep sitting on his lap and I had to keep explaining to her that other kids and people need to have their turn also and she had to wait. And that she did, she waited patiently for her turn AGAIN. She was sooooo sad to see him go. She followed him to the window and watched him leave. I wonder if she was hoping to see the reindeer out the window. Here are some pics from the party...

Sometimes she amazes me...

I haven't written about Alyssa's development in a while so I thought I would. It really amazes me how much she knows as a 26 month old. I just listened to her through the monitor while she is in bed counting to 15. She started counting to 10 about 2 months ago but she recognized all her numbers and letters very early on at 19 months. At 20 months she knew all her shapes and colors. At about 21 months she recognized her name when you write it down for her and while you write it, she will even tell you what letter comes next. Her new thing these days is counting things. Today she counted her toes. It was so cute - she counted them and then said "Mommy, 10 toes!" She counts things when we are out and she counts things in her books. My little princess is growing up so fast and learning like a sponge and talking and communicating so well. I am truly proud of her!!!

Sick...sick...sick...uggh!!!

Our entire family started getting sick about 2 weeks ago. As usual , it started with Alyssa who caught a terrible cold which turned into croup. Her cough was horrible. Hard to believe a 2 year old would cough that way. The poor kid was miserable. To make matters worse, she didn't know how to expel it. Towards the end of her cold is when she finally learned to blow her nose but still has no idea how to spit out the mucus. Mike caught it next and got laryngitis with it and a few days later, I got it and it's still lingering a little bit. It's never ending! Here's a picture of Mike and Alyssa during her croup days. I couldn't resist...they were so cute all bundled up on the couch!

Christmas in the park

We took Alyssa to Christmas in the Park in downtown San Jose. I was impressed with all the work the city and its volunteers did to put it all up. It was all so cute! We met up with our friends Abby and Brian who also have a 2 year old (along with a newborn) and the kids really enjoyed it....especially the carousel! They wanted to go around it non-stop! Afterwards, we all went to Gordon Birsch for lunch. It was a great day and really set the mood for the holiday season!

A lot to be thankful for!

Thanksgiving was great and even more special as we announced to Mike's family the gender of baby #2. We had the ultrasound the day prior to Thanksgiving and we found out that we are having another GIRL! We are very excited and she has been very busy bouncing around in my tummy as of late. We have a name picked out (which by the way was no easy task!) but that we are keeping to ourselves until her birth.

Anyway, Thanksgiving was wonderful as always. Being pregnant with all that food was FABULOUS. Hahahahaha! It was nice to see Matt and Uncle Steve as we don't see them very often. This was the 1st Thanksgiving with Nonnie and Grandpa Joe as a married couple. :)

Alyssa had a great time on Thanksgiving too as she got to eat a lot of what was offered on the table. She loved the homemade cranberry sauce that Nonnie made. To my surprise, she was not a fan of stuffing. Maybe it's the onions and celery but she wasn't having it. Alyssa was excited to see dill pickles on the table. It's strange but she LOVES them. She's definitely a Nielsen with that regard. I made some dairy free chocolate chip cookies that many enjoyed (especially Alyssa!).

After dinner, we cleaned up and Alyssa was right there next to Auntie Katie washing dishes. Nonna even had matching aprons for them to wear together. So cute!

2 Year Old Photos...

Our little pink Poodle...

So we all know of Alyssa's love for dogs. This year we thought it would be appropriate to dress her up for Halloween as a pink poodle. She LOVED her costume and walked around saying "woof, woof" Hahaha...She enjoyed her first time trick or treating. We went up north to her cousin's house and she trick or treated with the whole family behind her (Nonna, Papa,daddy, mommy, Auntie Katie, Auntie Tricia, Uncle B). She had a blast! She got a hang of it pretty quickly and knew to say "treat" when she approached a front door. The best memory of the night was when she walked up to a house and no one seemed to be home but the owner of the house left a big bowl of candy on the front porch. Alyssa went to town and started stuffing her bag. For someone who has never even had any candy in her life, she was pretty excited to fill up her bag! She was quite possessive of it too - not wanting help holding it when it got pretty heavy. Our stubborn little poodle certainly is very independent! Halloween was a lot of fun this year. We are looking forward to them as the years come!

More birthday pictures!

Alyssa turns 2!

Alyssa had a FABULOUS birthday filled with family, friends and tons of activities. Turning two was definitely much better than turning one. We're so glad she was healthy and able to enjoy her birthday this year! It was held at our home. We had a jumphouse set up for the kids on the driveway. There was a ball pit in the living room. Alyssa's friends had a blast with her new play kitchen. And there was tons of drawing fun happening in the garage. This year, we made it completely dairy/soy free and it was so nice to not have to worry about what Alyssa may or may not put into her mouth. The menu consisted of turkey + cranberry sandwiches, chicken nuggets, tater tots, chicken pasta with garlic and sundried tomatoes, potato chips, fresh fruit, green salad, and lastly dairy/soy free chocolate cupcakes that I made from scratch! The theme was "Minnie Mouse". So cute!!

Pumpkin Patch

In mid October we took Alyssa to the Pumpkin patch. While there, we paid to let her jump on the numerous jump houses they had. Alyssa was so drawn to the one with the giant slide. Too bad you have to be a much bigger kid to go down it. Being the stubborn and fearless child Alyssa is, she attempted to climb the thing while the other kids were sliding down. It was like watching a bowling ball knocking down pins. In this case, Alyssa was the pin. She is tough though, didn't cry at all when it happened. ANYWAY, after tiring her out on the jumphouses, we proceeded to attempt to take some pictures of Alyssa with the pumpkins. It is almost impossible to get this kid to look at the camera. For some reason when she sees it out, she won't look no matter how hard we try! SOMEHOW Mike managed to get a couple decent shots. Here they are:

September Fun!

September was a busy month with birthday parties and a trip to Virginia to visit Maitoni. It was very nice to get away and Mike got to relax a bit before he started his new job. Virginia is so beautiful - so green and certainly didn't seem as crowded as California. I love the homes in the East Coast. Alyssa fell in love with Flora - Maitoni's dog. She was the first and last thing Alyssa spoke about each morning and night. Flora is a great dog, incredibly mellow and PATIENT. Alyssa was harassing her during the whole trip and she was so good about it. I'm sure she was glad when the crazy toddler who took her toys, who followed her, hugged her, etc had gone home.

Maitoni shares our love for wine. So not even minutes after Maitoni came home the day we arrived, I had to break the news that I will not be consuming any alcohol during this trip. She guessed right away that I was pregnant. While in Virginia, we took Alyssa to the zoo, went to the mall, spent some time in DC, and last but certainly not least we hit Georgetown for some yummy crabcakes that Mike had been dreaming about. Tina and Russ drove up from Delaware and stayed overnight one Saturday evening. We celebrated Tina's birthday and Tina and Chiara met Alyssa for the first time. Chiara and Alyssa hit it off instantly. They played so well together. Alyssa did great while we traveled until the last evening when she fell ill with diarrhea and some sort of stomach bug. We had a rough last night there as she couldn't sleep well and as a result we didn't either. We were there for 5 days and as with all vacations, it seemed too short.

Here are some pictures from the trip.

Tall blocks!

Alyssa has always been into building with her blocks but lately she has been challenging herself with tall towers of blocks! When I mean tall, it means she has to stand to put another on the top. Mike and I were really impressed today when she built this:

Who knows how in the world she got it that tall when the base was so crooked and it appears to be leaning! LOL!

Silly faces

Have I mentioned how much I love this age? Alyssa was being a silly goose today and I asked her to give me some funny faces...I was laughing pretty hard when she delivered. Here's what I got!

Ready? GO!

Poor Mike got his workout tonight. Alyssa was being bossy and making him give her piggy back rides up and down our hallway. Here's a clip from it.

Mmmm...salmon

So Mike and I were having salmon a couple of nights ago and I decided to make Alyssa some "safe" salmon and see if she will eat it. What is "safe" you ask? Well, as you are aware she's allergic to dairy so she couldn't have any yummy butter on it. I didn't think she would like all the herbs and capers either so I made hers plain with just some olive oil, lemon, garlic powder, pepper and salt and baked it. Ours however, was smothered in butter, dill, capers, garlic, lemon, salt and pepper. YUM!!!

And well, that's exactly what Alyssa thought of hers too! Surprisingly she liked the salmon! She IS part Asian. And not only that, she is Pacific Rim asian. We like fish. I had a back-up plan for Alyssa's dinner as I honestly didn't think she would eat the salmon. But to my delight, she did. YAY! I hope this wasn't a fluke. It would be nice to be able to feed her more of a variety of foods since her allergies make it hard. Here are some pics capturing the event. :)

SOCKS AND SHOES

I know that almost all kids go through the phase of putting on mommy and daddy's shoes and wearing them around the house. This is where Alyssa has been for the last month or so...it's hilarious when she puts on her daddy's shoes because size 11 just look like a giants shoes on her. At one point she even put on daddy's socks all by herself! She's getting to be such a big girl...

Woof woofs and Meows

Just about every week I do some errands at the Coleman shopping center where conveniently our bank is, Chili's is, Target, Trader Joe's, PetSmart, L & L Barbecue, Una Mas, and Michael's. There's also a Starbucks there if I ever need a pick me up! ;) When we meet daddy for lunch, we usually meet at one of the eateries there.

Sadly, Alyssa knows this shopping center so well that the minute I turn into the parking lot she asks to see the "woof woofs" and the "meows". In this particular PetSmart, there's a doggie daycare where we can see them play from a clear glass window. One should see Alyssa's delight when she sees them. She is such a dog lover...certainly took after her daddy! In another area of the store are the cats (Alyssa calls them meows). The last couple of times we have been there Alyssa started by picking up a cat teaser toy and running towards the cats that are waiting to be adopted. I feel like the poor kitties are being harassed by this almost 2 year old but perhaps they are also having fun while Alyssa waves the teaser up and down, left and right. She laughs so hard when she does this...it really is funny to watch. Here are some pictures from our last trip to PetSmart.