My Blog Exploded!!!!!

So if I was better at this, I would have added them along the way. But let's face it, it is not one of my strengths.

There are many new posts to view. But I promise they are short and sweet and won't take too much time!

Ok...maybe not short. But still sweet!

Enjoy!

Happy 3rd Birthday!

Flowers from Daddy

Yay cake!

Sugar High

Dress up was a big theme this Christmas and Birthday

Flower cupcakes made by Ally

So on the 29th of December, our little Princess turned 3. She is growing so fast and getting so big. On her actual birthday, we took her (and Great Grandma) to the Butterfly Pavilion. Before we went, we had lunch at Red Robin. Adriana's favorite place to go. Grandma told the server it was her birthday. This brought out a gang of 6 servers, clapping and singing and bringing Adriana dessert. The only word I can think of when I think of this is mortified. She was terrified. She could not crawl any farther in my lap. When we sang to her at home that night she told me she was too scared and I had to promise that we would not clap, sing quietly and no strangers would be there to sing to her to even get her to the table.

That night she was treated to an evening of cake, candles, a big Kitty balloon and flowers from Daddy. She loved every minute of it.

The weekend after we day, we had a big party with her friends at Monkey Bizness. She played and played and played and had a blast. My niece, Ally, volunteered to make the cupcakes for her party and they turned out awesome! She is so talented.

It was a great day, and a great year for Adriana.

It's Christmas! And the Best Grandma in the World

This year Santa brought Adriana a dollhouse. It is huge and taller than her. She needs a step ladder to get to the top. That Santa! So generous.

We had a great holiday with family. On Christmas Eve, everyone came over to our house and we had dinner and made cookies for Santa. Adriana loves to help decorate cookies with her cousins.

Christmas ended with my Grandma staying with us for a week. Adriana loves her great grandma, who she affectionately calls Grandma Tumble Bug. Adriana loves to climb and jump on the couches (who doesn't?) and my Grandma calls her a tumble bug. Adriana thinks it is hilarious and now calls her Grandma Tumble Bug. She is very fun to have around. She will sit and play whatever Ade wants, for however long she wants. I get so much done when she is here. Organizing closets, cleaning. It is a super productive time for me. We are both sad to see her go. Adriana goes through Grandma Tumble Bug withdrawals. Not a fun time for anyone. :)

My Very First Gingerbread House

Before Christmas, Adriana and Rob decided to tackle making Gingerbread Houses. I bought the premade ones because, let's face it, I am not crafty and actually building the house seemed a little out of my league.

One night when I was out, they decided to make them. We had heard stories about how hard the pre made ones were, the frosting was awful and it would be a disaster. I must confess, it is kind of the reason I made it a daddy/daughter event. But jokes on me, because they made them and had a great time. Adriana did her own, all by herself. Rob put on the frosting and she decorated it on her own. It turned out great. Very uniform and symmetrical. Our little perfectionist.

Skating....Winter Wonterland Lights

Adriana and Monica

This Christmas we took Adriana ice skating for the first time. There are a couple of synthetic ice rinks around Highlands Ranch and I was told they are easier for first timers and little kids. Since Rob nor I have never ice skated, we thought that would be safer for us. We also brought along Monica, one of our wonderful friends (not to mention one of Adriana's favorite people) with us.

Well, we got to the rink and it was definitely fake. It was a bunch of weird plastic boards stuck together. I guess I should have maybe done some more research. Monica and I scrambled to find another place but Rob decided it was too late to run around and that we were skate there.

We made the best of it. When I say we ice skated, I use that term very loosely. We were not on ice and it was hard to actually skate. But Adriana had an absolute blast! She loved it. Had someone holding her up the entire time (mostly Monica, all she wanted was Monica) and fell a few times but she loved it.

After we were done "skating", we took ourselves to the Winter Wonderland at the Wildlife Experience. We had never been, and since we loved Zoo Lights so much, we thought it would be great!

Great is not a word I would use. There was a trail of lights to follow, which were good. And Santa's village made of little sheds with Elves inside working. All Adriana wanted to do was go in the sheds but since they had a plastic clear door on all of them, she couldn't. They had live reindeer, which were in a pen that was about 10 x 10. It was a little sad to watch.

Adriana had a great time but we decided maybe to stick to Zoo Lights. Lessons learned.

Christmas Tree, Zoo Lights

Going inside the Hippo, she talked about walking out his bum the whole night...

May the Force be with You! This Elephant light led our way through Zoo.

Decorating Tree

Like clockwork, the tree and Christmas decorations were up the day after Thanksgiving. Adriana had a lot of fun putting all the ornaments on the tree with Daddy.

We also took our annual trip to Zoo Lights. It was about 30 degrees which is about 30 degrees warmer than any other year we have gone. So while it was cold, Rob and I felt like it was springtime. This year, because it wasn't so cold, they were running the Train and Carousel so Ade had a blast. The lights are amazing. We got to see some animals. It was a great night!

Yo Gabba Gabba Live

The whole gang!

Muno!

It's Tooty!

Story time!

Backside picture of hugging DJ Lance Rock

I can't believe I didn't get this posted sooner. It happened to be the best night of Adriana's life. Thus far...

In November, the TV show Yo Gabba Gabba came live to Denver. Adriana has a friend whose dad works on the show so we were able to go to a backstage party after the show. She was so excited to go, although I am betting she wasn't entirely sure what she was going to. When they came out on stage, she was excited, but really only cared about the nets of balloons she saw on the ceiling. She was pretty reserved through the entire show, but did get up to dance with me a few times.

After the show we met up with her friends and went to the backstage party. Our understanding was that we got to stand in line and get a quick picture with all the characters. Adriana was Foofa for Halloween and all she wanted to do was give Foofa and DJ Lance Rock a hug. I wasn't sure this was going to happen so I just smiled and hoped she was happy with getting her picture taken.

Well, the night couldn't have been better. We were sitting on the ledge and up came Muno, Tooty and Plex. She was so excited. Tooty came over and rubbed her face. We were able to give the other 2 high fives. And this was just the beginning of the excitement. Once we took a picture with all the characters, Adriana got to hug all of them. It was a dream come true.

At this time, we had got to see all the characters except for DJ Lance. She seemed ok and we were getting ready to leave and low and behold, out comes DJ Lance. He was doing story time. There were lots of kids gathered and we were at the back. There was a little boy next to us that wanted to go sit up front but was too scared, but my brave little girl lead the pack, the little boy followed and they walked right up front and sat down. Afterwards she was able to give him a hug. Unfortunately we didn't get a picture of it and most of our pictures are blurry. Being parents of the year, we forgot our camera and had to use our phones.

It was a magical night and she had a blast!

As great as it was, for her first "concert" experience and getting to go back stage, we may have set the bar a tad bit high. She now asks, pretty regularly, when she is going to meet Wubbzey, Dora, Aerial, etc. Because why wouldn't you? She got to meet Yo Gabba Gabba and they are on TV. Why not all TV characters?