Grandma Katie visit

We were very lucky to have Grandma Katie come and visit us for a week and a half at the end of January. Tori got to spend two whole days with her while John and I went to Chicago to see the musical - Wicked! We loved Wicked and Tori loved getting to have lots of time with Grandma.

One fun place we went to while Grandma was here was the Children's Museum at the mall. Above Tori is in the hospital play area seeing how tall she is (around 42"). Below she is practicing brushing teeth. It's actually a big deal that she will brush this funny looking guy's teeth since the first time we went to this new part of the museum I teased her by saying that he was going to chomp my hand and she ran away terrified and wouldn't go near him for awhile - I'm such a good mother.

These are a couple pictures from the pizza making area - this is one of her absolute favorite things to do. She loves baking and serving me the pizza and has gotten very good at it. I shouldn't be surprised since pizza is her favorite dinner to help me make at home. This time at the museum she discovered the pizza case for keeping it warm while carrying it to my table and she thought that was the coolest thing ever.

Below is little mail-carrier Tori at the museum.

So, I think Tori probably spent about 75% of her time awake while Grandma was here in her sleeping beauty costume. Daddy was also on vacation while Grandma was here so he was home most of the time and Tori's favorite game to play with him is "princess". There are many variations of this game usually comprising parts of several different princess movies. The funny thing is when dad was home sometimes we would look around and wonder where did Tori go, but we always found her dressed in her princess outfit laying in her bed pretending to be asleep and waiting for "her prince" to wake her up. Her prince most always has to be daddy and he has to kiss her to wake her up - a few times she did let Grandma be the prince, though. She also loves to "dance at the ball" with her dad and they're really quite good at twirling and doing dips. :) Most of the time during the ball she suddenly runs away and is quite a pro at losing one of her slippers while running away without slowing down or missing a step.

Below Tori is helping dad clean-up after dinner. She loves to hand wash dishes, though she usually gets as much water and soap on her as on the dishes.

And last, our favorite activity with daddy - stories before bedtime.

New Hair Cut and other pictures

So I finally took Tori to get her haircut for the first time. Here are a couple pictures of her right afterwards (it may not look that much different, but before it was cut it went pretty much all the way down to her waist). She had a little bit of a hard time sitting still, but she was so happy to have it cut. She hates having her hair done and even now every time I have to comb out a tangle she tells me we need to cut her hair even shorter.

This is just a cute picture of what Tori calls her "fuzzy sweater" that she got for Christmas from Grandma Katie and loves to wear on these really cold days.

This is a picture of Claire, Tori and Lauren dressed up as princesses on New Years Eve. Life is so much more fun when you are in a fancy dress. :) That would be a fitting motto for Tori.

Disney World - Princesses

At the beginning of December John and I and my parents took Tori to Disney World for the first time. It was wonderful to get away from the cold winter in Iowa and Tori was in heaven. She loves princesses and all the Disney characters and movies right now so it was the perfect time to take her. She loved getting to spend lots of time with Grandma and Grandpa and going on all the rides.

The first park we went to was Epcot where we had scheduled a "Princess Lunch" for Tori. They have a lunch set up where you can eat while all the different Disney Princesses come by your table and say hi and take a picture with you. Tori dressed up in her Cinderella costume and loved pretending to be a real princess. I love the picture of her above doing her "curtsy".

Belle was the first princess she met and as you can see she is a little shy at first. As more and more princesses came around to our table she loosened up and had a permanent grin on her face.

Above is a video of Tori meeting Belle - I think she is a little star-struck.

She was beyond excited when Cinderella came up to our table and their dresses matched. She showed Cinderella how to twirl around in her dress and they twirled together.


Above is a video of Tori dancing during the lunch and pretending to be a princess.

At the very end of the lunch, our waitress brought Tori a certificate that said she had been selected as the honorary chef for lunch that day. They brought her out a chef hat and a cupcake for her to decorate and eat. She thought this was almost as cool as meeting all of the princesses and loved licking the frosting off her cupcake.

First Pedicure

One of the things I received on Mother's Day was a gift certificate for a manicure and pedicure. While Tori was at her little preschool, I had my nails done. When I picked her up and she saw my toes she wanted hers done, too. I figured this would happen so I had picked up a little thing of nail polish for kids at the store that came with jewel stickers.

Tori sat really still and loved having her toe-nails painted. Her favorite part, though, was putting on the "jewels". After that she had to show everyone we met the jewels on her toes.

She has definitely become my little "girly girl". Below is a cute picture of Tori and her friend Megan dancing around in princess dresses.

Grandma Margie's visit

Grandma Margie came to visit us for New Years and we had a lot of fun. Unfortunately, it was so cold and snowy that there wasn't a lot for us to do, but we had a blast just playing around. (I do think that Grandma played enough Candy Land and Caribou to last her a lifetime.)

Here are a few pictures of Grandma with "Princess Tori"

and some cute pictures that Grandma took while she was here.

Tori loved the little stuffed dog the DeHaemers sent for her

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Christmas morning

I'm very late in adding blog entries lately, but I'm going to try and catch up without leaving much out.

These are some of the pictures that we took on Christmas morning. She got lots of wonderful things from Grandparents, Great-Grandparents and Santa. Tori's Grandma Katie got her a Cinderella dress up outfit that she loved and looked so cute in that we had to take lots of pictures.

Very often when there is music playing she insists on wearing her princess dress so she can dance. She also wears the shoes all the time. She calls them either her"glass slippers" or her "high-heals".

When she was little, I didn't think she was very much into all the "girly" things; well, she definitely is now! She's loves being "fancy", wearing fun shoes, dancing, and talking about how she is a princess and daddy is a king. However, we still haven't given up hope that she'll be our little athlete. She loved the Dora tennis racket that Dad got her for Christmas.

Mom also made her a warmer blanket to sleep with since this winter has been so horribly cold.

Tori also still absolutely loves books and she got some really fun ones for Christmas, too.