Samantha's first blog

pamelamyers | December 24, 2012

Last night we finally made it over to Rose Tree Park to see the lights.  We have taken Sam every year and couldn’t wait to go again.  Thankfully, it was not bitter cold like it was last year, and the ground was dry, which is also was not last year. Sam was wearing her new cupcake hat, a recent gift from my boss.

Once again, she is hamming it up for the camera with her goofy grin.

One of our first stops was up the big hill to see Santa and his reindeer. Sam wanted to sit on the reindeer to Mark had to help.  Once she was up there I don’t think she thought it was such a great idea!

Sam’s favorite part of the display every year is the plywood “houses” because she gets to run behind them and peek out the windows.  This year, she had to peek out of literally every single one.

I love her little face peeking out over her hands, all clad in her tiger mittens.

This one was just her size!

Peek a boo!

She is getting so big, next year who knows which window she will look out of next.  Don’t grow up too fast, Samantha.  I want you to stay my little girl forever.

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pamelamyers | December 23, 2012

It’s that time again — gingerbread house time, that is!  Although, according to Sam, it is NOT a gingerbread house, it is a farm, thank you very much.  She kept saying it would be a nice farm for the animals. I assume she meant barn, but I got the idea.  We assembled the structure of the house a few days ago, then let it sit so as to not fall apart while it is being decorated (yeah, made that mistake one year, doing it all at once – toothpicks held the poor thing together). Sam was so excited that decorating the house was literally the first thing she said to me when she woke up this morning. She was a lot of help, more than I thought she would be, to tell you the truth.  She really didn’t have a plan as to how she wanted to decorate, but once we gave her some direction, she jumped right in.

She couldn’t wait to get her hands on that frosting!

One by one she placed each little candy on the row.  If we tried to do more than one at once, she said, “No, one at a time!”

“One at a time” didn’t keep her from wanting a whole handful, however.

Mark asked her to smile and this is what he got. She has reached that age where kids think making a big, goofy smile is clearly, the best way to go.

Eventually, she wanted to do the frosting by herself, so I let her.  I must say, she shocked the heck out of me. She did great!

Mark helped her roll some fondant figures, some windows, and some doors and also squashing some gumdrops.  She loves her rolling pin!

The entire time she was so focused on her task. I hope she keeps it up, the diligence, when she starts other things, like school.

Almost done now!

Ta da!  The finished project. It looks pretty darn good and was primarily decorated by a 3 year old (with some assistance, but not too much).

Sam was really happy the house had a Christmas tree.

She placed almost every single one of those candies herself.

This side is my favorite for a few reasons.  One, the snowmen, which Sam was really excited about. Secondly, the little green animal I constructed for her on the bottom right.  She draped a red “blanket” on top of him, “because he was cold.” Sam is always looking out for everyone. She is such a sensitive little soul.

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pamelamyers | December 22, 2012

Sam is so very into crafts lately. She is always asking us to make crafts with her. It doesn’t matter what kind — if it involves glue, scissors, felt, paper, pompoms, pipe cleaners, you name it. She is in! Since it is Christmas-time, we have been letting her do all kinds of crafty things. If you recall, she brought some of her snowmen crafts to Santa.

At my mom’s house, she does just as many crafts as she does at home. She takes it all very seriously, too. When she is into whatever she is making, she is very focused. I have tried to guide her a bit, but at the same time I am backing off more and more.  I mean, what do I care if the pieces are not on just right? As long as she is happy, and proud of her creation, that is all that matters.

Recently, I hung some ribbon so that I could display all of her handiwork. I think she did pretty well.

The pink snowman on the right is one of my favorites, just because he was so fun to make.  It started out with his body, his hat, his eyes and nose, and then I asked her if he needed a scarf, which of course he did.  Then she kept adding more and more scarves because, as Sam informed me, he was cold.  You can barely see his body, but that is exactly what she was trying to do, cover him up.  The big white paper on the window sill started out as a snowflake. I was explaining to her that she could cut all kinds of strips and pieces of paper and glue them on in the shape of a snowflake.  Her pieces were a little bigger than I expected…

I love all the foam crafts.  They are so easy to do since there is no glue involved and she can really go crazy all by herself.  We made a whole bunch of trees, gingerbread men, and snowmen.

The wooden mask above was a real trial to my somewhat OCD personality.  It was very hard for me to not try to get her to color it in just right.  That is one thing I have had to learn, as a parent, is to step back and let her do what she wants to do and to not dictate her creativity, her play, her imagination. It is difficult to not want her to do everything perfectly, since I am such a perfectionist.  But I am learning, I step aside, I let her imagination go, and I am so rewarded.  Listening to her tell me about what she is doing, and hearing her explanations, like that the snowman was cold, or that the ornaments have to hang on top of one another so they can hug, is incredibly rewarding.  Having a child really opens your eyes and your mind in ways you never thought possible, at least not since your own childhood. I am learning to let go, to be a child again, and there is something very special about that.

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pamelamyers | December 18, 2012

Yesterday, my mom and I took Sam into Philly to Macy’s to see the light show.  She loved it so much last year, and I always love it too, so we were pretty excited to go.  When we got to Macy’s, there was a little holiday display outside the main store entrance.  We had to make a pit stop so Sam could pet the horse.

When we finally got settled in, Sam was really excited to see what was going on.  The Nutcracker is the first portion of the approximately 10 minute show and it was really cute that she said, “We just saw The Nutcracker last night!”  I was surprised that, based on how little she paid attention to the ballet, that she remembered what we saw. And I guess she didn’t hate it as much as we thought because she seemed pretty into the fact that the light show had Nutcracker elements.

This is from near the end, when almost the entire thing is lit up.  I Love Love Love the light show!  It is exactly as I remember it from childhood.

We had some time before lunch after the show, and unlike last year it wasn’t crowded, so we visited the Dickens Village that was set up.  Many of the puppets move so Sam liked that a lot.  It is pretty cool.  She wanted me to take pictures of every single thing. This was one of the busier scenes.

One scene had this adorable little cat and I thought she’d love it so I took a picture of it.

But no.  My goofy little girl was more thrilled with what was right next to the cat….a teapot.  She is very into her tea parties these days so I shouldn’t have been surprised.

Grandmom and her girl. 🙂

After Dickens Village, we stopped by to visit Santa Claus.  Sam was too shy to sit on his lap, but we did tell him again that she wants some doctor stuff, a game, a Jack in the Box, and a purple toy for Zephyr (and Muffin — Sam never forgets about Muffin).

On the way to the parking garage, we had to pass by the area where you sit to see the light show.  It was about 20 minutes until the next show but Sam sat herself right down on the floor and said she wanted to see it again.  I asked her if she could wait because it would be a while and she told me she could.  She was good as gold and sat quietly waiting. When the show started, her excitement made the wait completely worthwhile. One last thing before we left was a picture with the famous eagle. At Sam’s insistence, of course.

Lunchtime! By this point, Sam was so worked up with excitement, she was feeling silly.

I am the proudest mommy. 🙂 I don’t think I could love this little one any more than I already do.

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pamelamyers | December 16, 2012

Today we took Sam to the Academy of Music to see her very first ballet, The Nutcracker.  It was my first ballet too so I was really looking forward to sharing the experience with Sam.  Generally, Mark and I go to see a concert at Christmas, but this year, we decided we could only do so many things and we wanted to spend our time with Sam.  So, no concert for us.  It was Mark’s idea to try The Nutcracker.  I thought it was a great idea, but we both had our doubts about how well she would behave.  To see the ballet, you have to be at least 3, so that tells you something.  Sam is really good though, usually, and will sit through a whole 2 hour movie at home quiet as a mouse.

We dressed up in our finery and, tickets in hand, off to the Academy of Music we went! Sam wasn’t really sure what was going on, but she was a good sport.

Our first stop was the concession stand where I bought her a little nutcracker ornament as a souvenir.  She was pretty excited about that idea.  It was taking forever to buy though, so Mark took her to the seats while I paid. We had great seats, 3rd row center stage! Mark took her to the pit to see the orchestra. They are always talking about the different instruments so it was really nice to show her all the various ones up close.

The Academy is a beautiful old building.  Everything you see seems sort of magical there.

As for the actual ballet, well…it was wonderful….but I must admit, a bit boring at first.  It got a lot better after the intermission when the sugar plum fairies and such showed up.  Sam thought so too.  She was not the worst behaved that she could have been, but she was not exactly planted in her seat watching intently.  I did manage to convey to her that she was NOT allowed to talk above a whisper, and only when we were clapping, NOT during the performance, so at least that wasn’t a problem.  The only part she was interested in was the portion with the mice and the mouse king.  The costumes, she loved.  If more of the ballet had been in costume, I think she would have been entranced.  Instead, I heard, every time we clapped following a performance, “Mommy?  Can we go home now?”  Ugh.  So much for getting some culture.  Maybe something a bit more kid friendly next year…

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