Finally a Tree

Since we were all not feeling very well, putting up our christmas tree was a little late this year. Last weekend, Ricky was able to go out and pick out our tree. Since Savannah and I were still a bit under the weather, we waited at home for daddy to bring a good looking tree home. We usually go out and pick one out as a family, but things were not like that this year. As soon as daddy got home, the tree was placed in its stand. Savannah immediately pulled over a chair and sat right beside the tree for almost a half hour. She continued to say, "This tree is beautiful, this is a beautiful tree, daddy." This made Ricky so happy, since if it were up to me, we would have an artificial tree.

Later that evening, I started off the decorating but putting the white christmas lights all around the tree. I love a well lit white lighted christmas tree.

After the lights, Savannah and daddy did a majority of the balls and the ornaments. Savannah again loved to decorate the tree and so far she has done pretty well with leaving the tree alone and not messing with it.
If you are wonding why Savannah has her halloween butterfly costume on, she is going through a phase I guess. She loves to wear this daily now and this is one of those battles I choose to not fight with her.
Here we are decorating the tree. I just realized that I do not have a picture of the final tree. I will have to post that just as soon as I take the picture. Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night.

The beginning of this month did not start out to great for our family. Ricky started it all by having a tiny cold and not feeling well, however, his was gone in 24-48 hours. We are not sure if it was coincidence or not, but somehow Savannah and I became sick shortly after. Savannah ran high fevers for a little over a week and ended up at the Dr's office twice for antibiotics. She has now returned to her normal hyper into everything self. We did get to enjoy some couch and movie time for a short time. Robin, as most of you know has now been in the hospital twice for contractions. I am only 27 weeks, so it is way too early to be contracting. The first time, I was very dehydrated. Must have been drinking too much caffeinated drinks and not enough water. I learned my lesson and now am only drinking water. A week later, I was at work and having more contractions. I again was dehydrated, but it was not my fault this time. I was coming down with a cold and having lots of drainage. The Dr put my on some medication to stop contractions and now I can take it whenever I am having problems. For now contractions are just occassional and I am taking it easy and relaxing. I have cut back at work to 2 days a week until I deliver the baby. I have to do whatever it takes to keep this baby in the oven for as long as possible. I hope we are all better and can stay healthy for the holidays that are approaching rather quickly.

Semmler Christmas Party

The first weekend in December was the Semmler family Christmas get together. We traveled to Zionsville to spend some family time and enjoy the holiday season. We ate lots of food and caught up with family members and their lives. Later throughout the night Santa always shows up. The grandparents give him gifts to bring for their grandchildren. Ricky and I figured we would have a hard time getting Savannah up on Santa's lap, but boy were

we wrong. I think she was sucked in by the fact that she got a present if she went up to Santa. We told her it was her turn and off she went, without hesitation like she had done previously at the mall. Here she is sitting on Santa's lap. She also started the tradition of opening the presents while sitting on Santa's lap. She did not want to give anyone else a turn. I had to literally go up and get her from Santa's lap. Hopefully she will not be afraid of Santa anymore, however, I have a feeling that she will be expecting a present from now on if she goes and sees Santa.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We had a great time over Thanksgiving. We got to spend time with lots and lots of family. Savannah and mommy got to go home on Wednesday and enjoyed hanging out with Libby, Chloe, Isaiah, and Kelly at mom's house. Little Isaiah is not so little, but he is such a cutie. It had been awhile since we had seen the Miller's.
Here are the girls after their naps watching a Disney movie. All girls must have their blankies and then the Miller girls must also have a thumb in mouth. This is when the girls are the quietest and at their best. Not getting into trouble.
After eating at my mom's house, it was time for me to head back to Terre Haute and go to work. Ricky stayed in town that night and headed over to his family's Thanksgiving dinner with Savannah. Here is a picture of Savannah and Tye enjoying some play time together.
No shopping the next day early for us since I had to work. I took a little nap after work and then headed back to Avon for some more fun with family and friends. We had a great Thanksgiving and hope to see everyone again at Christmas time.

Bear Joseph's Birthday!!

I am a bit behind in blogging here lately, so here are just a few things that have been going on with the Semmler's. November 22 was Bear's 11th birthday. Here is he eating a bowl of ice cream. The dog loves his ice cream, but usually just gets to lick the leftovers after Ricky eats it, but today was special. You would think that by now Bear would be slowing down, but not a chance. He is still as hyper as before, well most of the time. Anyways, heres to Bear and hope he is with us for many more years.

Happy Halloween

Halloween was a blast this year. Savannah really got into it and enjoyed it, even though she is a little bit of a wimp. The day started with Marcy coming over and giving Savannah a HUGE bag of treats. Just what Savannah needed. Thanks Marcy, I will send it with her when she stays at your house.Later in the day, we got ready and headed out on the town. We made a special stop at Elyse's house. We love stopping by and talking with Elyse. It had been a while since we had visited Elyse.

That night we went trick or treating to a few houses around the neighborhood. Savannah did a good job walking up to the door and showing the neighbors her bag until we came upon one particular house. After she knocked on the door a lady brought out her candy bowl. It was not just a bowl though, it was one of the ones that had a hand in it and when you reached for the candy it comes down adn grabs your hand. Even though Savannah had seen these in the stores and was fine of them, she was not a big fan of it and did not think it was funny at all. After that she was a bit scared and hesitant to walk up the people's houses.

Savannah's favorite part I think was trying to grab as much candy as possible with one hand and then putting in her bag and leaving. After every house she wanted to stop and eat candy first before moving on. She did not understand that the candy would still be there at the end of the night. Later in the evening, we met up with our friends, Lynn, Cary, and of course, who could forget McKinley. McKinley was adorable in his mailman outfit. Savannah and McKinley had a wonderful night. They were laughing and giggling at everything. We always have fun when we hang out with the Vernon's.

Before heading to bed that night, we let Savannah eat a few pieces of candy. Here she is in her jammies and for some reason she had to wear her sunglasses. Of course, they are upside down because she had to put them on herself, "me do, me do it." After all our adventures for the day, it was the easiest night to put Savannah to bed.

Fall Moments

October was a very fun and exciting time for the Semmler Family. With Ricky being off on the weekends, we were able to partake in several Fall activities this year. Here we are one night carving out our Jack-O-Lantern. Last year Savannah did not like touching all the pumpkin insides, however, this year she loved it and could not get enough of it. Here she is digging in and cleaning out the pumpkin guts. Here is the final Semmler pumpkin. Savannah loved it and had to hug and kiss it several times and then everytime we were outside she would have conversations with the pumpkin.

This is Savannah carrying around mommy's pumpkin decor. This stack of pumpkins was in my kitchen and would light up. The light bulb went out and since that happened I would find this all over my house. Savannah likes to carry it around and calls it her buddy. She too always has converstations with this and makes us laugh. She will ask it, "you okay, buddy?" I guess she can entertain herself, which is a good thing.

One weekend, while mommy was working, daddy, nana and papa went to Pumpkin Works. Pumpkin Works is a place in Illinois where they have corn mazes, hayrides, pumpkins, and lots of fun things to do. Here are some pictures of all of them having some fun. It was pretty chilly the night they went. I love this last picture of Savannah. With her coat, gloves, and hat on she looks so grown up.

Disney World Vacation

This past week, Ricky, Savannah, and I hopped on a plane and flew to Orlando, Florida and did the whole Disney World Vacation. I know some of you may say, isn't Savannah a little young for this, but we decided that she would have an awesome time and decided to take her anyways. She knows who the characters are now and watches them daily. It was great and an awesome experience to see her reactions and expressions on her face. Here are some pictures of our trip, but if you want to see all of them you will have to come over. I am planning on putting together a scrapbook of our trip to help Savannah better remember our vacation for the future.
Since we went in October it was not that crowded at all. Don't get me wrong, yes there were people there, but we did not have to wait in lines long at all. Savannah got to see all the characters and loved every moment of it. At first, she was a little hesitant, but by the end she would run up to them hug them, get their autographs, give them a high five, give them a kiss, say goodbye and be ready to move to the next one. It was a cycle she did with each and everyone of them. Here she is with Mickey and Minnie Mouse, her favorites.It was a coincidence that the resort we stayed at was the All-Star Movie Resort. There were 4 different sections of this resort and we actually stayed in the 101 Dalmation section. 101Dalmations is Savannah's favorite movie right now. She though it was the coolest thing that Pongo and Perdy were outside of our room. Here she is standing with Lucky. We had to give him a hug everytime with left the hotel.

The first day up, Savannah was ready to go. She had her purse in hand and sunglasses on, giving us a thumbs up that she was ready to get going.
Here we are at the Magic Kingdom in front of the Princess Castle. We bought this Mickey stuffed doll one night and from that moment on, Savannah had to take Mickey everywhere and he had to do everything she did. If she ate, he too had to eat, if she rode a ride, he too had to go. One night at the Marketplace in Downtown Disney, we are not really sure what happened, but we turned around to see Savannah falling from a bench straight on her head. We thought she would have a huge bump on her head/face, but to our surprise I guess it sounded worse than it looked. Anyways, the only thing that calmed her down after this tragedy was to put a bandaid on her head, along with Mickey's head. To this day, Mickey still has the bandaid on his head.

We waited in line to see the princesses, but by the time we got up to the front, Savannah was dead asleep. She would not wake up. Here she is with Aurora, Sleeping Beauty herself. Don't worry we later went back when she was awake as well.One of our big events of the vacation was getting to eat at the Crystal Palace with Pooh Bear and his Friends. Savannah's face was priceless seeing all the characters in action. I think her favorite was Tigger, by far. She loved every second of this part of the vacation.
Another great part of this vacation (for Ricky and I) was that Savannah was beat by the end of every night. It was the easiest thing to put her to sleep, unlike at home. There were times that she did not even make it awake until we got home. She would fall asleep on the bus ride back and not wake up to put pj's on. She than would sleep like 10-12 hours straight until the next morning. This never happens at home.

Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Night

Tuesday night, we got to go to the Magic Kingdom and trick or treat with Mickey and the gang. This was an extra part of the vacation. During October Disney has a special that if you pay extra then on one night the park is open until midnight for special guests only. You get to trick or treat for candy, get really close to all the characters, they have a special Halloween parade, and special fireworks. The perk is you can dress up and wear your costumes. Here is Savannah as a butterfly fairy. She loved her outfit and was sooo excited.

We again got to see more characters and get pictures. Even the characters had there special costumes on. This was a great and another fun experience.

Ricky and I dressed for the occassion. We had our orange and black on. We even bought special Mickey Pumpkin ears that were perfect for the occassion. Don't we look good?

The best part about this halloween fun, was that it was not crowded at all. They had certain areas set up where they played music and the characters would come out and dance with all the kids and adults. Savannah not only loved the dancing and jumping around, but the fact that she got to do it with her favorite characters.

We had an awesome time on our family vacation. Not only was Disney the greatest, Florida was having record high temps for this time of year. It was wonderful weather. It was great to see Disney through Savannah and her reactions. We will definitely be going back in the future.

Indiana State Fair

This summer we had the opportunity to take Savannah to the Indiana State Fair for the first time. She got to see bunnies, chickens and roosters, pigs, horses, and cows. She even got to pet a baby cow.
Here Savannah is enjoying herself while going down the big slide with daddy. Her face was priceless. They were going really fast and her eyes were really big but when they finished she loved it and wanted more.
If you know Savannah you know that she is not a big eater. Well the fair of course proved us wrong. She enjoyed every moment of the food. I guess she learned this from her mommy. Mommy has a weakness for fair food. Savannah enjoyed bites of a corn dog, french fries, a sno-cone, an elephant ear, fudge, gummy worms, and at last daddy got some fried cookie dough. What a meal for a 2 year old. We had a great time and maybe we will head back next year. The night ended with Savannah falling asleep before we hit home. Always a good thing when falling asleep in the car.

Tumbling!

Savannah has started going to tumbling at the Y. She absolutely loves it. Although the last 2 weeks she has not gotten out of bed to go. They moved the time up and apparently it is too early for her to make it. We are working on it. Here she is doing her stations and jumping onto the mat. She can also do somersaults and put her feet on the wall while holding herself up with her hands.
Here is Savannah and Daddy at tumbling class. Ricky has taken her to most of the classes while mommy has only taken her to 1. Tumbling is on Thursday mornings and it seems like lately I have been working a lot of Wednesday nights, so 10:00 is too early for mommy when she gets home at 8:00am.
Savannah loves to walk the beam and usually says, "I do it, I do it." And here she is hanging from the uneven bars. We might just have a little gymnast on our hands in the future.

Birthday Party #1

Sunday, we had a birthday party for Savannah. This party was in Terre Haute at our good friend, Marcy's house. She has a pool and the day ended up being a beautiful day for a pool party. Lots of good friends showed up and I believe everyone there had a wonderful time.

My friend, Melissa, from work, has an awesome sister who made Savannah her Elmo cake. This cake was not only awesome looking, but it tasted just as yummy. I recommend her for cakes.
Joan Phegley, Luke and Pam Tidrow poolside drying off.

Here is Savannah and one of her buddies, McKinley jumping in the pool together. McKinley loved playing in the pool and could not get enough of it.Savannah and mommy and some of the WTWO gang.
Elyse, Kristen, and Sarah

Happy Birthday Savannah and a huge thank you goes out to all our friends for coming to the party and also for the outrageous, wonderful gifts.

































Here are the kids eating the delicious cake. Notice all the other kids are digging in making a mess of themselves. Now look at the picture of Savannah eating her cake. Notice how she is making Elyse feed her with a fork. Initially she stuck her hand in and got icing on her fingers and Savannah being the girly girl she is did not like this.