Christmas 2010

The traditional in our pajamas and in front of the tree Mazingo family Christmas picture.

We had a great Christmas around the Mazingo house. Grammy and Pop Pop stayed the night with us so they didn't have to make the drive down to our house early for Christmas presents. We told Cloey she could get up at 7am for presents because that is the time that we told Nana and Paw Paw to get to the house. She was up and ready to go. Nana and Paw Paw hadn't quite gotten to the house yet, so we took some time to take some Christmas morning pictures. Lets just say she wasn't exactly thrilled to take pictures and wait to open presents. Uncle Jeremy and Aunt Hillary came down to watch the girls open presents as well.
Both girls made out with more presents than they needed between all the relatives and Santa himself. The highlight for Cloey was the DSi that she got from Daddy and I. She has been wanting one and with the amount of time she spends in the car going back and forth it seemed like a nice present from us. She also ended up with some movies, Barbies,and craft supplies to name a few of the things. Emma was excited for the......paper. She would rip a strip of paper off and put it in her mouth. She didn't seem overly excited about the presents Christmas morning, but has since had fun with her play tables, peek a boo people, and refrigerator just to name a few of the items.
All in all it was a wonderful Christmas. While we celebrated Christmas it is always our goal to reminded Cloey and Emma (as she gets older) that Jesus is the reason for the season. We find it exciting and fun to celebrate Christmas and all the hustle and bustle, but find the real story of Christmas to be a very important aspect of the holiday season.
We hope that everyone had a Merry Christmas like we had and that each and every one of you have a very BLESSED New Year!!! We know we end 2010 with a lot to be thankful for and look forward to what 2011 will bring us.
Cloey opening her presents.

Emma liked to chew on her sorting blocks more than play with them.

Present time - here you can see that Emma was very excited to get new Puffs for Christmas. Like we have said before the kid would go crazy if she didn't get her daily fix of Puffs in.

Playing with The Chipmunks that came from Gran Gran's house. It was a sad Christmas without her this year.

This was Emma's expression when we woke up and saw all of the presents Christmas morning.

Christmas Break 2010

Cloey arrived on Friday Dec 17th for her Christmas Break and left on Saturday Dec 25th. We had a busy and fun filled week with her.
Friday - Once Cloey arrived we headed to bed because we had a busy day ahead of us on Saturday. Thankfully I had a snow day today and was able to get a lot of stuff done.
Saturday - Up and at it early for the Mazingo clan. We had an appointment for surprise pictures for the grandparents. The picture place was backed up which led to 2 cranky girls and stressed out parents. In the end the pictures turned out AMAZING! We bought more than we had intended, but couldn't pass some of them up because they were so precious. Had lunch at Panera and then ran around to pick up a few last minute gifts. Once we got home it was our "Christmas Eve" so that Cloey could have some time to play with her gifts instead of opening them and then leaving shortly after. Both sets of grandparents came down and we had a yummy lasagna dinner. As a special treat the girls got to open some gifts early. Aunt Sandy and Uncle Kurt's gifts were under the tree and waiting to be opened.
Emma with the box her gift came in - she was pretty impressed with the box.

Cloey with her new Zhu Zhu pet Airport. Emma decided to attack the plane numerous times and it was quite funny.

Cloey and I worked on a gingerbread house and boy was it a mess. While it was messy and stressful at some points it was a lot of fun to have some one on one time with Cloey to build the house.
Our Gingerbread House

Jason and I gathered the girls up and read Twas the Night Before Christmas and then headed to bed.
Goodies for Santa and the reindeer

-Sunday - Our "Christmas Day" will have its own post tomorrow with LOTS of pictures.
- Monday - Daddy hung out with the girls while I worked. Once I got home we headed to Grammy and Pop Pop's house because Adam and Angela had arrived. We had dinner and hung out before heading back home for the night.
-Tuesday - After I got home from work with exchanged presents with my parents, Adam and Angela. The girls made out very well, as well as Jason and I. After presents we headed to the hotel in our area for Cloey to swim and stay the night. We were suppose to go to the indoor waterpark, but that has been moved to January. We had a lot of fun swimming, hanging out, playing games, pizza and making 'Smores with my new microwaveable 'Smores maker.
The girls with Peppy aka Uncle Adam

Cloey and Angela having fun in the pool.

Emma's 1st Swim. She seemed to enjoy herself and stayed in for quite awhile.

- Wednesday - We got up and came back to the house so Cloey could play Wii with Peppy. After a little Wii time we headed to lunch. Adam and Angela left from Macado's and the rest of us headed Mom and Dad's way to see Santa. Emma was not fond of Santa, but we still bought the pictures because it was a memory. After Santa we headed to the Christmas light show. Then it was back for a quick dinner and we headed home.
- Thursday - Mom and Dad came down and we hung out at home. We had lots of fun making smoothies and playing Uno Attack and Go Fish.
- Friday - We spent the day at Jason's parents for a Christmas Eve lunch. After spending the day with them we headed to the candle light service at church.
- Saturday - Grammy and Pop Pop came down for a big breakfast. We hung out and played for a bit. Then it was time for Jason to drop Cloey off.
So as you can see it was a very busy, but fun filled weekend. Stay tuned tomorrow for the Christmas post.

Snow Day

Well we finally got a snow day so I have been enjoying being home with Jason and Emma. Yesterday Emma became such a grown up baby. She has been crawling the last couple weeks but it would be one little crawl and the rest would be an Army low crawl. Last night she was on the moving, but this also meant she was in everything. The dvds were strewn about from the tv stand, she was pulling herself up on the tv stand, and the ornaments on the tree became a goal of hers. It made me cry to see her crawling first she is growing up way too fast and second we have been told that she would take a lot longer to hit milestones along the way with everything she has been through. Last night Jason and I learned we have a very determined little girl who will prove everyone wrong.
Here is a video clip of her crawling this morning.

8 years old

This past week Emma turned 8 months old, and Cloey had a big milestone as well. We now have an 8 year old on our hands. It is so hard to believe that she is 8 years old. For some reason 8 sounds so grown up to us. A lot of things have changed in this last year. Cloey now reads chapter books - on her own, has that independence in picking out her outfits and getting herself ready, takes on responsibilities. While we have seen lots of growth she continues to be our beautiful, loving, creative, amazing, precious, thoughtful, writer, reader, and there are so many more words to describe her. She loves her little sister and cares so much for her. There is a special bond they have as Cloey is the only person who can always get a smile out of Emma when she walks into a room. They are almost 8 years apart but love each other dearly. I hope that Emma gains a lot of the wonderful qualities that Cloey has to offer. We know she will do big things one day may it be one of her many dreams that range from a writer, to a dog rescue owner, to a singer, to a hairstylist. What every she becomes she will always be our very special Birdie who makes us proud each day.

Another Weekend Bites the Dust

Well it was yet again another busy weekend with the Mazingo family. Here is how we spent our weekend.
*Friday - Jason headed to NC to pick Cloey up for the weekend. I had my work Christmas party so Mom came down and kept Emma until Jason got home. By the time Jason got home it was time to lay the girls down for the evening and I got home about an hour later.
*Saturday - We got up and around and headed to Roanoke. Our first stop was for Cloey to get her 8 year pictures taken. We were in and out and I only spent $10. There were pleanty that I wanted to buy, but we went in knowing we were only going to get the $10 package. Our next stop was to head into the mall for a few things. Oh boy was that a crazy place. There were lots of people hustling and bustling buying gifts. We wanted to get the girls picture with Santa but Cloey quickly vetoed that we are going to try again in a couple of weeks. After leaving the mall it was a quick trip into Target. At this point it was snowing and that makes everybody around here panic and go crazy. We ran to Red Robin to celebrate Cloey's birthday dinner and then headed home. It took awhile to get home, but in time we made it. Once we got home we pulled out all the Christmas tubs and decorated the tree. I will have to take a picture of the tree and post it this week. After that was done and the day we had there were two tired girls and two tired parents ready for bed.
Decorating the tree

New matching pjs

*Sunday - We got up and the first thing Cloey wanted to do was play in the inch of snow we had. Jason got dressed and they headed out for about 45 minutes. We then had our usually Sunday morning breakfast of cinamon rolls and bacon. The rest of the morning was spent lounging around and playing Wii. We then showered and got ready for Daddy to take Cloey back to NC and Emma and I headed to the Glasgow Parade. The student leadership group I work with at the elementary school walked this year and boy was it cold. Emma was all bundled up and did very well. We were thankful to get home to the warm house.
We hope everyone had a great weekend. We can tell that the holiday bustle is here and Christmas is fast approaching. We are looking forward to lots of excitement this Christmas season as well as teaching the girls(well mainly Cloey about the real meaning of Christmas.