Caught RED Handed!

Alegria is usually pretty good about not chewing or tearing paper, in fact, she loves books and has always been great at handling paper pages...a lot of her books are NOT board books and I've only ever had to tape one page back together because she flipped through the pages too fast and it tore...so I don't know why she decided to chew a hole through this:

For the longest time, I'd been trying to feed Alegria sandwiches because on a busy day, it's just so much easier to slap together a peanut butter and jelly sandwich than to have to stand at the stove trying to cook her a hot meal while she screams at me because we've been out all morning and the snacks she's had on the way home have not done their job of satisfying her hunger...but she's never liked bread, so that's been a problem.

Well, today at lunch time, I took out leftovers from Andrea's party last night and when Alegria saw me having one of these yummy chicken salad sandwiches, she decided she wanted one instead of her veggie and pasta shells...and she ate it all!

And then another! YAY!!! Thank you Andrea and your yummy sandwiches for bringing my child to her senses!!! :)

Later on in the afternoon, it got hectic and busy. I had to go to Wal-Mart to pick up a few ingredients AND to find a $5 gift for Alegria so that Santa could give it to her today at the work family Christmas party. Thank goodness Cameron had the day off, so he was able to stay home while Alegria napped so that I could run my errands.

At Wal-Mart I couldn't decide on a toy. I really wanted to get her a doll or a horse stuffed animal, but there were none in the $5 price range that I liked for her. I finally settled on a soft stuffed frog. Then I got the ingredients I needed and headed off...

...except I forgot a disposable casserole pan! So I stopped at the Dollar General on my way home and bought one. Phew!

Once home I quickly showered and between fixing my hair and getting the diaper bag ready, I fixed a green bean casserole (which I'd never in my life made). In the midst of all of this, Alegria woke up and Daddy got her dressed and ready to go.

At one point, my kitchen was unmanned...and this is what Daddy found when he went searching for the child who made no noise:

Alegria was caught RED handed!

Yes, Alegria is an expert now at pulling chairs to drawers, so we have to keep our eyes peeled because her favorite drawer is the silverware drawer and her favorite things to empty are the forks with their sharp tynes.

On our way out, as we were turning the corner to get onto the road that goes to the main road out of our community, we saw a cop. "Thank goodness I have my seatbelt on," I thought.

Surprise, surprise, he stopped us anyway...on account of we didn't make a complete stop at the stop sign. And then although our insurance is always paid/renewed automatically, our insurance company doesn't send reminders by email about printing off the paperwork to stash in our car...so we were also cited for not "maintaining financial responsibility." ARG!

So off we went with a gray cloud over our heads to a Christmas party.

Alegria got bored on the way and took off her shoes and socks...as usual.

When we arrived at Belton Lake Outdoors Recreation Area (BLORA), there were already a few people there...including Santa! So to get ahead of the crowd, we went over to see him...

Alegria was NOT pleased to see him, even though he offered her a gift that I had spent weeks debating on and finally purchasing and that I knew she'd love because she'd always try to steal Jace's frog and the loves Hopkins (a baby frog) from her Baby Signing Time dvds! Oh well. I guess it will now go under the tree for her to enjoy on Christmas morning!

So Daddy had to grab the gift and when Santa waved bye-bye to her, she was more than happy to go.

What a traumatic experience!

Alegria and I found a few empty seats while Cameron went to help out in the kitchen. The Abbatacolas arrived and Kerri and Quinn came to sit with us while Justin also went to help in the kitchen.

As we waited for dinner to be served, Alegria amused herself with playing with the tinsel decorations on the table:

FINALLY they began serving...but all they were serving were appetizers. Kerri and I agreed that it was ridiculous to make us stand in line for appetizers. The appetizers should have been out on a table where people could get them as they walked in and were waiting for the real food. Luckily, both our hubbies were in the kitchen, so we didn't have to wait in line...they brought out a couple of plates with appetizers to us. Alegria was sure grateful (as was I) because she was hungry. So she dipped her crackers in ranch dressing and went to town!

At long last, the real food was served. Now Cameron and Justin were busy serving in the kitchen, so while Kerri stayed with Quinn and Alegria, I went to go get us some plates of food.

I liked everything except the rice. Alegria ended up liking the rice, so that was good:

After dinner, Alegria was getting restless just sitting at the table, since I wouldn't let her climb into Quinn's stroller, so I took her over to Santa's little village to play with the other kids. At first she was apprehensive about going back there and I had to reassure her plenty of times that Santa was no longer there:

Alegria...see all of the little kids playing in the little house? Don't you want to go play, too?

Alegria: "Shush, Mommy! Just a second!"

Alegria: "He really IS gone, so I think I'll play on Santa's chair!"

Alegria: "Halleluia! Halleluia! San-ta-'s GONE!"

At about 7, we left the party so that we could get home at a reasonable hour and get Alegria to bed. To exit BLORA, we had to go through the Nature in Lights exhibit, which was fine, since I'd been wanting to take Alegria to see it.

Unfortunately, since we'd been in a certain area of BLORA for the party, we didn't get to see the whole Nature in Lights, but what we did see was awesome!

Here are some videos and pictures from our "trip:"

We hope you enjoyed the bit of Nature in Lights that you've seen as much as we did!!! :)

Have a most wonderful night!!! :)