Of course, the day she could sleep in was also the day she woke up at 5:50 in the morning. So we said goodbye to Mommy, had some medicine, some crispys (Rice Krispies), and watched a couple rounds of Horton Hears a Who.

Along with being sick, Brooklynn has been pretty horrible in the mornings for the past three weeks. Over half of the days it feels like she spends most of the time crying because she doesn’t want to go to school or telling us she doesn’t want to get dressed, and no she doesn’t want to wear that. No, she doesn’t want to eat that right now, and no, we can’t put on a coat or shoes or cooperate in any way.

To be honest, it’s a crappy way to start a morning. I can’t wait until we’re trying to get two children ready each morning.

I mentioned that I stayed home with Brooklynn a couple days ago, and we spent some of our time on the couch watching movies.

After taking a mid-morning potty break, before we restarted the movie, she told me to lie down and she sat on my chest. She reached out her hand and gently touched the tip of my nose with her fingertips before quickly jerking her arm back to her chest.

“I got your nose, Daddy!”

Again, reaching her hand out to my face, “It’s ok, Daddy, I give it back. Now, you get mine.”

So we played, taking turn at getting each other’s noses and eyes, and ears and lips. As I gave her second ear back for a second time (because you can’t take just one ear and not the other), her eyes finally started to betray how tired she was really getting.

“Ok, all done.” She laid down nestling her head underneath my chin and curling her body up on my torso. We grabbed a blanket to cover up with and she reached a hand up and felt my face again.

“Daddy, you happy?” she asked me, raising her head to look at me from 6 inches away.

“Yes, Brooklynn, I’m happy. Are you happy too?”

“Yep.” She laid her head back down. “Let’s watch Horton now.”

This morning was a bad morning. I had to physically force a small screaming child into a car seat. So every time that I ask why myself doing this again seemed like a good idea, I also think of times like that morning, cuddling on the couch.

We get to do this again. That’s the focus. We’re looking forward to having you, Artoo.

I’m sure I’ll get over it sooner or later. I did get a good meal out for the special occasion with my two favorite ladies. (Hint: one of the them is pictured with me above and the other one took the picture.)

Considering the people I get to hang out with, maybe the 30s won’t be so bad.

Three days in to this week and it’s going. I’ll leave that without a clarifier.

She’s been eating breakfast in her pajamas and taking her sleeping blankie downstairs with her, but we’ve all been getting out the door on time. She’s not at all thrilled to see me in the morning when I wake her up, but that might be a little bit our fault for letting her stay up like it was still Christmas break. I’m sure we’ll get it figured out again eventually.

Considering the picture below was taken at 6:15 am and she had already finished her oatmeal, I guess I could finish my previous though: it’s going ok.

2011 Photo Recap – as always, head over to Vimeo to see the HD version.

Sometimes Rhiannon and I discuss all the things we don’t do. We don’t camp as much as we would like. We should really get around to building that container garden in the back yard. Why haven’t we finished flooring of the garage yet?

And then I actually go back and look at some pictures from the past year and I guess that we are busy enough.

You’ll notice that our pictures are kind of dominated by Brooklynn. With Artoo on the way, I imagine that she’ll have to share the spotlight a little more next year. Either that or this yearly effort will scale up to mini-documentary status. I already crammed about 620 photos into 390 seconds. At this rate, we’ll be 1000+ pics and double digit minutes. That, or I’ll actually have to edit a little bit.

This year was also the first year that our cell phone cameras have a major presence. We’ve found the saying that the best camera you have is the one you have with you to be very true. A decent chunk of the photos in this were taken by Rhiannon, so thanks to her and every one else that helped make 2011 a great year for our family.