'Tis the Season...

...for Santa hats, yuletide cheer, and pictures of our Christmas sweets:


We had our very own little Christmas elf help us pick out the perfect (10 foot!) Christmas tree this year!


Santa's helper made sure that all of the breakable ornaments were placed high up on the tree, and out of the reach of his inquisitive, crawling baby sister.


Someone with a sweet tooth is thrilled to have his first Advent calendar. Counting down the days until Christmas is fun, but the best part of this activity is eating the treat hidden behind each day's door (which Luke refers to as: "Number 9 Chocolate", for December 9th, etc.).


Our 'Struction Man's perfect new ornament.


Our sweet baby girl's very first Christmas ornament.


Our special 2011 Family ornament.



We're busy decorating, celebrating the season, and preparing for a wonderful and full month of Christmas fun!!

Ice Skating!

Now that it's December, we've been getting into the holiday spirit with lots of winter-themed activities. This afternoon, we took Luke ice skating for the first time, and it was a great success! After a few minutes on the ice, Luke no longer wanted me to hold onto him and insisted on using his "walker" all by himself. These large, plastic guides are wonderful invention that give children security while learning how to skate, and Luke had a blast. He wasn't hesitant at all, and even let go of his walker to try to skate all by himself! Here are some pictures from our fun adventure on the ice:

Trying out ice skates for the first time.


Mommy was ready to help Luke onto the ice...


Look at that focus!


The spectators


Getting the hang of it...


All smiles!


Click HERE to see a video of our little ice skater! I wish I had more video of Luke skating by himself at the end of the video (after he lets go of the walker), but I didn't trust myself with the video camera in one hand and my 3 year-old clutching the other.

Thanksgiving Week Wrap-Up

We stayed here for Thanksgiving this year, and celebrated a quiet holiday as a family. We had a productive and fun week together, went on several special family outings, began decorating for Christmas, and enjoyed the time with our little turkeys. Here are some of the highlights of the week for each of us (and things that we are thankful for), in no particular order:

Mommy: Redeeming a massage that I received as a birthday present (Daddy watching the children was part of this gift), checking off many little projects on my Honey-Do list for Mark during his time off work, going to see the new Twilight movie with my equally-obsessed girlfriends (while Daddy baby-sat), taking a nap (while Daddy took Luke to the park), going to a late afternoon dentist appointment without fussy children in tow (while Daddy made dinner at home with the kids), leisurely shopping child-free at 5 a.m. at the outlets on Black Friday... do we see a theme here?

Luke: Per the bulletin board at preschool, "Luke is thankful for firetrucks and animals." Other highlights of Thanksgiving week for Luke were: acting as Daddy's sous chef to prepare our Thanksgiving turkey, going to the zoo with Daddy, jumping at Gigglebugs with Daddy, playing at the playground with Daddy, watching the marching "vands" on the Macy's Day Thanksgiving parade, and putting ornaments on the Christmas tree (on Daddy's shoulders of course).




Leah: Tasting her Daddy's Thanksgiving turkey for the first time, all of the attention and time she spent with her favorite guy this week (guess who?), "the new, giant tree that just appeared inside our house and is covered in pretty white lights with things for me to grab", and the fact that "Mommy has now put away all of that ridiculous turkey-themed attire that she insisted that I wear"...



Winnie: Sampling all of the dropped pieces of turkey that fell from her baby sister's high chair, the multiple walks that she went on each day with Mark, and knowledge that "it will be an entire year before they dress me up in this ridiculous turkey scarf again and make me pose for pictures"...




Daddy: Daddy must be so exhausted from his "vacation" that he is probably thankful to be back at work today, and for all of us to have resumed our normal routine. But as you can see from our list above, he is the common denominator that made our week so much fun. We are thankful for you, Mark! Thank you for giving us 110% all week and allowing me to recharge my battery. Love you (and your delicious Thanksgiving turkey)!

Turkey Antics

In the spirit of Thanksgiving, we wanted to show you what our little turkeys have been up to this week.

Turkey Luke refuses to stay still whenever I try to take a picture of him in his Thanksgiving pajamas (aren't they a part of everyone's holiday wardrobe?), but still has a charming grin for the camera:



Fire Turkey in his hat and boots:





Bashful Turkey donning his Native American headwear from his preschool Thanksgiving feast:



Nutty Turkey proudly showing off her First Thanksgiving outfit:



"SO BIG" Turkey covered in blueberry pancakes from head to toe (because bibs are such a nuisance, Mom!):



Winnie Turkey thinking that her turkey disguise permits her to lounge on the couch (which is off limits to dogs):

GOBBLE, GOBBLE!!

On the Move

Now that Leah is crawling, she is everywhere! The beauty of her being our second child to become mobile in this house is that baby-proofing is a lot easier this time around. We can usually anticipate her moves and often catch her before she gets into too much mischief. However, in the past few weeks, Leah discovered Winnie's water bowl (and splashed around in it as if it were her own bath), removed every book from our bookcase, hid in the dog crate (photo above), and ate several leaves from a houseplant. Mommy just can't keep up with everyone at once, and am surprised by how quickly our little girl can move!

Yesterday, I discovered Leah in our bookshelves. She cleared all of the toys out of the bottom shelf and somehow wedged herself in the small space. Leah happily entertained herself here for quite awhile until she needed me to help her out of this tight spot. I remember when Luke used to play in the same cabinet, right after we had it built:



LeeLee makes a beeline for the fridge every time we open it. These pictures amuse me for a couple of reasons:
1) We had to remove every object from the bottom shelf on the door due to our curious, exploring baby.
2) It looks like an advertisement for Bud Light- In bad taste, maybe, but funny nonetheless.
3) The numerous bottles of wine in our refrigerator door makes it appear as if we are party animals. My one glass of wine consumed each month is really not accurately depicted here, but Leah seems to enjoy the challenge of reaching for these pretty objects:





These days, the only way to contain our girl on the move is in her highchair. Leah has a new favorite food: spaghetti. We have a very messy little diner on our hands, but she's cute, so it's worth it:



Like his little sister, Luke is also on the move. Every Wednesday after preschool, Luke participates in a program called Soccer Shots at his school. It's a half hour of absolute chaos (those coaches deserve medals!), but he loves it and "Soccer Wednesday" is his favorite day all week. His fall soccer season came to an end yesterday, but we loved this first taste of our little boy's participation in team sports. Here's goalie Luke (dressed in red) in action:



A newfound hobby is Luke "driving" his remote control police car. It moves up and down our hallway, driveway, and through the house. Winnie skitters out of the way, Leah giggles in delight and crawls after the car, and Mommy carefully sidesteps yet another moving object on our floor:


Sadly, I think it's our last year of footie pajamas for Luke. He is getting so big, and I'm not sure how practical or cute one-piece pjs with feet are for older children. So we're relishing in the warm, snuggly adorableness of our son this winter, as he proudly moves in his monkey jammies. Luke insisted on climbing the stair railing like a monkey as soon as he put on his new pjs for the first time last week:


Always the ham, he just had to show off those monkey feet:





Of course, being on the move can wear out even the most energetic little monkey. I recently found Luke napping with his beloved train conductor hat on, dreaming of Thomas the train, I'm sure:

BB Weekend

Leah and I flew to Baltimore yesterday to join my college friends, the BBs, for a girls' weekend. Nutty was a wonderful traveler, waving to people at the airport, sitting contentedly in my lap observing the other passengers, and falling asleep as soon as the plane took off. We had a great visit, meeting the 2 other brand new BB babies, watching Wake Forest football, and catching up. Luke began the next generation of BB offspring in 2008, and since the summer after his birth, there has been a BB pregnant at all times. So far in this 3 year period, there are 7 BB babies and 1 on the way! Needless to say, our weekend reunions have adapted as we've gotten older, and now involve Daddies (a.k.a. BB Coaches) on Duty, lots of baby equipment, and earlier bedtimes, but we still manage to have fun grown up time, too:

Dressed up for our evening out to dinner!


Miller, Leah, and Emmett (the 3 BB babies born in 2011) represented Wake Forest well in their Demon Deacon onesies, but unfortunately couldn't help us clinch a crucial football win yesterday!


As the only girl among all of the other BB babies, Leah has her choice of future suitors:

Cool dude Liam picked us up at the airport, and he wasted no time holding Leah's hand in the backseat...


Leah shied away from Miller's advances, but the onesie says it all!


Wait a minute! Is that my daughter with her hands on the legs of both boys? Maybe she's not as innocent as she looks!


Coach Adam entertains the 3 newest BB additions- this is what triplets would be like! (Insert sigh of relief here...)


BB Sav and Leah shared a little bonding time.


What a fun weekend we had- We miss you BBs (and babies) already!

Leftovers

After taking almost a week to recover from all of the Halloween-related excitement, we've finally resumed our normal routine. Here are some of our leftover Halloween pictures from trick or treating on Monday night:

Luke thought it was fun to trick or treat at our own house, where Grandpa was passing out candy. We also made it around our entire neighborhood (vs. last year where we only went to a few houses of neighbors that Luke knew) and had a very fun evening.


This was our attempt at a family picture before trick or treating. Luke was NOT interested in posing with us. Finally we just decided to scoot/lean toward him and hope that he made it into the camera frame.

We also took about 82 pictures of Luke and Leah on the front porch in the hopes of getting just one good one of them together in their costumes. Sadly, these are the best few. All I kept thinking about during this exhausting endeavor was how challenging it's going to be to get a smiling picture of my children for our family Christmas card this year:






And here's one leftover glimpse of our cute little ladybug. She was such a sweet, cooperative little trick or treater and served as the caddy for her super-golfer brother's clubs and candy:


I forgot to bring my camera to Luke's preschool Halloween party, which was the cutest thing in the world. All of the children dressed in costume and the parents came for treats, games, stories, and crafts. Oh, what fun it is to be 3, where Halloween is a week-long event! However, I did manage to snap a picture of Leah, as she found our leftover Halloween candy stash in the pantry. She now makes a beeline for the door every time it is open:


Eternally optimistic that Mommy might let her have a piece (which is NOT going to happen), Nutty has tried her best to get a taste even with the wrapper on:



Also in the leftover category, there were a couple of important activities in September that I forgot to include in our recent blog posts. The first was Winnie's annual day at the waterpark. We absolutely adore our parks and recreation department's Waggin' at the Waterpark event every fall, and Winnie had the time of her life. Here's one of my favorite pictures from that day, of Luke in the water with all of the dogs:


Here is one of Winnie with several of the other black lab friends in the pool. They formed a little retrieving pack and chased the balls together:



As always, we enjoyed attending the annual NICU reunion at the hospital in September with Luke, other NICU graduates, and medical staff. After giving birth to Leah who was healthy, full-term newborn, I can now compare my childrens' experiences in the hospital during the first days of their lives. This perspective gives me such an appreciation for the medical team who attended to our firstborn in the NICU, and extra thanks for our 2 thriving children. What a great way to celebrate this every year with a party!






It's hard to believe it's already November and Thanksgiving is less than 3 weeks away. What a busy, fun fall we've had so far!!