January indoor play- 2011

The beginning of this month has been fairly cold with little snow, so we have had lots of time to play inside.  Noah's latest obsession is picking out which cake he wants for his birthday.  He gets this book out almost everyday and spends at least 30 minutes thumbing through  it.  Currently he is focused on the car cake, but since daddy's birthday is first, daddy may be getting a car cake instead... it is a pretty funny scene when Noah is looking at the cake book and James is jumping on the bed and falling all over him:) The top pictures are of Noah and James dancing.  James likes to take all of the puzzles out and dance around with a bucket full of puzzle pieces.  Noah has some fun new dance moves thanks to the "Just Dance" game on the Wii.  

James has recently started to "snore" which is one of the funniest things I have seen, but I can't for the life of me get it on video (I will keep trying!). It all started when he caught my dad napping (and snoring) on the couch.  He does it most reliably when he is in his car seat.  He will turn his head to the side and pretend to sleep, he starts making snoring sounds.  When you say "James are you sleeping?" he starts laughing hysterically, then turns his head to the side and does it again.   So, this is his new favorite game... pretending to sleep.  

Christmas Dinner- 2010

Here are the rest of our Christmas Day pictures, similar to Thanksgiving, I didn't make a conscious effort to take any pictures, but thank you to all of you who did!  We all really enjoyed ourselves.  I think the boys were a bit overwhelmed by the day, but they did very well considering:) Uncle J-me- as you can see, they really enjoy their "3-D couch".  

Christmas Eve/Morning- 2010

This year we had a nice, low-key Christmas.  I had to work for a few hours on Christmas eve.  By the time I got home and Noah had developed a fever and an upset stomach.  Needless to say, we didn't make it to church, but he was feeling well enough to put out some cookies for Santa.  Basically everyone has been sick with some degree of fever, vomiting, diarrhea, etc. for over a week, but I think we are all finally on the mend.  Christmas morning was very exciting this year.   Noah really understood and was genuinely excited for Santa coming and Baby Jesus's birthday... James was just excited b/c Noah was:)  Santa brought a drum with a drum stick and a cooking set for the boys.  James may have been most excited about sneaking the left over cookies from Santa's plate.  As you can see, they were both very spoiled with lots of wonderful gifts. 

First Snowman of the Season!

The kids and I had a very fun "snow day" on Tuesday.  It is days like this that I really wish I could be home with them everyday.  We went outside and had perfect "snowman snow".  Noah was really good at rolling the snowman and James was good at being patient and packing the snow down.  The snowman only lasted for a few hours before the rain caused it to fall over, but fun none the less.  James was so excited about looking at it out the window that even now when we ask him to show us the snowman he gets very excited and runs over to the window pointing and making an "ohohohoh" sound. We came back in for lunch and had a fun time vacuuming/playing on the couch. They love playing together, especially things where they get to jump on the furniture... 

Oh, Pelkey family... thank you so much for the Buzz and Woody figurines.  They play with them CONTINUOUSLY... James has even figured out how to push both buttons at once so we hear all of the sayings in rapid fire and simultaneously... over and over and over:)

Pre-Christmas Trip North

Christmas never seems to work out for us being up north for the holiday.  This year Gabe has 5 days off during Christmas, but I have to work 3 of those 5 days.  So, we made a pre-christmas trip north last weekend and had a great time visiting friends and family.  It was a full weekend, and it took us a few days to recover, but it was well worth it!  On the first day we stayed at Grammie & Grampie Civiello's where Noah and James really enjoyed playing with Stella (the dog) and "ice skating". The next day with spent at Nanny & Grampa's house and got to visit with lots of family, including baby Dennis, aka Trey, who is VERY CUTE in his Santa outfit!  We also played a very fun game similar to 20 questions where you had to ask questions to guess what was on your headband... Noah kept giving the answers away (which is why everyone is laughing in this last picture.  The highlights of both days were probably the good food and both kids loved all of the Christmas tree ornaments!  Thanks to all of our family who made the trip and effort to see us!!

Noah's Christmas Sing-A-Long- 2010

Last Friday Noah had his Christmas sing-a-long at preschool.  He was very excited to sing on the stage and did a great job singing loudly.  He favorite part though, was the "picnic" we had afterwards of fruit punch, brownies, cookies, "roll-ups", and the "veggie tray with tomatoes" that he brought.