Its beginning to look a lot like christmas

Saturday after we got home we put up our Christmas tree. Colin really got into decorating this year and carefully placed his ornaments.The tree is a little bottom heavy with ornaments and they get moved constantly as Colin keeps playing with them all.  He really likes the nativity set and its fun seeing him play with the wise men and baby Jesus. Colin woke up the next morning and told me it was going to be a really fun day and I asked him why and he said "Santa came last night" so he's a little confused as to how it all works and thinks that Jesus has a really long birthday party (what he told me today) and he wants to know if he can have his birthday party just as long.  ha!  Joel loves sitting under our tree and looking at all the lights and wants to just eat the ornaments.  I remember being little and just sitting near the tree just looking at all the lights and ornaments.  Colin and Joel both like sitting next to (or under the tree) So fun.

I tried to get a picture of the boys and I in front of the tree but self portraits are hard - esp when they love looking at the tree

 

Sunday night we went to the Founders Inn Illumination.  Julie, Eli and Jasper came and so did our friend Sarah. According to the website and brochure there was going to be a lot of stuff going on.  It sounded really fun and very family friendly.  Ha nope! There were crowds of people and the lines for everything was really long. I think it was over an hour wait for the free carriage rides and the face painting was just as long.  So we all went out to the courtyard to wait for the lights while Brent and Colin stayed inside to listen to the Christmas Story. Colin wanted to stay and listen and Brent said he went down with all the other kids next to Pat Robertson to hear the story. (I had the camera - i wish brent had gotten a picture) Pat Robertson asked a few questions and then Brent said he opened up his bible and read mabye 2 sentences and then was done.  It lasted all of 5 minutes.  So they came and joined us outside where Colin and Jasper were crying and Eli might have been crying too.  It was dark and you couldn't see and there were tons of people. Then Pat Robertson came out on this balcony (where they had an orchestra that no one could hear) and we counted down from 10 and then they turned the lights on.  Then everyone went home.  Not too exciting and next year we'll just go on another night and walk around the courtyard.  The kids were disappointed since I think we had talked it up but it was still good to get out of the house.

The real deal

 This morning we stopped by Southern States in Louisa to see Santa.  My mom and I took Colin to see this same Santa when he was 6 months old and he is the real deal.  Its great. He takes his time and lets the kids get used to him and really listens to the kids.  A lot of people brought their dogs and cats too to get pictures of Santa.  You can buy their professional pictures or use your own digital camera for free. So we used ours and got about 30 pictures.  You never know with kids so I kept snapping away and Santa kept telling me to take pictures so I listened to Santa!   And I love the progression of Colin and Santa.  At first he was super excited to go see Santa and then got nervous and just wanted to stand there and then Santa slowly coaxed him closer and closer until he was sitting on his lap.   Colin told Santa he wanted a blue flashlight for Christmas.  3 blue flashlights.  Thats easy enough.  I was curious what he was going to say since he has a notebook in his room that he writes his christmas list in and only he can read it!  As we were leaving Brent told me that he was glad we waited in line to see Santa (at first he was trying to talk Colin into just driving home and skipping Santa) but Brent is now a fan of the Southern States Santa. Joel loved him from the beginning.

Thanksgiving

We just got back from a wonderful Thanksgiving at my grandparents farm.  Colin and Joel both had so much fun. (And so did Brent and I) We love the farm.  And my family. Colin loved hiking through the woods and he told me when we prayed at night each night that he wanted to thank Jesus for the creek.  My dad took Colin on a walk to the creek to look for lions and then I think he went twice with everyone after that. Its always a fun walk down to the creek and I don't think we've ever been there and not gone down the path.  Brents dad joined us thanksgiving day and then on Friday my uncle David brought my cousins Capers and William as well as my cousin Cindy and her boys, Michael and Sam.  Colin thought Sam was so cool and just wanted to do anything he did. And somehow Colin convinced Sam to pull him around the yard with the wagon for a while.  Sam came in and said he was exhausted.  Ant Ant fed Colin chocolate pieces all weekend and my dad taught Colin to spray the whipping cream into his mouth!   Colin made Ant Ant sleep in the same room as Joel, Colin and I and Brent lucked out with a room by himself! Not sure if Ant Ant liked that but hopefuly she was able to get some sleep.   Mary and Sarah made pilgrim and Indian hats for us all to wear which was really fun.  Joel entertained everyone and smiled and giggled the whole time.  He loved all the attention.  And is even close to crawling.  He scooted in a circle several times and woudl smile at everyone. Not sure I'm ready for a 4 month old crawler though.  We need to start baby proofing.  It was a great relaxing Thanksgiving. I have such a fun family.

 

Friends from Abroad

The past week or so we have been having fun with some friends from Hungary.  Julie went to college with Brent and came on staff with Campus Crusade with Brent maybe 10 or so years ago and is now in Hungary working with their high school student ministry.  I remember once at our friend Lisa's wedding Brent pointed out Julie and whispered in awe "there's Julie" and then I don't think we were able to talk to her since we had to leave the reception early for a staff conference.  ha! and she's every bit as great as Brent said.  She and her husband have two boys - Eli (5) and Jasper (2) who are both just so sweet and cute.  They are here for the holidays and we are blessed to have Julie's dad living close to us.  Which means more time to play with us.  Colin is just in awe of Eli. When a 5 year old thinks you are cool and wants to be your friend then its pretty amazing.  Its been fun getting to know Julie better and I wish they lived closer.  Its always so encouraging to be around Julie.  I have a feeling we'll have to go fly over to Hungary one of these days and visit.  In fact Colin keeps asking where Eli and Jasper live and if he can go fly on an airplane and go to their house. We are going to be so sad when they leave.

 

When I grow up

Colin will tell you when he grows up he wants to be an astronaut. He loves his outer space books and can tell you random facts about all the planets.  I've been wanting to take him to the Air and Space Museum so on Friday we went. I had never been to the new building - I had only gone when it was at NASA and we'd go visit my dad for lunch.  So I was excited to check it out.  I had read that there was an exhibit open where you could try on a space suit and touch a moon rock...only when I asked about it the person at the front desk didn't know anything about it.  I just looked at the website and it was this weekend - the whole exhibit was open but the actual space suit demo was sat and sun. OH well.  Colin had a great time and it was the perfect time to go.  There was maybe 20 people in the whole museum so we got to take our time and Colin fell in love with this airplane they had. It was the whole airplane and Colin had fun sitting in all the seats and really loved playing in the cockpit. We played in that cockpit for HOURS.  At least 2. And since we had the whole place to himself he just played and pretended to fly us everywhere.  I tried not to think about all the kids whose hands have touched the levers and buttons and kepts sanitizing the boys hands.

I think if he was a little older the museum would be perfect because they have so many neat hands on exhibits. But the velocity of the wind and all those factors are lost on him. He just liked to push the buttons and make the wind tunnels go. 

Joel woke up a little afraid of where he was.  He woke up when we were in the Mars exhibit!   He wasn't to sure about where he was but he also loved the airplane cockpit and wanted to touch everything. Colin loved telling his little brother all about the airplane and planets hanging from the ceiling.

It was fun and I'm sure we will go back, especially when the boys get older.

The joy of fall

Thankful

This morning I was in the kitchen cleaning up after breakfast (joel is the messiest eater as he likes to grab the spoon and try to feed himself. Everything usually needs to be wiped down afterwards) But Colin was in the other room watching tv and one of the commercials between shows asked "what are YOU thankful for?"  And Colin very sweetly said to the tv "ME MOMMY!!"  After I wiped the tears from my eyes I left the messy kitchen and snuggled with my big boy on the couch while Joel napped. 

This little guy can be so serious one minute and then giggling the next.

I just love him!

Us construction guys

We survived the Nor'easter we just had.  We now have a lake in our backyard and lost power for 25 hours but overall it wasn't bad.  And the best part is that our swing that my dad and I build never budged even during the 60mph winds!  Anyone want to hire us to build a swing set?  ha!  We just a lot of mess to clean up.  I am glad we got our big tree trimmed this summer :)  Brent had a few days off due to the rain and removed a wall and tried to fix a clog in our drain pipe from the washer. The clog is still there despite his attempts and Rod graciously came over in the middle of the wind and rain to help.  They are going to attempt it again tomorrow and think it could be tree roots in our drain.  But Brent and Colin removed the damaged wall and half of it is back up tonight and looks really good.  You're not goign to be able to tell there was any damage once we paint it.  I'm excited about having an excuse to paint the room since I wasn't always crazy about the paint color when we moved in.  That'll take a few nights after the kids go to bed.

Ready for demolition

 Inspecting the damage

This makes me laugh since it looks like Brent is smelling the insulation.  Dont worry he wore a mask for most of it.

My mom came by this morning and brought my bead completers to work on and had fun playing with the boys.  Joel really wanted to look at  eat this book.  Its a spider man letter book and Colin told Mama-maa that he beat spider man in a race and that makes him a super hero too.  

Food

Today was a rainy, windy day. Brent was off work which was good because we realized Sunday night we have major water damage behind our washer. The drain pipe is clogged and leaked under the drywall in the garage and also the wall behind it to our backroom. We need a new wall and we'll see about new carpet - depending if we can dry this out and get it cleaned.  So we were busy trying to figure out how to fix the mess.

I made cookies and let Colin frost and decorate them.  He had a blast and did a pretty good job.  I was in the other room and Brent told me to come in the kitchen and look.  Colin had decided to dump all the sprinkles on the table and was rapidly shoving the pure sugar into his mouth as fast as he could. 

Joel has decided what is good enough for us to eat must be good enough for him.  He would rather eat our food than the rice cereal we've started giving to him.  He knows there is a difference.  And he's fast.  You have to watch him or he easily succeeds. 

So Colin ate sprinkles for lunch and Joel had spaghetti for dinner.  Maybe we'll balance it out tomorrow...

Playing together

Tot Trot

This post will have a lot of pictures but I think the pictures tell the story so much better.  Yesterday we went to watch Colin in his first race.  He loves to race us around the yard and wanted to run in a real race.  He kept asking so I signed him up for a tot trot.  Kids 6 & Under ran 100 yard dash.  I wasn't sure he was ready for a kids mile run yet.  Colin was so excited he almost didnt sleep the night before.

When he got to the starting line he started to get a little nervous.  I love how the big kid next to him is sizing him up.

If you notice - Colin is looking at SpiderMan.He was running in the race too with the kids.

The big kid is still sizing him up. (Colin beat this kid by the way)

The race was really disorganized. They were still getting the kids lined up and ready when the dj said 1 minute to go. Well a kid heard Go and took off so the rest of the kids started running too.  Colin was still at the starting line waiting for them to say "ready set go" until I told him to run

 

He really does love to run. 

And if you notice Colin is now in SECOND place.  He had come from that far behind to almost win.  If it was any longer I think he could've taken the big boy in blue :)  He freaked out at the end because he didn't see Brent and ran back to me crying because all the people at the end cheering yelling at the kids scared him.  He was also disappointed he didn't get first place but when we told him he beat spiderman all was better.  Because you must be a fast runner if you can beat a superhero like spiderman.

  Telling Joel he beat Spiderman.  Joel was very impressed!

Ant Ant came to watch and cheer on her favorite little runner.  Colin and Joel are both sad she had to go back home this morning.

The best family picture we can get for now

It was a great morning and the after race party was amazing. All the food you could eat.  And there was crab cakes, macaroni grill food, cookies, donuts, shrimp salad, barbeque,PF changs,  you name it they had it.  Colin loved all the chocolate chip cookies and chocolate donuts. Brent just ate :) We might have even convinced Brent to run a 10K with us in the spring! he wants to do it just for the food. Colin wants to run another race and I'm glad.  I wanted him to have a good experience and I also think that coming in second was good for him to learn he doesn't always win.  Even though there's not doubt if he had started with everyone he would've won.  Thats my boy!  Keep it up and we'll be looking at a free ride to college with his scholarships!