White Christmas in MN

After a shuttle ride from uncle Aaron to the airport (Thanks, Aaron!) we flew out of PDX at 3:00 on Sunday afternoon. Luckily, Ben's nap coincided with the flight time - he slept most of the flight, while Andy and I got to watch a movie on our new little DVD player. We got in to MN, picked up a rental car, found some fast-food dinner and were on our way "up north". Ben fell asleep pretty quickly, and we got to grandma and grandpa's (a 3 1/2 hour drive) at about 1:15AM. Ben woke up as I carried him inside so he got to play for an hour with the train table that grandpa had made and set up for him, then he went back to bed.

At that point there was very little snow, but the next day, we suited Ben up in a borrowed snow suit, and headed out to play in the snow.

We ended up getting a ton more snow in the next few days - maybe about a foot and a half or so, which made for lots of shoveling and blowing but also some fun playing inside (decorating cookies)...

Mid-way thru cookie decorating, Ben discovered that he could lick up the extra sprinkles... We had a crazy-hyper baby that night!

Don't these 2 shirts just scream "Minnesotan"?

Winter Wonderland?

Uncle Brent and Aunt Patti arrived on Wednesday with their 3 month old baby, Nicholas. What fun to finally meet my baby nephew. He is a happy little guy who really likes his food - check out the cheeks on this kid! So cute!

Poor Nick was overdue for a nap...

After a big meal on Christmas Eve, we opened gifts - my goodness, we all got some very nice things... Ben had a blast carrying the gifts to the living room, and ripping open packages, and helping Nick open his gifts, too.
We headed back to Mpls to get together for "Stokes Year's Eve" on Sunday with my girlfriends from college - fun times! I don't have any pictures of the event, but we had a blast catching up with my good friends and watching the kids go crazy with all of the toys and open space in the basement.

All in all a great visit. Ben had fun and was very well-behaved and adaptable the entire trip. He also had a "language explosion" while we were there. Here is a partial list of some of the new words:

ham: ahhh-mm

snow: snow

gas: gassss

hummingbird: said one time very clearly

up: up

down: down

pie: pa-eeeeeee?

Patti: Pa-teeee

The flight back also went OK - Ben watched a little Madagascar on the DVD player, took an hour nap, and played nicely with some books and snuggled with mom and dad. Another shuttle ride from Andy's dad (thanks, Tom!) and we were back home!

In the airport, Ben liked pointing out all of the "owie chairs" (wheelchairs) that were strewn about the concourses. (I called them 'chairs for people who have owies on their legs' in the Portland airport, and Ben remembered this upon our return to the airport - and said "owie" or "owie sair" each time we saw one - this kid is quick!)

We still have some belated Christmas celebrations left to do with Andy's family over the next 2 weekends - looking forward to seeing everyone!

Christmas at Home

Before we left for MN, we had our own little celebration here (on Saturday, December 19th). Ben was pretty excited to open his gifts! The first one he opened was a shopping cart. He was watched daddy put a few screws in it, then ran to the other room and came back with his little kid-drill and screwdriver to help daddy out... Too cute!
I think he played with the first gift for 20 minutes before we even got to the next one... He also got a little guitar that plays some great tunes like "Message in a Bottle" by the Police and "Love Shack" by the B-52's - it even has a whammy bar.
We spent Saturday playing with new toys, relaxing and packing for the trip to MN.

Dapper, dontcha think?

Little boys look so grown up in sweater vests, don't they?

We had a very nice time at Andy's family gathering - great food, great company, great hosts (thanks Charlie and Debbie!)

Fun with grandma!

We took a few of the 3 of us together. I couldn't find one where we all look good, so I picked this one to share, because at least my boys look great.

We are getting geared up for the visit back to MN - just 4 days left of school... Let the list making begin... Just to show you how obsessively "planner" I can be - here is a list of the separate lists that I will be probably be making (or already have):

1. Things to pack for Ben

2. Things to pack for A/J (remember gloves and hats this time - Hello!)

3. Gifts to bring

4. Things to do before leaving - garbage, bills, water the plants, stop the mail, etc.

5. Things to bring in carry on

6. Locations of all of the lists... :)

Look, daddy - this is THE one!

We did a bunch of shopping this weekend, and picked out the most perfect little tree and got it up and decorated.

Right here daddy - this is the THE one!

Doesn't he look so tiny next to the 12 footers?

Ben loves looking and pointing at all of the ornaments (so far, anyway, none have turned into toys). We got some of the new LED lights for the tree - finally getting rid of the old college room Christmas lights that I've had since pre-1994... Ahhh, the memories.

Oh, and yes, we've been elfed again - country-style this year.

Oh, and Ben had his 18 month appt on Thursday - right on about 50th% again for head, weight and length - I don't have the numbers in front of me. We have one happy, healthy baby (er, toddler??) boy, that's for sure!

Fun times at the p-a-r-k

A clip of Ben practicing to sell foul calls (aka falling on purpose).

An another of fun times with daddy - trying to unstick their fingers from the sticky octopus tentacles in Matthew Van Fleet's Alphabet book.

We're starting to get into that cute mispronounciation stage. He seems to have forgotten some of his old favs, like bubble and purple and is working on other words latley. Right now it's:

Baby: Baaa-bee

Uh-oh: Uhh-ooo or sometimes Ahhh-oooo

Beep-beep: Bop-bop

Hi: Haaaaaeeeee (best said on the phone)

We had a great low-key Thanksgiving with Andy's family. Ben mostly ate green beans and pumpkin pie. We had a nice long weekend at home, finishing up some Christmas lights, doing some cleaning and the standard grocery and Target runs. We're gearing up for the trip back to MN in just 3 weeks... Can't wait!

Question for ya...

How cute am I?

I'll even help with the yard work: A little raking and...
watering the bushes...

and adding some "flair" (aka rocks) to the avocado pot.

Like my rain boots?

Jump, jump!

No pictures this week, but here is a clip of Ben "jumping" - arm motions and all... Wonder if he gets this from daddy's porch jumping escapades...

We had a nice weekend at home... We did venture out of the house on Saturday night to attend a play at a children's theater in Oregon City (Krayon Kids) - it was a fun variety show - musical numbers, some dialouge, dancing, and lots of activity. Ben did very well sitting still, watching and pointing at all of the neat things going on. After 1 1/2 hours of the show (starting at 7PM), there was an intermission which was already well past Ben's bedtime, so we opted to head out and miss the last part of the show... I think our little guy could have handled a bit more show, but we thought we'd better head out while we were ahead!

2 little videos

Singing "Twinkle, Twinkle..."

And trying to say "cock-a-doodle-doo"

Really, it's November already??

For Ben's second Halloween, he actually got to try his hand at the door-to-door trick or treating! He picked up on the idea pretty quickly. Well, his version anyway: OK - so you climb up the steps (on your hands and knees), then you knock on the door (or hope they have a doorbell, so you get to push the button), then you say say trick or treat (or some gibberish that sounds really cute), then you get to take some loot (or see how much you can get away with taking because you are so darn cute), and put it in your pumpkin bucket (that mommy and daddy will carry for you) then you move on to the next house and repeat. It only took him about 2 houses to catch on to the pattern.


Here is Ben "helping" to rake and haul leaves on Halloween.
Sunday, we went on an awesome hike for kids in the Columbia River Gorge to Wahclella Falls with Andy's bud, Riad and kids Alex and Dylan. It was a beautiful autumn day in Oregon - It certainly didn't seem like November...