Merry Christmas(es)

Christmas #1 (Christmas Eve morning) was a small affair at the house, involving a couple of presents for the kids and cinnamon rolls. The kids were beside themselves with excitement! They had no clue just how much more there was going to be to Christmas this year. They ran around excitedly all morning, playing with their toys. We celebrated on the 24th since Kip had to work the 25th.









That afternoon, we had Christmas #2 - which involved Andrew, Heather, Sarah, Dennis, cool presents,



and a tasty meal.


Christmas #3 was at Great Grandma Beatty's house with Grandma and Grandpa Weber and Aunt Jackie. Jack was a little overwhelmed at this point, glommed on to the first present he opened, and refused to look at anything else. That was his m.o. for the rest of our gatherings. He gets so engaged with that first or second toy, he has little interest in seeing anything else. Those who witnessed this will be happy to know that he is now excitedly re-discovering all of the things he didn't want to acknowledge at first.






Kip tried to hide behind the camera. He was successful, for the most part.


Christmas #4 was Christmas day, and involved spinning and dinner at the fire station. By this point, the camera was coming out less and less.


Christmases #5 (Mom's condo) and #6 (Kip's brother's house) were, sadly, undocumented. There's still a 7th get-together in the works, so maybe we'll remember the camera this time.

All in all, it was a wonderful Christmas season. We all got more than we could possibly desire, thanks to everyone's generosity. The children will be discovering the toys they haven't played with yet for weeks to come. Everyone got what they wanted - even Cinderella got her prince:



(Kudos to the designers of Prince Charming - he's amazingly well articulated.)

Subdivided pictures

This one's for Tom and John. For those of you who don't know, my brothers created this cool software for creating 3D images. The pictures that Kyra's been drawing lately remind me, in a very basic way, of the method of dividing and subdividing to create an image. She starts with a large outer shape and breaks up the space to make a picture, then she'll add more lines to build out. Sometimes the pictures turn into flowers or spider webs, or just shape creatures with a smiley face:



Sometimes she colors in the spaces:


Other times, she draws more typical pictures. Here's Kyra (on the left) and Jack:


They have a great relationship. Kyra is constantly wanting to teach Jack how to do things, and when not doing that, they chase each other around the house while giggling. There are sharing issues (see picture below of the two 'happily' sharing Dad's chair), but for the most part they really do enjoy each other - and for that, I am grateful and lucky.

In unrelated cute news, Jack doesn't just say 'yes' anymore. Now the yes is accompanied by a jump. A clumsy, belabored jump with a long drawn out yes.

Good Morning

Can you tell which one of our kids isn't a morning person?

Educational T.V.

Every once in a while, Jack will find his lovey and his blankie and curl up on the floor with them to watch a show. His favorite shows are Caillou, Little People, Kipper the Dog, and Little Einsteins. Last night I found him in watching mode:



And what was it that captured his attention, to the point that he didn't even notice that I had the camera out?

BBC World News.

I'm convinced that half of the Super Nanny's sway over children has to do with her English accent.

The Christmas tree is finished...

It looks better in real life, I'm having trouble getting the color balance correct. I really should break down and buy photoshop one of these days! There's only so much Picasa can do.

'They say it's your birthday'

It's my birthday too, yeah!
They say it's your birthday -
We're gonna have a good time.
I'm glad it's your birthday -
Happy Birthday to ya!

Ok, so I'm not exactly 'going to a party party', seeing as I just fought off a migraine, the house is a colossal disaster, I only got maybe 4 hours of sleep, Kip is at the fire station till tomorrow morning, Jack is sick and Kyra's still recovering from it, and we're expecting a 'cold' winter storm today. But it is the perfect set-up for ordering in all the pizza and thai food my heart could desire and going on an on-line shopping spree with coveted birthday money!!! Thanks, mom and dad! For the yet to be purchased, take advantage of holiday pricing and free shipping gift, and for bringing me into the world.

Oh, and tomorrow I'll be 24 weeks along. That's my favorite pregnancy milestone - viability. This little guy *could* survive if he were to make a really early entrance into the world. Stay in there, little guy. I love you, but I don't want to share a birthday. No offense. We don't have a name for you yet. But here are some of the contenders:

Ethan
Rourke
Isaac
Miles
Luca
Ansel

And here's a picture of me and the little guy to mark this milestone for both of us: