Holiday Fun at Pullen Park

Last night we took Lucas to Pullen Park - for the first time ever they decorated it with Christmas lights and had a Santa there for pictures. You can't tell from Lucas's expression in these pictures, but he really enjoyed it.

Dad double knotting those little Keds.

"Wait, something looks different about this park. I've never been here at night!"

Lucas on the carousel with Jeff. We asked him which animal he wanted to ride and he snorted like a pig. Lucas, can we get a smile?

Oh wait, I see a little smile! Too bad the jacket was covering up his little grin.

"It was fun when it first started, now I'm bored with it. Can we ride the train next?"

One thing they had that they don't usually have is arts and crafts - or gingerbread houses. Here is Jeff pretending to build a house with Lucas. Lucas kept eating the supplies and it kept falling apart, so they aborted the mission pretty quickly.

The best thing about last night was that we got the Santa picture out of the way! Now we don't have to stand in line at the mall - thank goodness. Jeff and I knew that Lucas wouldn't want to sit in Santa's lap, but I thought we would try. When it was our turn I tried to sit Lucas in his lap and he whined and clung to me. Santa told me that kids Lucas's age don't usually cooperate, kind of like, "Hint-hint... let's keep this thing moving lady." So we both sat down and they quickly snapped this shot. I'll take it.

The other great thing about last night was that Lucas saw Katrin and she convinced him to ride the boats with her! This was his third try - the first two ended after one lap. Katrin told him before the ride that "it was okay". I had to run around in a circle so that Lucas was never more than a few feet away from me, and he protested during the middle of the ride, but he did indeed finish. He even gave us a little smile :)

"Lucas, it's okay."

Fun with Frosty

I haven't been into Christmas like I am this year since I was about 8 years old. Lucas is making it fun for me because every time he sees lights he says "whoa-owwwww!" And, he really digs Frosty. Jeff is being nice to tolerate the radio station that plays non-stop Christmas music that I've had on in the kitchen since Thanksgiving Day. We've decorated for Christmas - except for the tree. My grandmother was obsessed with snowmen, and since she gave me most of our decorations, we have tons of Frosty the Snowmen in our house. I've almost learned all the verses to the song since we sing it 89 times a day. Lucas can't say Frosty - he calls him mee-mee. He sometimes gets the tune right -"mee mee me me mee"...

Oh yeah, we have singing snowmen from Hallmark from the past several years. Lucas loves to turn them on and then start dancing. Here he is doing that...

Tyson

When Tyson was our only baby we treated him like an actual baby. We brushed his teeth almost every day, we took him on daily walks and exciting outings, and we kept him well groomed. We don't love him any less that Lucas is here, but there is definitely not as much time to dote over him. The good side, however, is that he is hardly ever alone anymore. We used to go into work and leave him alone 8 hours a day (well, actually we came home to eat lunch with him), but now that I work from home he has almost constant companionship. While I'm working during the day he is usually laying at my feet curled up in a ball asleep. He's a champion sleeper. If anyone in the house is asleep, he prefers to be right next to them. And unlike most dogs, he likes to sleep in. Today he stayed in bed an hour after we got up and didn't wake up until he heard Lucas get up. I'm not sure how he feels about Lucas. It may be a love/hate relationship. Lucas bugs the you-know-what out of him. Constantly putting toys in his face or playing with his dog food. Tyson, however, insists on being involved in the bedtime routine and would stay next to Lucas all night if we'd let him. Tyson was long overdue for a haircut - he could hardly see. Here he is in a before and after shot...

Before

After (a kiss from Lucas).

The Crib is Gone!

Thank goodness. We should have put it away a long time ago. The Friday before Thanksgiving, after a few nights with little sleep, I decided that the crib was a jinx and it had to go. I figured that things couldn't get any worse than Lucas waking up every 2-3 hours, and at the very least I'd sleep better when I went to him in the middle of the night.

The first few nights we put the crib mattress on the floor and surrounded it with blankets and pillows. His sleep patterns stayed the same, but at least I wasn't climbing in and out of the crib anymore. A couple of nights ago we moved the twin mattress down to his room and it is wonderful. The mattess is SO comfortable. Last night Lucas slept from 9:30pm-2:30am, which is a long stretch for him. I don't know who likes the new setup more - Lucas or Tyson.

The boys on the crib mattress.

Lucas waving to the camera - showing off his new bed.

Both boys snoozing last night.

What we've been up to...

Yikes! I can't believe that I have let one week and two days go by without making a post. What a slacker. We've had a busy nine days, as I'm sure most of you have. Today is Sunday. Last Monday we got a new addition to our neighborhood - a little guy named William Finn (Finn). I was so excited during the last week before his arrival. It brought back memories of how exciting it was when we were waiting on Lucas. I have the baby bug again, but then there are moments when I wonder how it would be physically possible to be pregnant and still get up so often with Lucas during the night...

On Tuesday Dennis (Grandpa) arrived. We couldn't get all of Jeff's family to Raleigh, so Sandy (SaSa) went to Atlanta to spend time with Scott. Dennis's sisters and their families were coming to Raleigh, so it was like a small family reunion for them this week.

Wednesday night we went to Mike, Jill, Max and Ben's house for dinner. Everyone else arrived that evening, so there was a lot of catching up (and wine). Thursday was Thanksgiving at their house and Friday night was pizza at our house (and wine). You'd think we'd all have been sick of each other, but we went to Mike and Jill's house again on Saturday night.

Today was a really great day of catching up on house stuff and decorating for Christmas (yay!).

So that is the gist of what we've been up to as a family. Now, what has Lucas been up to...?

First Haircut

On November 5th we cut a wee, little piece of hair off of his left side. It was sticking straight out and was a lot longer than the other side. We didn't touch the front or the back...

Then on November 14th we cut a little bit more off of the sides. We were so glad we did this ourselves and didn't pay the salon $16.50. You can hardly tell, but it does look better.

Showers Followed by Veggies

Lucas went through a phase for a couple of weeks where he didn't care for the bath, but tolerated the shower. This was actually easier because he just got in with Jeff or me. He would wail, however, when we turned off the water. We told him that there is a water shortage, but he didn't care. Tonight he took a bath and played with the bath toys that his Grandpa gave him, so we'll see where this goes...

I love the way Lucas's hair looks after a shower.

Lucas dinner one night. He's still a big fan of veggies, but as far as fruit goes, he'll only eat bananas and apples. Tonight I made strawberry smoothies for dinner and he drank about 1/4 cup, so maybe I'll try to make more of those...

Temper

Lucas continues to show us his temper. He gets the most mad when we take something away from him or tell him that he can't have something. These are shots of him after we told him that he couldn't go outside (it was dark and cold and he wasn't dressed). There is usually a lot of loud crying and tears, but it only lasts a minute or two. A few times we've caught him looking up to make sure we were still looking at him : )

Mommy's Purse is Fun

Lucas has two piggy banks in his room - a pig and a dog (that was min when I was little). He loves to put money in their slots. He knows that I have change in my purse and the other day I caught the little bandit in action...

When he couldn't find any change he settled for the plastic...

Mama's Sweet Boy

For a while we had a strict bedtime routine of bath, stories, etc. Sometimes we'd spend a couple of hours on this routine, so when Lucas went on this bath strike we decided to loosen up and just let him tell us when he was ready for bed. It turns out that the routine didn't do much for us. We could spend two hours reading stories or doing nothing of the sort and Lucas would still ask to go night-night around 9pm. Either way he's up several times during the night. Anyway, on this particular night about a week ago Lucas crawled into my arms and just fell asleep. He is not a cuddler, so it was a special night for me. It turns out that he had a slight fever. Whatever, I'll take it. I was so moved that I had Jeff take a few pictures of the sweet baby in my arms...

Red Bean Bag Chair

Santa is brining Lucas a bean bag chair this year. Santa's elves were setting it up one night after Lucas had gone to bed when the first baby of the house decided that it was HIS bean bag chair...

Happy Thanksgiving

Lucas sitting at the big boy table with Ben and Max and everyone enjoying Thanksgiving Dinner.

Mama's Thanksgiving Day

Ellie, Geri, Tanya and I decided to take Lucas, Max, Ben and Tyson on a walk while the turkey was cooking. About a quarter of a mile into a two mile walk around this beautiful lake Lucas decides that he's done with the stroller (see group shot below). I try to carry him, but of course he wanted down so that he could run around and explore (I don't blame him). I told everyone else to go ahead with the strollers and we'd be right behind them. Over an hour later we made it to the end of the trail. Lucas took advantage of the nice, fall weather and examined nearly every leaf and every stump along the way. He even took a few moments to lay on his back to get a better view of the colorful leaves on the trees before he was up and running again...

Backyard Buddies

Here is little Lucas striking up a conversation with our next door neighbor, Will. He and Tyson love to talk to him and the lady that lives behind us, Alberta. Sometimes Tyson will sit at the back fence and just look at Alberta's house... I guess he's hoping that she'll come out and talk to him. So Tyson prefers Alberta, but Lucas definitely prefers Will... or really any guy. If there is a man and a woman in the room, Lucas always initiates conversation with the man first. He'll take them a book or a toy, or ask them to pick him up. I think it's because he knows that the man will play rough with him... Jeff plays rougher with him than I do and he loves it. Will flips him in the air, Neil lifts him to touch the fan, Mark throws him in the air, etc. Lucas definitely loves adventure and doesn't have much fear. Good thing I'm not a scaredy... I think this is great and we have a lot of fun playing around.

"Mr. Will, are you out there?"

"Hello Mr. Will!"

"So, how's your day going?"

New Rocking Chairs

We have a long list of things that we need to get for our house. Rocking chairs probably shouldn't have been that high up on the list, but they were one of the least expensive items and they add so much to the front of the house. Next on the list is blinds.

Best buds.

Lucas's expression for all pictures these days...

"Will somebody please take me to get a haircut?"

Can you say?

Lucas's vocabulary is taking off. It's so cute to hear his voice as he experiments with new sounds. When he wakes up from a nap or in the morning we like to play a little game where we say, "Can you say ___?" The list of words that we go through are mama, dada, sasa, grandma, grandpa, truck, trash, witch, ball, uh-oh, bye-bye, tyson, moses, ty, mom, pop, and moon. We'll throw in a few new words each time and he'll try to pronounce those... sometimes it sounds like the word and sometimes it is mumbo-jumbo, but you can tell he's thinking about it. He'll really be into the game for about 10 words and then he'll show us the sign for "all done".

Christmas Wreaths

Our good friends, Sean and Rachel, have decided to adopt two children from Ethiopia. Sean was a fraternity brother of Jeff's at Georgia Tech and I got to know him well when we went on our study abroad trip in 1998 (also the trip where Jeff and I started dating). Sean met Rachel in grad school and they got married around the same time that we did. They are wonderful people and I admire them for helping the world by adopting two little babies that are in need of parents.

Adoption is very expensive. To help with the costs they are making and selling wreaths this Christmas. So if you were thinking of buying a wreath this Christmas, please consider buying one from them.

Visit http://www.bringourbabieshome.com/ to check out the wreaths, and if you'd like to follow them on their journey through adopting, visit http://www.kerriganadoptionstory.blogspot.com/.

Our Flight to Atlanta

We had such a great time when Ty and Jenn came to Raleigh that Lucas and I decided to fly spend a weekend at their house in Atlanta (actually almost an hour south of Atlanta). Our little turkey did SO GREAT on the flight. We were lucky to get 3 seats to ourselves, so he could move around a lot. I was planning on taking his carseat on the plane, but it didn't fit on the stroller and I couldn't figure out how to carry it through the terminal, so we checked it. Lucas was paying no attention to me checking in, but when he saw his carseat moving down the conveyor belt he completely freaked. He went running and crying up to the check in counter... big ole tears streaming down his cheeks. Jeff and I laughed - who knew he was so attached to it?

We had very nice people sitting behind us on the plane. Lucas had a ball playing peek-a-boo with them througout the flight. He started to get ancy the last 15 min our so. He told me so by doing the sign for "all-done". Luckily we were descending and I could show him the trucks down below. I hope the novelty hasn't worn off when we fly home on Monday....

Pretzels on the plane... and nuts, and water, and cookies as a back-up.

Peeking at the lady behind us.

Lucas made up a game of drinking from my water bottle and then letting the water run down his chin... whatever works!

Lucas is loving all of Ty's toys. His favorite is a school bus and Ty's favorite is a dump truck.
They are playing really well together.

"Ty, I'm the big cousin, so I get to push you."