Merry Christmas

What a week! We had a wonderful and merry Christmas in our house, and hope all our friends and family did as well. Brian took almost the entire week off leading up to Christmas and my birthday. Matthew and Allison came in from Denver and spent over a week in town (they leave today, bummer) and Grandma spent a couple nights with us as well. We had lots of fun family time.

We made and decorated cookies and rice krispy treats. As well as a gingerbread house, which by the way would be condemned by the housing authority if they ever saw it. We looked at Christmas lights and played games, including Brian's new Band/Guitar Hero setup that Mom & Dad gave him for Christmas.

We did some last minute shopping at the mall, and I got absolutely nothing done. Carter played in the play area, rode on the carousel, rode the miniature train and jumped on the bungee trampoline. Check out the video ...

Christmas morning in the house was run as smoothly as can be expected with 2 little ones and 7 adults. Carter enjoyed passing out the gifts. He wanted to know who it came from and who it went to every time. We had a lot of gifts, but savored opening them all. I think the last present was opened sometime around 1:00 that afternoon, after starting at around 7:30. Actually, I ended up putting a couple presents back in my closet to pull out for their birthdays which are in a week and a half. Santa brought Carter exactly what he asked for "an airplane with people inside." And Cole got an electronic rocker that turns into a riding toy. They also got several other fun toys, a wooden parking garage, trash truck, books, nice play food and several other things that have now caused me to purge, store and donate old and unused toys from our playroom. I've got a bit of the spring cleaning bug.

Here is Cole climbing on the presents, surprisingly it was one of his :)


Carter is showing off his reindeer antlers we made from foam cutouts.

The condemned gingerbread house. We weren't even done decorating it when the walls started caving in.

Cole now has two teeth on bottom and they are really bothering him. Popsicles seem to work, especially when he sees that Carter has one :) This child wants everything that Carter has.

Carter had his Christmas party at school and I went and helped set up ahead of time. He's sitting by Kassie, his absolute best friend at school.

Here he is hugging Mrs. Hewitt goodbye.

The cookies that we decorated on my birthday. They were covered in sprinkles.

Daddy's rice krispy treats were a hit and also fun to decorate.

Here is Cole on his toy from Santa. Please ignore the half decorated tree. I stopped putting the ribbon and ornaments back on after the two boys and cat kept taking them off.

Carter just saw his airplane from Santa.

Here he is opening his trash truck from Nan and PeePaw. The next morning our trash pile was enormous. Fortunately our trash came the next day and Carter took his truck out to show the trash man.

Carter and his circular saw.

Cole playing with his musical jungle. He loves anything where he can put balls in and watch them go around and come out.

Cole got his first monogrammed towel, it's an alligator. It was from Grandmama who gave Carter a monkey and dog towel over the last two years.

We all seem to have caught a cold. The boys had a minor one two weeks ago, but over the last couple days something else has hit the entire family. Grandma, my mom, Matthew and all four of us are battling a variety of yucky cold symptoms. I'm hoping we get over quickly.

I never got a family photo. Maybe I'll try and do that this coming weekend for New Years, or on their birthdays.

"I want to talk about Jesus"

Every night after Brian reads Carter some books and tucks him into bed, he always asks me to come in and sing him "one song". It's never just "one song" but that's okay. After our songs, I snuggle up with him and we talk about what he/we did that day and what we'll do tomorrow. Tonight I was telling him we were going to his Christmas party at school tomorrow. It was going to be a birthday party for Jesus. He said "I want to talk about Jesus." So I started telling him the story of how/when Jesus was born. I told him Jesus was born a long time ago and when he was born 3 wise men came to visit him and they brought him gifts. That's why we give gifts to each other at Christmas. He then said, "Did they buy their presents at Target?"

Oh I just about choked on my tongue. I tried so hard not to laugh. My face hurt so bad from smiling so big. It was the funniest, yet most endearing conversation we've had recently. I did get to finish the story. He wanted to know what presents Jesus got for his birthday. I told him Frankincense, Myrrh, and Gold. He said "I want to talk about Gold." And so our conversation took another turn.

We have little conversations like this all time. People say that the 3's are a rough stage, and while yes, he does utilize his free will, we are having so much fun talking and sharing together. He is such a sweet sweet little boy.

Snow and Santa

I'm sure you've all heard by now that Houston got some snow yesterday. It was our earliest snowfall since they've been recording weather. It was funny; Nan was in town on business and hung around a couple extra days and experienced her first snowfall of the season here instead of in Indiana. Here are some pictures of the snowfall. I have video, but I haven't watched any of yet. When I have some time I'll cut some of it and post it up here.

Cole was confined to his exersaucer outside. He's kinda over being in that thing now that he can crawl everywhere and pull up and cruise. But I didn't want the wet snow getting on his pants and feet, he'd freeze! He does enjoy the cold weather though. You can't see any snow falling in this picture. It had just started and was still pretty wet.

This was about 4:00 in the afternoon. We had two pretty decent downfalls during the day.

Brian and Carter made some snowballs and threw them at each other.

After we came inside, Carter found Daddy's after-ski-boots and my scarf. SO CUTE!

Today we went and visited Santa at Memorial City Mall. We got there at 9 only to find out Santa doesn't arrive until 10. So we shopped around until it was time to see Santa. Unfortunately during that time a line started and we ended up not getting out of there until 10:45. Cole was terrified of the white bearded man.

But Carter hung around to tell Santa "I want an airplane with people inside." We'll see if St. Nick obliges the little guy.

Thanksgiving

I was going to update the blog with pictures from our visit to Santa and our recent snow and then realized I hadn't even uploaded and updated on Thanksgiving. So here's that.

Brian, the boys and I drove to Oklahoma City to Brendon and Stacy's for Thanksgiving. Brian's parents drove in from Indiana, so all the Sheltons celebrated Turkey day together. It was so much fun to watch the boys (the little ones that is) play together. Cole was enamored with Brady, and Carter was enamored with all the animals. Brendy has 2 outdoor cats and Nan and PeePaw have 2 dogs they brought with them.

Birthdays, Birthdays and more Birthdays

My birthday gift budget is going to help the economy. We've been to at least 5 parties and missed a couple in the past few weeks. We had a blast at all of them though. And Carter keeps insisting that it's HIS birthday party we are going to and I keep telling him his birthday is in January and we will celebrate then. But on Wednesday when we went to Luke's party, he again said it was his birthday and I told him no and asked him when his birthday was. His reply, "On Tuesdays and Thursdays". Uh no, honey, that's when you go to school :)

Another fun thing we did recently is enjoy a trip from Brian's mom. She came down for almost week at the beginning of the month. Here she is with the boys before bedtime.


And on Dad's birthday, the 6th, we all went to Benihana's to celebrate. Dad picked the best place to take the boys. Carter had a BLAST. He didn't try, even once, to get out of his chair during dinner. That's one of our biggest battles these days.

They sang to Dad, Parker was embarrased I think :)

Here are some pictures from Luke's party. I'm waiting on a real cute one from Joanna that she took of Carter and Luke. I'll edit my post once I get it from her.

Cole joined in the festivities as well. Here he is chowing down on a cupcake. At Grant's party last Saturday he ate a chocolate cupcake. And at Carter's friend, Madison's party he ate an entire piece of chocolate cake. I would NEVER have allowed Carter to eat all that sugar before he was 1. But hey, your rules get much more relaxed with number 2 :)

The boys are doing well these days. We're staying busy, as you can assume with all the parties. Cole is on the move big time. He's even pulling up to a standing position on his own now. I put him down to play with some toys in the living room while I was doing laundry and then a few minutes later I heard banging on what sounded like the table in the playroom. I thought, no way, he can't stand yet. But alas, this is what I found when I walked in the room. Cole had crawled in there and pulled himself up to stand at the table.

He loves his new found freedom, as does Carter. They play really well together. Yes, Carter gets frustrated every now and then when Cole takes a toy he was playing with. But overall, they really do enjoy each others company. I have the cutest video of them playing chase around the kitchen island. But since they had just got out of the tub, and are naked - it is obviously inappropriate for the Internet. Guess those that are interested will have to come over and see it person.

Carter continues to enjoy school. They have off next week for Thanksgiving, but celebrated this past Thursday. He came home with a turkey painted handprint, a colorful pasta necklace and an Indian headband.

Big weekend

Boy did we have a big busy weekend. In the past 4 or 5 days I've taken over 200 pictures. Cole was baptized on Saturday morning. Our friend, Danny, who is a pastor in Mansfield came down with his wife, Sarah, and did the baptism for us. It was intimate and special. We did it in our backyard and had a brunch to follow. Here are some pictures from that.





Rev. Danny Anderson and his wife, Sarah Anderson with Cole.

A full length photo of his gown. It was the same one Carter was baptized in. I hope to keep it in the family as an heirloom, it sure has the quality for it. I had Carter's full name and baptism date embroidered on the slip back in 2007 and will do the same for Cole.

Cole and Grandpa

Grandmama with her 3 great-grandsons.

Erica and her boyfriend, Jake, came in from St. Louis. He coincidentally had a CPE course in town and they stayed for the ceremony. Too bad he's blinking in this picture, otherwise it would have been a good one. Sorry Jake!

I like this picture not only because Sarah and Cole are in it, but Carter actually took it. He insisted "I do it on my own" and indeed he did.

On Friday night we went to the Fall Festival at church. They did such a great job. There were so many games that were age appropriate and the boys had a blast. Here they are dressed up in their costumes. Brian has on one of his shirts from when he was in the Navy. It was a little tight, so he didn't wear it all night.

Grandpa volunteered for parking lot duty; that's his uniform not his costume :)

Here is Carter fishing for lollipops.

Here is Carter at the bean bag toss. He got two out of three in the hole. Great job!

Cole is getting a duck out of the pond. It has a number on it, and you exchange it for some candy or prizes. He got a lollipop - the only kind of candy I'll let him have.

Here's Carter on the play castle inside the Kingdom Club (that's the area they call the Nursery). It's there year round and he loves it.

This was Cole's favorite room and Carter's second favorite. There were bubbles everywhere and they could pop them with pool noodles, so creative.

And this was Carter's favorite. They had a preschool room emptied and filled with balloons that they hit around with blow up bats. We spent alot of time in that room.

The ring toss. Yea, he got pretty close but thats okay.

And the bowling game.

And last week we went to Awbrey's 3rd birthday party. It was a princess party and all the girls got dressed up in their princess dresses. So I went and found a King's costume for Carter. Cole just wore a crown, I didn't think he'd enjoy, nor keep on, a costume.

Here is Carter and his friend Luke, the only other boy at the party besides mine.