The Holidays

Hot Cup was off work from Christmas Eve through the weekend after the New Year.  In the weeks prior our 3 year old had been saying "daddy no work, daddy play all day" every morning, and he loved all the playtime with daddy over the break.

Christmas Eve we visited Hot Cup's dad.  He doesn't really say anything but seemed to enjoy seeing his grandkids. They were a little more animated than this ... some of the time.


Christmas Eve we stayed the night at my parents'.  We had a little program that evening with the Christmas Story and we were each also supposed to share something.  I didn't really plan ahead with our preschooler to do anything because he doesn't like to perform for people.  But he did something!  Hot Cup suggested he count backwards and he did :)

Christmas morning:



Visiting with Hot Cup's family:


I didn't really take more pictures on Christmas, but we had a really fun time at my parents'. My baby sister and my oldest sister and her boyfriend were there too and we really enjoyed it!

2 new nativities. We got the first as a gift and I had our preschooler make the second.




The day after Christmas. They were playing with each others gifts and I thought it was funny & cute so I took a couple pictures.


We didn't get to it until after Christmas but we made goodies for our neighbors. Hot Cup made the chocolate chip covered oreos and the lime coconut jigglers, our preschooler (with dad's help) made the rice krispy treats, and I made the sugar cookies and mints.

My friend that I always borrowed cake decorating supplies from moved away (miss you!). So, my own supplies for Christmas + a Relief Society meeting on cookie decorating in November (thanks Ashley) = experimenting after Christmas!

Our baby loves to play with light switches. Whenever he sees them he begs to play with them. So Hot Cup made him one! He also loves wearing jackets and hats. Notice he's wearing 2 jackets in this picture. His big brother's red one under his camouflage one.

He loves his new very own light switch. But he also still loves all light switches.

We spent new years with our families at my parents' playing games. Before the boys went to bed we played a couple little kid games we got for Christmas - Roll & Play and I Can Do That, they were so much fun to play together. Our preschooler is getting so grown up.

Good morning and hello 2015.


My baby sister flew back to Utah on Saturday. But first we celebrated her birthday! Isn't she lovely?

December

Our baby has been more into hugs and kisses lately.  (Kisses are still mostly reserved for stuffed animals.)  Big brother gives them to daddy by the door before he leaves in the morning and baby has decided to join in for that goodbye. He's saying a few more things. Monkey noises (ah mm), cat sounds (meow), off (fff - used when he's asking to play with a light switch), and uh oh (though it's more hummed than spoken). He'll imitate lots of other sounds including elephant noises, dog pants, mommy, and daddy. If you ask him a yes or no question - shaking his head means no and a funny little laugh means yes. He loves to put stuff "away." When he hears me say "diaper" he lies down for me to change his. He's super attached to me, but at the same time he loves to check out other people, he'll walk right up to them to see what they're doing and/or to get a smile from them. At our ward Christmas party (and church in general) he did that a lot with adults, and he does it with kids when we have them over or something.  We're slowly transitioning to one nap.

Little Faker.


Big brother has had a big letters and numbers month. He'd already been into telling time, but this month he's really loved tracking every minute of the day. If he goes a while without telling us the time he likes to play catch up. He's very cooperative when he knows what time something will be. Like naptime and clean up time. And when he plays games on daddy's tablet we tell him what time he can play until and he stops and returns the tablet at that time. He can count over 100. And backwards from 100 too. He loves to play with the puzzle numbers and magnet numbers to make times and double digit numbers. We continue to use very simple addition where we can and he has fun with that.
Here's a clock we got him for Christmas. This model is out of production but Hot Cup found a used one online a couple months ago. You move the hands and then press the foot to open the eyes and see the time you set.

He's had a lot of progress in both writing and pronouncing letters this month. He says them very distinctly. He plays a lot with letters. We have magnets, a puzzle, baby rings, and 2 sets of foam letters. And it's a good thing because he often ends up needing them all in order to spell everything he wants to :)


The first pic is his writing at the beginning of the month (the first time I saw him write this :), and the second pic says the same thing as the first pic, but he written at the end of the month and much more legibly.


And here's a sampling of letters written on his new dry-erase Thomas the Tank Engine alphabet cards. (Thanks Santa ;)


He's saying new things and has favorite phrases. He says love. He tells us he loves us and that we love him. His favorite color is red and if there are color options he says "I just love red." He loves (Curious) George, of course. He says please. He says right now, not right now, and later. He says all day. He wants to play all day. He says "where are you?" - usually referring to a toy.

He went through a phase of never sleeping during naptime. One day I went to get him after naptime and he'd emptied the entire container of wipes onto his bed. I didn't get upset at all but I still didn't handle it right because I didn't ask him about it, so it wasn't until we went up for bedtime that night that he told us he'd cleaned his bed. Haha.

Must be Christmastime!


Little brother wants to color like his big brother, but hasn't quite figured it out.




In his PJs and with his train after The Polar Express preschool day.


Preschool Christmas Party


Grandma's birthday party!


This happens occasionally, running circles around the couch and laughing together for a long time ♥


My sister and her family came the week before Christmas and went back to their Utah home for Christmas. Thankfully they stayed with us a few days before going down to our parents'!


Both my boys wanted to give their baby cousin toys to play with. They would overwhelm him by bringing him everything.


We went to the temple visitor's center and my camera battery died after this shot.


So these pics (and a few others in this post) are from my sister. (Thanks!)