Elfin' around

Auntie Angie reminded us that it's Elf season... This is so easy and SO addicting! Thank goodness I still have a few weeks of maternity leave left. Weston and I will stay plenty busy with this website.

It snowed today - Part II

Digging out!

It snowed today

That's actually an understatement. It REALLY REALLY REALLY snowed today! So awesome. Thanks to the cRaZy storm, we spent the entire day at home. It was fabulous! We did a variety of things (mostly in our jammies) and had fun listening to Christmas music thanks to the KOOL-108 radio station.

Miles made an angel for the top of our tree. Miss. Ronda, one of his teachers, gave him the red glitter glue to use when she found out he wanted to make a red angel. She's such a nice gal!

Then he and daddy put some ropes on our sleds so that we can go for sled rides in the basement until the wind calms down outside.

I made 10 dozen Oreo balls (Evan: I can't promise that I'll get to the coconut balls this year....but the Oreo balls are pretty ball-icious.). Weston guarded them.

He also sported one of my favorite onesies that Miles used to wear (and no pants - who needs pants when you're staying home, right?!). He looks as handsome as his big bro did back in the day.

Miles and I decided we needed some fresh air, so late in the afternoon we braved the elements. Here we are preparing to battle the snow drifts -

And attempting to walk through one...a tiny one compared to the waist-high drifts in our driveway. Yikes! I almost lost Miles.


Brrrrrrr!

Oh yeah, and here's what Tanner did today besides prepping the sleds.

(He cleaned the toilets. That's why I married him - he cleans toilets.)

Tonight we ate some balls -

and Weston and I snuggled as daddy made fun of me for having squinty eyes. That made me laugh and have even squintier eyes.

We hope you all had a warm and relaxing day, too!

An interview with Weston

I'm 30!

McD's...

We went to Green Bay for Thanksgiving to visit Great Grandma Lucille (as well as other relatives, but of course she's the highlight!). It's a good 5+ hour car ride from O-town to GB. Both boys did exceptionally well! On the way there, we made it just over 3 hours before stopping for lunch. I'm not sure how that happened, but it was awesome.


We were surprised by how many restaurants were closed on Thanksgiving day. You'd think they'd at least stay open through lunch time, but apparently burger-flippers get the entire holiday off. The only place we could find open was a McD's attached to a gas station. Miles has never eaten at McDonald's (interestingly, Tanner is more proud of this than I am) but as you can tell, he loved their chicken nuggets...mostly because he could dip them in honey. In usual Miles style, he talked his way through lunch and ate only a fraction of the food - but all of the honey. That's my boy!

Funny guys

Weston is officially smiling! It took him a while to get the hang of it, but it was worth the wait...

He thinks he's pretty hilarious.

Miles is gearing up for his Christmas program at school. The preschoolers are singing a few old favorites (i.e. Twinkle Twinkle Little Star) as well as some new ones. Here's a preview:

Miles is 3!!!

My (bigger) baby boy turned three years old today! Where has the time gone? Wow. We're are grateful for the curious, goofy, chatty, smart, smoochable preschooler that he is right now and are looking forward to a year of the Terrific Three's...they're going to be Terrific, right?!

It's been a full week (or more) of celebrating. The first round of happy birthday-ing took place in St. Peter two weekends ago when Lead Cousin Hannah, Lead Baby Cousin Vivian, Lead Monkey Cousin Owen and Lead Librarian Cousin Ethan were all together (with their mommies and daddies) for a wonderful visit. Miles was lucky to share the party with Auntie Angie, who was getting ready for her *ahem* 21st birthday. Unfortunately I don't have a photo of the big event, as a certain Grandma (who shall remain nameless) never gave me a CD with pictures from the weekend. Rumor has it she gave the prized images to others in the family, though...so CP or ESPD, help me out here.

Back to the birthday talk:

This past Sunday, Miles celebrated his birthday with Grandpa Dave, Grandma Doreen, and Uncle Will. We also celebrated a Packer victory over the Vikes! Wooot wooooot! Obviously Weston isn't the biggest party animal in the family...

Today is Miles' official 3rd birthday. We celebrated with his friends at school. Here they are singing happy birthday to him -



And here he is being goofy with his good pal Myles -

Watch out ladies...this is one cRaZy 3 year old!

Then tonight we opened presents (he got a super cool car backpack and the Chutes & Ladders game), had pancakes for supper, and enjoyed a delicious cake with blue frosting. And Uncle Will showed up again! Life is good!

Happy birthday, buddy boy. Thanks for being born. We love you!

Under Construction

If you plan to come visit any time soon, you might want to call ahead to make sure there's a parking spot available... Here's what we've got going on in front of our house.

Super cool if you're almost three years old and obsessed with construction trucks and construction workers! Not so super cool if you're the parent of an almost-three-year-old and a three-week-old. Our mini van is pretty rad, but it doesn't have the off-roading capabilities that are required to get in and out of our driveway right now. Bummer!

Happy Halloweenie!

The Halloween festivities have finally come to an end in Otown. We started celebrating Friday afternoon with a party at Kids Korner. Every last kiddo in Miles' class was excited to run around in costumes and eat special treats. It was the perfect afternoon for these 2 and 3 year olds!

Mmmmm...cookie....

On Saturday we went to a friend's halloween party. With two firemen at the party, I knew we were safe.

Tonight, we cruised around the neighborhood and visited some of our favorite friends. Before we ventured out, we had to capture the start to Weston's first Halloween.

These two boys were ready to hit the road!

Here is Miles with Abi and Dani, his neighborgals. The three kids have had their pictures taken together every year since Miles' first halloween. They were excited to keep the tradition alive!

And another neighborgal, Ava.

Miles had a great time visiting friends and seeing all of the fun costumes. He wasn't the only one...Tanner went to a halloween party on Saturday night and sported the "Federated Underwriter" costume...what a nerd.

pumpkin time!

To help us get in the spirit of Halloween, the boys carved a pumpkin. Miles' main job was sorting through the muck and pulling out the seeds. He salvaged lots of seeds for us to roast!

(As you can tell, Weston's main job was to supervise.)

Tanner had the most dangerous job - drawing a face on the pumpkin. And then cutting it out, of course.

Here's a blurry shot of the final product....two happy boys and a very handsome pumpkin!

Good help

Miles is a good helper when it comes to feeding his baby brother. Of course Grandma Jill is a good helper, too!

The baby is here!

As most of you know by now, we have a baby! Weston Charles was born on October 15th in the wee hours of the morning (1:13am to be exact). He happens to be a wee thing himself, so it was fitting. He is totally perfect in every way! Here's proof -

(Considering he is still just a spring chicken, this is a rather uneventful video clip. Although there IS a tiny sneeze around the 20 second mark that is pretty exciting.)

Since he "grew a belly button" yesterday (those are Miles' words - what actually happened was Weston's umbilical cord stump fell off), Weston has graduated to the baby bath tub. Miles thought it was great, but Weston wasn't so sure...

And here are the happy brothers, clean and snuggly!

Lovely fall weather

Mother nature must feel guilty about all the rain that was dumped on Otown a couple of weeks ago, because ever since then we've had nothing but blue skies and sunshine! Absolutely gorgeous weather. We love it, and (needless to say) we're spending a lot of time outdoors.

Does this picture ring a bell? The photo below was taken when G2 was 37 weeks old in my belly. He/she is now approaching 39 weeks and can come join us any time! I tell him/her that every day, but so far it's not working.

Last weekend was super fun. We watched some of the TC Marathon -

and look who was participating!! Uncle Charlie and Auntie Angie totally rocked the course - we were VERY proud of them.

Then we met up with Grandpa Dave, Grandma Doreen, Uncle Will, (Auntie) Anne, and Uncle Chester at Como Zoo. We won't tell you what side of the family Uncle Chester comes from...

Miles and Grandpa enjoyed watching the polar bears. So did the rest of us, actually. They are HUGE and kind of strange.

We also supported our local fire department by attending their annual "Chili Feed" fundraiser. Miles passed up the chili, ate a cookie, and then got down to business with the trucks...

Miles quickly learned that it takes a lot of strength to haul around a fire hose, but he's up for the challenge.