Bye Gramma Shell and Grandude!

Last morning with us...for now.

Post-Christmas Zoo trip

These roaming peacocks at the Wichita zoo were beautiful. They ate out of Grandude's and JB's hands. It's kind of funny to see flamingos in the middle of winter.

Christmas

Here's Gloria playing with her new play-doe that she got in her Christmas stocking.

No, that's not a beer bottle on the table, it's Green Tea Root Beer. However, Grandude and Max got liquor-filled chocolates in their stocking and they were chugging those down early Christmas morning as well as spiked egg-nog (not enough to get even JB "buzzed").

Gloria got a hand-made leopard suit from Gramma Shell. It especially looks cute when you can see the tail and the hat that goes with it.

You can see the tail sticking out of the bottom of the coat she got from her Aunt Cami. She wore her new leopard suit and coat almost all day. She also got new "running shoes" that help her do laps around the center stair-case of the house, her favorite thing to do to get exercise.

I think JB was in present overload after opening the late-morning big gifts. However, he did have fun with the Thomas Lego Train that his Daddy helped him build. You can see Gramma Shell lounging in the background with her new warm socks and comfy jamy-jams (good for all-day Christmas comfort). JB was in his new wolf suit most of the time the Colorado grandparents were here.

First Presents!

Here's JB on his first ride outside on his new two-wheeler (actually 4 with training wheels). This was his big birthday gift from Max and I along with the helmet, knee pads, and elbow pads. He wasn't too excited about it the night that he opened it, but once he realized he could ride it outside the next day, he was so happy.

You can see that Gloria is excited about just about anything she got to unwrap. These were both taken the day after JB's b-day and the day before Christmas. Gloria got to open an early Christmas present. "A DBD!" she says as she opens it. Gloria loves watching cartoons. Oftentimes I have to tell her "no cartoons right now" and she says "please?please?please?" Sometimes she ends up in her bed for asking so much when I've already said no. Overall, Gloria is a very cheerful girl and was only excited for JB when he was opening his Birthday gifts and she wasn't getting anything (except the joy of watching wrapping paper ripped open). I think she mostly enjoyed singing happy birthday and eating the mocha b-day cake.

All Lit Up!

A little bit late to be showing our Christmas lights, but I only took the picture a couple of days ago.

JB turns 4!

JB during dinner and JB during cake-time!

Gramma Shell made the lion cake and Grandude arrived the afternoon of JB's birthday, the 23rd. JB wanted his friends Logan and Maria to be there for his birthday so they came over along with their parents. I asked JB what he would want for his birthday dinner and he said "artichokes and elk", so that is what we had. After dinner and cake we opened presents!

Leaves!

I thought these were some good action shots of the kids playing with the leaves that fell on the snow after our pin oak in our backyard finally dropped them. The snow is now mostly melted and the leaves from this tree are left. We raked them up and then the kids jumped in the pile and threw them at me.

Do wolves climb trees?

Here is JB in his wolf suit in "his tree" (the tree he likes to climb). Max took these pictures and said he slid down the tree a few times trying to get higher...at least he didn't fall out. No wonder his wolf suit ended up gray down the middle of his front and with holes in the toes! Good thing his Gramma Shell is making a new one for him for Christmas.

Our Last-Minute Snowboy

As the kids and I drive through the neighborhood they notice the snowmen in some people's yards and say, "can we build a snowman?" Since I neglected to build one with them when there was mounds of snow around, I took the last remaining snow and they helped me build this beautiful snowboy that eventually had lots of sticks in him and then JB knocked the head off...at least we have the memory.

Stocking

Stockings are for wearing, right?

Just cute!

I can't remember why Gloria was leaning up against JB like this, but I knew it was cute enough to take a picture. The kids were waiting to go outside with their Daddy to put up Christmas lights in the front of the house.

We seem to be strictly white light people whereas a few other people in our neighborhood are colored lights people (I'm not trying to make a racial comment). Many people are able to pull off the colored lights without looking gaudy. There are a few houses here and there that are just junky looking, but mostly I love to look at the various Christmas lights around the neighborhood.

One I love the most is a house right at the entrance to the neighborhood we drive through to get to our house that has a nativity scene with a huge lit-up sign next to it that says "HAPPY BIRTHDAY JESUS!" They also have a huge star that's lit up right above the nativity scene that's hanging on a tree or a pole, I can't remember which. The decorations that I don't care so much for are the ones that are cut-outs of Santa and look kind of cluttery. Just my personal opinion. I also like the houses that look like a "wonderland" of lights, and the ones that frame most of the outline of the house...the roof, doors, windows, etc. That's a lot of work. Maybe tonight I'll take a picture of our house with the lights on it. I'm being rambly now, so I'll post some more pictures.

Fun in the snow...a while ago

This was one of our days of fun in the snow. Max built them a ramp out of snow in the driveway that started at our old dishwasher that we had to leave outside for a while.

Then we decided to take a walk and ended up at Garrett Park, about a mile away. I pulled JB most of the way and Gloria walked most of the way home and most of the way back! She's a trooper...and JB likes the excitement of dragging his feet and hands out of the sled, which gave me more of a workout. The "snow days" were a lot of fun, but now the snow is gone and some leaves still remain.

Gloria!

I decided to dig out our Christmas CDs this morning because there are only three more weeks left until Christmas and a limited time to listen to them. As Gloria was eating her breakfast of PB&J and Jelly with apples (something JB requested for breakfast) a song called "sing Gloria" came on that has the chorus "sing Gloria, sing Gloria, sing Gloria!". She was bee-bopping to it in her little chair when she started singing "sing Mommy, sing Mommy, sing Mommy!". It was very touching. I guess its these kinds of entertaining and sweet things that "make up" for her stubborness in the terrible twos period of her life.