Merry Christmas!

Yesterday afternoon we endured the 4pm Children's Mass at Immaculate Conception with every other Catholic in Clintonville. Phew, what chaos! We were very happy to get home to our Antipasta and Gnocchi dinner. Then it was off to bed for the kids and off to work for Santa's elves who purged all the broken toys from the house and put two giant bins of baby toys into storage. Good thing we made lots of room for new toys because Santa and the grandparents were overly generous.

The morning started dark and early at 6am. This is Michael's monster truck ramp from Santa. He won't stop playing with it.

These robots came from Grandma Carole. They are loud and obnoxious and the boys love them!

Poppy and Nan sent Luke TWO building sets. This is the recycling truck set. It's really cool.

And this is the pirate ship set. Luke's favorite part is the giant octopus.

Michael got Handy Manny and Mickey Mouse Clubhouse car sets from Poppy and Nan.

Luke had been asking for "robot animals" since he saw a commercial on tv. Santa found these baby pandas. They have bottles for feeding them and make eating and sleeping noises. Luke, especially, likes taking care of his panda. I wonder if he'll be quite as excited about taking care of the new baby in April?

Imitating Caillou

This is Caillou. He's Canadian and does a lot of winter activities. Luke learned how to ice skate by watching Caillou. Today Caillou was sledding. The boys were disappointed that there wasn't enough snow in the backyard for them to take their sleds out, so they practiced inside instead. Hurry up, big snow, the boys want to be like Caillou!

The First Snowman

We got just enough snow a few days ago for the first snowman of the season. Luke named him Rocky. He's no longer with us, but I'm sure there'll be another snowman along soon.

Wildlights

We went to Wildlights at the zoo tonight. Matt thought the boys should walk, but by the time we got dinner and got parked, it was almost 7pm, which is usually bedtime for our kids. So, we ended up renting a double stroller and it was very nice to have the kids contained all evening. By the end, Michael was totally zoned out and Luke was pretending to be asleep. Both zonked out completely on the ride home.

Superheroes

Have you met the Caped Crusader and the Man of Steel?

Reading with Nan

Michael's posse

This is from before I left for El Paso when Michael was in full goose-egged forehead mode. Michael has quite the stuffed animal crew and he is usually accompanied by at least two of them. Monkey and Elephant go with us most places around town. He reluctantly leaves the rest behind, but once home, he likes to have the whole gang around.

Some news

I haven't blogged for a while. I took a quick trip to El Paso for my Grandpa S.T.'s funeral. It was a time of remembering with my extended family. I got to see all of my cousins on that side, which is very rare considering one lives in Taiwan and another lives in Beijing. I got back just in time to teach my last class. Nan arrived yesterday in the middle of a major windstorm. Today we had our "big" ultrasound and . . .

IT'S A BOY!!!!!

We've been hearing a lot about My Three Sons.

I've been waiting . . .

. . . for five years for Luke to be old enough to understand and enjoy our Fontanini nativity set. We set it up today and he loves it. I am learning to let go of my perfectionist tendencies and not sneak over after he's done playing to put the figures back in their "proper" places. It's really ok if Jesus is on the roof.

Michael as human train wreck

Geez--he's croupy, snotty and he faceplanted at a friend's house yesterday resulting in a giant goose egg on his forehead. Still cute, though.

Blue Thunder

We are now the proud or, in Matt's case, resigned owners of a minivan. Luke has named it Blue Thunder after a monster truck, don't you see the resemblance?

Thanksgivings

I didn't take pictures today, although usually I'm pretty good about taking pictures of the boys on Thanksgiving. I was thrown off by an early morning phone call from my aunt. We lost my Grandpa, S.T. Anderson, this morning. Grandpa had been having a rough time for a few weeks, battling pneumonia and he had taken a turn for the worse a couple of days ago. He passed away peacefully in his sleep early this morning. He would have been 103 this December.

On this Thanksgiving, I am thankful. I am thankful that Grandpa went peacefully. I am thankful that he didn't have to spend Thanksgiving day in a nursing facility and instead spent it in Heaven with my Grandma Annie Lou and my dad. I am thankful that my stepmother Carole was able to visit him yesterday morning when he was still lucid and that my aunt Loura made it into town in time to see him last night. I am thankful that we will be postponing the funeral until late next week, so that my cousins and I can get to El Paso.

I am thankful for my wonderful husband and my beautiful boys and the baby in my belly. I am thankful for my wonderfully supportive mommy friends are our great friends from ODU. Truly, we are blessed.

Random things

The boys just finished watching half of the Wizard of Oz (we discovered it was on halfway through) and they LOVED it. Flying monkeys for our little monkey and Luke was enchanted with the whole thing. Guess that will be a dvd purchase soon!

We put the boys to bed late with just enough time for prayers. Turns out Luke knows the Our Father. All by himself with no prompting. I don't think I knew it by heart well until I was 5 or 6. Pretty amazing.

We also went to the zoo today and the weather was beautiful, the animals were out and the kids were great. What a great day!

Climbing Trees

We're having some late Indian Summer weather. Yesterday, Matt took this picture of the boys climbing the pear tree in our backyard. Crocs and no coats in mid-November.

The Wedding

Well, chasing after a toddler and a preschooler does make it hard to take pictures during a wedding. It also severely impacts one's ability to eat, drink and be merry. But we had a lovely time overall and the kids were surprisingly good, especially once we got settled at the reception. The biggest surprise of the night was that exhausted Michael crashed on his daddy's lap at 8pm and ended up sleeping in his cousin Jacinta's stroller for the rest of the reception (well at least until we left at 11pm, the reception went on without us until 2am).

From left to right (I'll try to swap in a brighter pic later): Jon (eldest), Matt (second born), Stephen, Katie, Chris (youngest) and Greg (third born).

The wedding pictures were taken in the quadrangle at Trinity College at the University of Toronto (where Matt and I went to grad school). It's beautiful and a great enclosed place to run.

Best Man Uncle Greg and Uncle Chris as photographed by Luke.

Luke and his cousin Claire the flower girl. Luke told me he would like to marry Claire. They are adorable together, but does anyone else hear the banjo theme from Deliverance playing?

Poor Michael, all these pictures of him sleeping lately. Can you tell someone has recently dropped his nap?

chillin' with the groomsmen

Granddad's house was the staging area for Uncle Chris and his groomsmen. The boys loved getting on their suits while all of the other groomsmen were getting ready, too. It was a beautiful day, very warm for November, and we all waited outside for the limo to arrive. Then we waved goodbye to Uncle Chris and the guys and headed off to the wedding.

The Fam

More wedding blogging and pictures to come, but I wanted to get this one up right away. I stole it from my SIL's facebook site. I think her mom took it.

thoughts on Chris's upcoming wedding

We leave tomorrow for Uncle Chris and Auntie Katie's wedding on Saturday.

Luke is very excited. "I get to wear my wedding costume! And my shiny shoes! And my tie!"

All Michael heard was costume. "Michael wear monkey costume!" Oh my disappointed little moo-bug.

Wish us luck, it will be a long day in the car tomorrow and a very long day and late night on Saturday. I'm hoping for no major meltdowns from the kids and no major puking episodes from me!

Too Much Halloween

Matt and I are not big fans of the Columbus tradition of moving trick-or-treat night and we couldn't stand the thought of not doing anything on the "real" Halloween. So tonight, we drove into Westerville for more trick-or-treating. There weren't many kids out at all where we went, so we didn't feel bad for imposing ourselves on the neighborhood. After all, somebody had to collect the candy! We only went for about 40 minutes, then the boys tuckered out. "Tuckered out" is an understatement for Michael, as the picture shows. He fell asleep on the way home and didn't wake up when we moved him, took his picture, took off his costume or brushed his teeth.

violin lessons

We have been trying to get into a Saturday violin lesson routine with our friends, but managing our schedules has been tough. We're finally getting into the swing of things. Luke and Malcolm have real violins and are learning to play such classics as "Mississippi Hot Dog"--it's really more of an exercise than a song, but they love it. What we didn't count was the little ones wanting to join in. So now Quinn and Michael are also "playing." Matt does all the work, while Karla, Pete and I sit upstairs, eavesdrop, giggle and marvel at how well they are all doing. Here they are, all holding the violins in the proper position.

Beggar's Night

I'm not sure we'll ever understand why Columbus doesn't do trick-or-treat on Halloween if it falls on a weekend. Oh well, the weather was beautiful for Beggar's Night last night and the boys had a blast.

This morning, Michael was hung over from staying up late and too much candy. Here he is with a much needed sausage fix, still wearing his costume, which he wore all day again today.

Apple Picking again

We made a quick trip out to Lynd's for our second 20lbs of apples this season. It's the only time Michael ever eats apples! We were supposed to go this weekend, but the weather is looking nasty. We still hope to get to the pumpkin patch on Sunday, but I didn't want to risk not being able to get my Winesaps and Fujis. So we made the trek today, met some friends and got a huge bag of apples and a couple of squash for good measure.

Pigeon Roost Farms

I love all of the fall activities in Central Ohio. On Monday afternoon, we took the kids to Pigeon Roost Farms. So many great "low-tech" activities. Poppy and Nan, I think you should buy a little piece of land and start building your own slides, obstacle courses and spooky tunnels. You can probably do without the obnoxious goats, though.

Michael loved the "corn box."

Most of the slides are just this black tubing, Michael couldn't get enough.

Luke's new best friend, a fuzzy caterpillar.

Climbing the obstacle course in the "enchanted woods."

Love the tire dragon!

And we finished with about a hundred slide races down the hill.