Christmas 2013

Christmas 2014 was spent at home in Strongsville with Matt's mom visiting and just a dusting of snow.

This year Jake really gets the idea of Santa and presents, and Grace still believes (I wonder what she'll think next year?).   At 3am Christmas morning, Grace came in and said she thought she saw Santa's sleigh outside.  I told her to go back to bed.  Other than that, the kids actually slept in (well in our house 6:30 is sleeping in).

They were very excited to see all the presents and quickly tore through their stockings.  Jake was very excited to get his excavator.

We spent an hour or so opening presents, took a break for a cartoon and then brought out the parking garage that Matt made wrapped in a blanket.

We spent the rest of the day cleaning up the mess, eating, playing with toys, and watching cartoons.

Thanksgiving 2013

It's almost Christmas and I'm just getting to blogging our Thanksgiving (I guess that's how this time of year goes).

This year we went to DC for Thanksgiving.  My Dad and Cindi were also there.  All of the adults did the Alexandria Turkey Trot (in 30 degree weather), while a brave babysitter watched the three kiddos.  It was pretty busy for just being there a few nights.  We played at the house, went to a really cool playground and even made it out to dinner with all the kids (and all the iPods!)

Grace and Zachary love hugging each other and reading books together.

Jake and Zachary would play near each other, and they always wanted the same toy.  Jake would usually just grab what he wanted from Zachary, but Zachary was a little sneakier and would wait until Jake wasn't looking and then swoop in and steel what he wanted.  They also liked to play with (harass) the cat together.

The kids enjoyed playing with (or on) Grampa too!

I tried to get a nice picture of all three kids together, but clearly that's not so easy.

Jake's Birthday

This is the first year Jake's old enough to be really excited about his birthday.  Also, all year long, I've been using the "you can have it for your birthday" line when we're at a store and Jake sees something he wants.  So, I felt the need to get him something really cool.  We didn't want a lot of little parts or cheaply made toys, so we splurged and got him a really nice and big crane truck on the internet.  I invited a few of Jake's friends over for a little party, two little playdate friends and Max, the 12 yr old neighbor, who Jake loves and Max's sister came too.  We had a truck theme (of course) with balloons and I even made a truck cake!

Two Birthdays in Two Days = Two Exhausted Parents

This year for their birthdays, each kid got ONE day.  Not a party at school, then their actual birthday, and then their party day (turning into a week of birthday stuff).  They each had a party ON their birthday.  I'm not sure if this was easier or not, but then again there is no easy way to celebrate two birthdays a week before Thanksgiving!

Grace got a new room for her present.  For the last few months she has been sleeping in the spare room  because she got tired of Ariel and her bunk bed.   She decided on black and white (zebra) accent colors and kumquat (peach) for the walls.  I think we are happy with how it turned out.  

For her party (black and white themed) she picked two friends to take to the big McDonalds playground after school and then have pizza, cake and a treasure hunt at our house.  

Horse Day

A couple weeks ago, Grace went to Horse Day with her Girl Scout troop.  They spent two hours at a farm nearby learning about taking care of horses and even got to ride two different horses English and Western style.

Family Pictures

We had our annual family pictures last week.  I guess we felt like doing something fun and different from the usual pose (plus you get a much bigger smile from Jake if you tell him he gets to hang upside-down for the picture), so here's what we got:

"Please can you get me a truck?"

Jake's birthday is in a few days and we are having a few of his friends over to celebrate.  In the past, when we have given Jake gifts, he reacted unexpectedly disappointed in what he got, even cried and said "that is not what I wanted."

So, I wanted to make sure we talked about good manners before his party.  I tried to explain that no matter what gift he gets, he needs to say thank you.  Here's the rest of our conversation:

Me: "so if someone gives you a doll..."
Jake interrupts:  "Mom, I don't like dolls"
Me: "it doesn't matter, if someone gives you a doll, what do you say?"
Jake thinks: "if someone gives me a doll, I say, please can you get me a truck?"
Me: laughing

Hopefully nobody gets him a doll!!

Snow!!

Nov 11th, the first snow of the season.  The kids were very excited and couldn't wait to get outside to play.  As far as I'm concerned it's a little too early for snow.  There are still lots of beautiful fall leaves on the trees.  I'm not ready for this.  I don't have the snow boots, snow suits, sleds, and all the other snow stuff out of storage!  Oh well, I guess I better get ready.

Jake's Strider

We got Jake a Strider bike (balance bike) in May.  It as a wonderful $75 purchase, even though when we first gave it to him he cried because he wanted a firetruck or a monster truck instead, he loves his Strider now.

It has no pedals and is supposed to help kids learn to ride a bike because they don't rely on training wheels to keep them up.  It took Jake about two weeks to really get the hang of it and now he's a pro.  He loves to get going really fast and lift his feet up and coast for a while.  He can also stop on a dime. When we walk to Grace's school he rides it and gets lots of second looks and comments (like, "that bike's got no pedals," and "how cute").  The only downside is he has to use his feet to brake so his shoes are worn through on the front and bottom!

Jake Strider Video: http://youtu.be/iqJvxqPNb-I

Family Hikes

One of my favorite things to do as a family is go on hikes.  We've been having some fun lately exploring the Cleveland area nature centers.  It's a great Sunday morning activity when there is not much else to do and we don't go to church.  We usually head out around 8, try a new coffee shop (if we can find one), visit a nature center and go on some of the hikes nearby.  It's been really pretty hiking in the fall.

French Creek Reservation - a nice nature center, with an awesome kids play area

Brecksville Nature Center and Deer Lick Caves - a very small nature center, but neat architecture.  We stumbled on a great, short hike to some "caves" and even managed to get a good family picture with the self-timer (one second before it clicked, Jake was whining and refusing to participate).  We also stopped at a fun playground on the way home