Family Visit

We were so happy to have our family from Colorado visit for Christmas!  The boys were thrilled to see each other and were as funny and active as ever.  We did a lot of fun activities while they were here and had a lovely Christmas holiday!

Jackson and Auntie Stephanie came with us to Simon's music class

Navy Pier Children's Museum

Digging for dinosaur bones

Pretend snowball fight

Such a big boy!

Best Nonna!

Gingerbread house time

Christmas crackers

The Fab 5

Let's bowl, let's bowl, let's rock and roll

Strike?

December Happenings

Simon loves celebrating all parts of his heritage.

Meeting Santa (he asked for trucks of course!)

Lighting the Menorah

He went for a visit to the annual CTA Holiday train

We celebrated Marisa's 2nd birthday with cake

And we got ready for Christmas by decorating our tree.  Simon made sure he was in charge of the first two ornaments which were Monka and a front end loader.  The boy knows what he likes!

Monthly update

Simon just gets more funny every single month.  A few of the funny things he says all the time are "Oh my gosh!" when he sees something exciting.  Or, "Oh my goodness!"  He has had a blood blister for some time now.  Even though it doesn't hurt him, he can see it on his finger so he constantly demands that it be covered with a bandaid.  We have run through almost a whole box of Spiderman bandaids at this point.  The boy is so funny.

We had a little bit of snow on Christmas, so we went outside to build a snowman.  Simon has a book about Babar the elephant where they build a snow elephant so that is what he wanted.  Luckily when I pulled out the hat, he got excited about a snowman again because I do not think I could make a snow elephant.  The next day, we were driving around and Simon was very concerned about things being so dirty (especially the cars).  He would tell me each car that needed to be washed.

 
Simon also potty trained this month.  He is doing perfectly with #1 and not so great with #2, but we are working on it.  On the first day of potty training, we kept him with nothing on.  I went upstairs to get something.  He was downstairs with Russell and I suddenly heard Russell shouting "oh no! oh no!'  It turns out that Simon had pooped.  He told Daddy "I pooped!" and then Daddy asked "Where?" Simon answered "Everywhere!"  It was the truth.  Because he was naked and did not make it to the toilet, he was covered in it.  He had to take a shower, but luckily it was not on furniture or anything.  We are so proud of how well he is doing!

Simon has become quite the negotiator.  He knows what he wants to do and often when we say something like "It is time for bed." or "It is time to go pee pee".  He will answer back, "Is not for nap time." "Is not for pee pee."  He will then tell us what it is time for by saying something like "One more story" or "One George" (meaning he wants to watch an episode of Curious George.)  We also used some sweets as bribes for potty training (which worked well) but sometimes he will try to negotiate "One popsicle".  We have a long road ahead of us if he is this smart at 2 1/2 years old!

When I put Simon to bed, he generally either goes straight to sleep or sings to himself a bit.  One night he was yelling so I went to the monitor to see if I could hear what he was saying and he was shouting "I want to be happy! I want to be happy!" over and over.  I have no idea where that one came from, but it was funny.  I went back into his room and said it was time to sleep.  He rolled right over and I did not  hear another peep.  

Simon got to take his first bubble bath too!  We held off for a long time because we knew how much he would love the bubbles and that we would have a hard time getting him out of the bath.  While that has turned out to be true, it is worth it to see how sweet and happy he is about his bubbles.

Happy Thanksgiving

We celebrated a quiet Thanksgiving at home.  Simon was so happy because the Tyrells came over so he got to be with his best friend Conor.  These boys are so cute together!

November Fun

Simon was so happy to help Mommy vote for the presidential election in November.  

He carried the "I voted" receipt all day long

 We also celebrated Buffy's birthday and Simon was so excited to pick out a cake for her.  He ended up picking a giant cupcake and licked the frosting.

Simon has been taking a Wiggleworms class at the Old Town School of Folk Music.  He actually got the class for free because they put him on the program cover last year.  He loves music and especially loves the play the instruments.

 

We spent a lot of time at the park and playing in the sand with trucks.  He could spend all day digging the dirt and sand with his trucks and shovels.

Visit to Colorado

Back in October, Simon and I went to Colorado to see our family.  The boys were so happy to be reunited.  Simon was also very relieved to see that Dennie and Jackson's toys made it to the new house.  He had been very concerned since he saw their empty house in Evanston.  We miss them so much and can't wait to go back for our next visit.

Simon is such a great traveler and even carries his own backpack

These boys at a lot of pancakes and "dip" (syrup) 

At the Pumpkin Farm

A lifelong dream fulfilled for Simon (though it would have been better if it was actually moving)

"Hiking" in Boulder

The hills are alive!

Such fun throwing the leaves

Patti was so sweet to come hang out with us twice! We love her!