Today we all went to the Gulf Breeze Zoo — it was Katie’s first zoo experience!
Stole the cup right out of his hand!
Owen can jump as far as a tree frog!
Who can jump farther?
Train ride!
Hugging the stuffed animals!
Owen picked a bat mask at the gift shop!
Owen was out with daddy and grandpa, so we took Katie to the beach!
This is her saying “SNOW!” She kept saying snow snow snow—and we had to keep telling her it was sand. 🙂
Waving goodbye to the birds as they flew away!
Splashing in a little pool!
Chasing the birds!
Grandpa David and Tom took Owen with them to scout out potential fishing locations…
We waited until Katie went down for her nap, then we took Owen down to the beach. It was a Red Flag day which meant dangerous surf conditions, but it was too cold to even get into the water anyway…but he still had fun!
Both kids got to bed late tonight due to the long day of travel plus a time zone change…
I had a very attentive audience!
She grabbed a bag of cookies right away!
Then dug right in!
“Oooh!”
Daddy sent home a present for him and Owen that they opened first:
Katie jumped right in to help daddy open a gift from Grauntie Marge:
And we saved some of Grandma Marsha’s presents for the kids so Tom could watch them have fun opening:
Of course since I had Gramma Jean sew a bunch of Baby Bs into blankets for Katie, now she likes the singles. She asks for one at naptime and bedtime—but tonight she wanted the 4B blanket PLUS the other single Bs that were floating around. You can’t clearly see them all, but she’s laying on them all and loving it!
December pics are finally up at Shutterfly!
I thought we were done, but we forgot Grannie’s bag of stocking stuffers… Katie saw them and brought them to me. 🙂
He was excited about his new cars!
Opening presents is a serious business.
She likes my new towel!
I didn’t cry until my mom and aunt were driving away and Owen quietly said “Thanks for coming to Christmas!” 🙂
Santa does know all! He knew Gramma Jean was staying with Owen, so he brought her a Lego car to assemble! So the three of us put it together!
Gramma gave Katie triple pig tails today!
There was such an over abundance of gifts this year that we opened some on four separate days…and today we finished them.
Owen got Tinkertoys from Grauntie Rose and Uncle Jim. (I miss the wooden toys of yesteryear, but these are cool, too.)
>>> Tinkertoy Transit Building Set
He had to open them right away!
Charlie liked the box!
First we built a windmill (one of the patterns given—I’m not that smart):
Then we tore apart the windmill to build the train. Gramma was impressed with how quickly I put it together…but I’ve had practice with Legos and this was far fewer pieces! Then I left Owen to his own imagination and he built this spachship:
Then he opened his Lego book from Doug and Marie: “OH. MY. HEAVENS.” 🙂
>>> LEGO Minifigure Year by Year: A Visual History
Or, technically, Ninja Turtle “pop up” game. The game went on a little longer than his attention span…but he won so it was all good!
One of my mommy group friends invited a bunch of people over for Christmas dinner, so we all went! I made mashed potatoes and peas and peanuts. I forgot my phone (EEK!) so didn’t get to snap any pictures. I grabbed my friend’s phone to take a cute picture of Katie eating a candy cane, but long story short I didn’t end up with it. The kids had a blast running around playing with other kids—and Katie tested my nerves by wanting to go up and down the slippery wood stairs by herself! The dinner was delicious and there was about as much dessert as dinner!
When we got home, I managed to snap a few pics of the kids with Gramma—but we didn’t get any with me and the kids. (We had planned to before the party, but it was chaos trying to get out of the house on time.)
Grandma promised Owen some of her M&Ms so they were counting them out before bedtime.
We didn’t take as many pictures this time, as the kids spent more time playing with old and new toys among unwrapping gifts.
Katie liked the wood vegetables from Aunt Marie and Uncle Doug.
And her new singing bear from Grauntie Marge:
And Owen LOVED his Mecha-Pede from Grauntie Marge. It really is quite cool—it has pincers and a tail, it lights up, and the eyes glow! And it’s remote-controlled!
Katie’s new bear laptop from Gramma Jean.
And Owen’s hand-me-down Jack-in-the-Box!
Since there were SOOOO many presents under the tree before Santa even got here, we decided to let the kids open some. Owen was SUPER excited and Katie quickly got into the spirit—she is actually really quite good at opening presents!
Let’s just say once the first present was opened, it was pretty much chaos. I had planned to take videos for Tom…but once things got started, it was all I could do to keep snapping pics. I feel bad because I missed a really great opening by Owen (details later) but between two kids opening presents at the same time, each of them wanting to play with each other’s things (and not their own), mini tantrums from both when they didn’t get their way, Owen just wanting to blow through all his presents without actually taking even five seconds to look at what he just opened…I was glad I got some pictures.
Katie loves opening clothes…because of course she wants to put them on right away. It might be pants on her arms or a PJ top on her legs, but she doesn’t care.
Gramma Jean bought the kids a sandwich-making kit and both had a blast with it. Owen made GJ a lovely peanut butter and ketchup sandwich! I think they played with it for 10-15 minutes before wanting to open more presents!
Then Owen opened the cash register from Grannie and Papa…and he was EXCITED!
And of course Katie LOVED it, too, because it made noise! And she figured out how to get the drawer open in about three seconds.
Helping Owen open his next present.
Katie co-opting Owen’s gift. She got one of her own shortly thereafter. 🙂
Playing in the cash register box!
And then Owen grabbed (what I knew was) the Doc McStuffins kit. I had wanted to record it because I knew he would be super exited about it. But before I could tell him to wait a minute, he was ripping it open.
And of course Katie recognized what it was and was immediately interested, too!
He was SO damn cute. As he was opening it, he says “OH…MY…HEAVENS! This is my most favorite thing ever!” or something very close to that. (Of course I was sure I would remember it, but of course I didn’t.) He just went on and on about how great it was while I was opening it and taking everything out. And the doll! It talks! (I hadn’t realized that.) So that was exciting. And Katie wanted everything and Owen didn’t want her to touch any of it. (He eventually relented.)
Giving Grauntie Marge a check-up!
Posing with his new doctor’s bag.
My favorite picture of the night!
Katie opening the hand-me-down Elmo. She loves Elmo, so I couldn’t wait for her to see him. She did like him, but the batteries were mostly shot so he wasn’t very exciting at first. A quick change and he was back up to speed…then I realized he had a broken arm. But she loved watching him and carrying him around.
Owen playing with Katie’s school bus. Funny story. I actually got it for Owen A LONG time ago and put it in his closet and forgot about it. Then he didn’t really need it so I thought I’d save it for Katie but left it in his closet. Fast forward to about four days ago when I happened to have his closet open and he said “Mom! I want that school bus!” So on the spot I decided it would be for Katie, and explained how we give gifts to people we love and that we know they’d like, so why don’t we give this to Katie? He accepted that, so then we wrapped it together—our first wrapping attempt. It didn’t go too badly, though I apparently didn’t stress enough that we keep gifts SECRET because he told Katie it was a school bus when she saw it under the tree. 🙂
Opening a big squishy package from Grannie and Papa!
He had no idea what it was, other than he was excited it was Sparty. So I reminded him that he liked to curl up/hide in the pillowcases that Grannie had made him, so she had told him she was going to make him an Owen-sized bag! Oh my, yes, he remembered, then he was SUPER EXCITED!
Someone else liked it, too!
Owen wanted us all to fit in the sack but we didn’t quite fit so just the kids were in it! (This is the only family picture we ended up getting!)
Someone wasn’t happy that we told her she couldn’t play with Owen’s Doc McStuffins doll. She was also TIRED as it was past her bedtime.
A cookie alphabet matching/spelling game from Grandma Marsha!
Serious Katie opening a present. You can tell she’s concentrating because her tongue is out.
Not a great pic, but I left it in so you can see how long her bangs are! This is why she wears pig tails all the time (but tonight was bath night).
Minion PJs from Gramma Jean!
And of course Katie co-opted them to put on!
A Christmas flap book from Grandma Marsha!
Magformers from Grandma Marsha!
A thank you hug!
Finally! Bedtime milk with Gramma…wearing a tote bag of Grauntie Marge’s!
Both kids went to bed about 30-45 minutes later than normal, and both were TIRED even though neither claimed to be. But it was super fun and I’m glad we did it. The kids loved most everything and I did a pretty good job shopping for the grandparents! There are still more pre-Santa presents to open, but that will come tomorrow…
Practicing with a fork and spoon!
Bath time! The water was purple—they weren’t super dirty!
She’s been much cuddlier lately for who knows what reasons…but we’ll take it!
It’s time to make Katie some small Bs…
Tomorrow’s project is to redo Owen’s pants—Grannie Lin hemmed them when she was here in October, but he’s grown enough to let them out already!
Out of nowhere, Katie picked up Owen’s sword:
I kept Gramma Jean and Grauntie Marge’s arrival a secret just in case something didn’t work out…
Yummy care-package cookies!
I got out the bag of stitched ornaments that my Grandma Smith made (and got passed down to me after she died). I figured Katie couldn’t really hurt them…and she LOVED them. Getting them out of the bag, putting them back…tongue out the whole time, working hard.
Gramma Jean got them this net. Katie loves it. 🙂
And you’ll notice the tights came off—she trued to pull them off herself but got frustrated when they didn’t come off as easily as socks!
This game has been going around Facebook whereby you are given a number and you are then required to tell that many unique or fun things about yourself that most people wouldn’t know. I’ve really enjoyed reading the answers from all my friends, and while I didn’t officially get a number I thought it would be fun to play along.
