Snow buddy

I can't remember for sure if we had Novak out in the snow last year, but finally the weather was warm enough yesterday that I felt he could be outside.

As predicted, he was a little whiny and didn't like walking in his snow boots, but he got over that enough to have some fun.

Afterwards he got to have another first. Hot cocoa with peppermint marshmallows - in a "big boy cup!" He calls it coffee, the silly boy.

:)

Hot cocoa...soda fountain style

Only Nile would have to drink his hot cocoa through a straw.

"Hey mom! I sucked a marshmallow up through my straw!"

Winter?!?

It is 83 degrees today. In March. Amazingly, it's still technically winter.

And best of all? Nate didn't have school today! So we packed up the new minivan and headed to the zoo. (along with the rest of Geneseo, I think!). We met our friends there and had a picnic lunch. We also picked up our zoo membership for the year ($55 - can't be beat!)

Novak was getting tired and cranky towards the end, but we always ride the train last. So I was hoping he would settle down and enjoy the ride.

I think he did :)

Play-Doh Explosion

We are at home for another snow day, which means no preschool, no babysitting room at the gym, and because it's so cold out, no playing outside. So I am looking for ideas to entertain these two for a whole day. Remember we just had two straight weeks at home. You would think that with all the new Christmas presents they would have plenty to do. But...the first thing they asked for was the old standby, the Play-Doh table.

What mom wouldn't trade 20 minutes of cleanup for an hour of peaceful playtime? I was able to start two loads of laundry (one is in the dryer, another in the washer), put waterproof mattress covers on the boys' beds, get some Facebook and CafeMom time, and I'm even blogging...all before 9:15 am!

Unfortunately, this is all before 9:15 am, and we still have two hours before lunch and even longer before Tom gets home... I'm still thinking about ideas for things to do later.

But...back to the Play-Doh.

Nate made me a Play-Doh cookie, caramel apple, and pretzel.

I have no idea what Nile is doing here.

Below is the aftermath. This is just a shot of the table. In the picture at the end, you may be able to see some of the thousands (okay, maybe I'm exaggerating, but there had to be hundreds) of tiny pieces of Play-Doh that are on the floor.

It was quite messy.

I got a small lightweight stick vacuum from Tom's mom for Christmas. I have used it every day. But no day have I been more thankful for it than today. What would have taken me a long time to pick up by hand was actually not too bad.

Now, off to figure out entertainment for the next few hours.

Christmas Eve

As is becoming our tradition, we celebrated Christmas with the Fairbanks family on Christmas Eve.

The boys enjoyed cooking cornbread with Grandma.


Then they patiently waited for Becky and Josh to come over before opening presents. Nate and Nile helped read tags and hand out gifts.


One of Nile's favorite gifts is the "GloWriter" from Becky.


Nate got Twister - but we haven't played it yet. Nile got the "Cootie" game - honestly I have no idea how to play it. I have a feeling both of these will produce interesting blog posts.


Nile also finally got his own tools - so now Nate won't be mad when Nile wants to play with his!


Nate got tons of Lego toys - and has played with them every day since.


The biggest gift of the evening was the Wii for my mom and dad. I'll post a video of that on another blog post.

Gingerbread House

Today the boys and I continued our annual tradition of decorating a gingerbread house for Christmas. (I guess I haven't shared our photos from prior years.) This was Nile's first time helping out. It was a little different this year because I had to make the frosting and find the candy to decorate, since we didn't have a full kit. (Believe it or not this is a Halloween gingerbread house kit!) We had a lot of fun. And I think we only chased down about 100 of these little "bb" sized candies as they rolled over the floor.



In all fairness, I took photos of both boys' sides. Here is Nile's roof:


And here is Nate's roof:

Three Days Until Christmas!

I know I've been negligent on blogging. I have cute videos and
pictures from Nate's Christmas program to share. I promise to work on
this later today if I get a quiet hour!

Nate has been counting down the days to Christmas using this calendar.
He was excited to see this morning that we were down to three days left.

Snow Ice Cream

I had promised the boys that they would get to make snow ice cream on the first big snowfall of the year. So - when we got to have a snow day they were really excited to do it!

It's basically an egg, milk, sugar, and vanilla. And mix in a bunch of snow. They really enjoyed it.

First Snow 2009

What kind of mom would I be if I didn't let these two out in the first snow of the year? (Well, I'm not really sure, but there would have been mutiny in our house...)

Shoveling the driveway. They were surprisingly helpful.


Eating snow.


Making a snow angel.


Action shots of snowball-throwing.


We are anxiously waiting the "real" snow that is to come on Wednesday. I have been told that it will be full of snowball fights and snowman-making. Oh, and lots of hot cocoa has been requested.

Christmas Cheer

Feeling a bit like we were really late getting our decorations up this year (what is it this year with everyone being done Thanksgiving weekend???), this last weekend we decided to decorate the house for the holidays.

On Friday the boys and I got started, with the stockings, some smaller decorations, the nativity, and this little tree in the office.

Nile helped with the lights.


The boys with the finished "little tree."


Then on Saturday, Tom got out the tree and Nate helped us decorate it. Nile for some reason just wanted to walk around with his guitar, so he was our "supervisor" for the morning.


Nate was so full of the holiday spirit he wanted to record a special message for everyone.

Run, run, as fast as you can...

One of the boys' favorite books is "The Gingerbread Man" - I read it almost daily to Nile. For a few weeks he's been asking to make his own Gingerbread Man. So, we bought some premade gingerbread dough (even I know when to let Pillsbury take over) and borrowed some cookie cutters from my mom. Today, since we had to stay home for the morning (cousin Emily came for a visit), we decided to do it!

Step 1: Roll out dough and select your shape.


Step 2: Bounce excitedly as your brother gets to cut out a cookie. Ask ten times if it's your turn yet. Switch places with your brother. Repeat 10 times.


Step 3. Watch mom put cookies in oven. Ask her 15 times if they are done yet.
Step 4. Watch mom take the cookies out of the oven. Ask her 10 times if they are cool yet.
Step 5. Ask mom again when they will be ready to decorate. Get frustrated when mom tells you we don't have the ingredients to make royal icing.
Step 6. Send mom to the corner store (i.e. gas station) for powdered sugar.
Step 7. Watch mom make icing. Ask her 5 times why the egg yolks don't go into the icing.

Step 8. Finally! Decorate the cookies!


Step 9. Ask mom 50 times when you can eat the cookies. Sigh when she says not until after naptime.


Step 10. Eat a cookie and pronounce it the "greatest cookie ever."

I suppose I'd have to agree. They do look pretty festive, don't they?

First Snow

This year, I have been making as much of an effort as possible to enjoy those little moments, the ones that you may only get once. This morning, as we awoke to the first snow of the year, I was able to pull Nate onto my lap and look out the window with him, and enjoy the surprise on his face when we opened the blinds to see the snow. But for Nate,this was something he had seen before. I couldn't wait to show Nile.

Nile slept late today, so when he woke up, I went up to get him and brought him downstairs. I opened the front door to show him the snow. Looking at the wonder on his face, I realized this was the first snow that he would actually be able to enjoy, since last year he was a baby. So, naturally, I went for the camera. I am lucky I got a picture that caught the awe on his face as he tried to understand what the snow is.