Holiday Home

Being the first Christmas we've spent in a house (well, in a house that belonged to us), I had a lot of fun decorating for the holidays. My parents asked me weeks ago to post pictures of my Christmas'd up home, so I thought I'd better do it finally before I start taking it all down tomorrow (boo). Here you go, Mom and Dad!

Our little 4-foot tree from our apartment-dwelling days found a new home in our bedroom this year. Note to self: buy a tree skirt and topper.

Big Family Christmas

This year we had Ben's entire family come into town. It used to be that Ben and I were the only ones in the family who lived away, but now only one brother besides Ben lives within a couple of hours of Ben's parents. It's been three years since we've all been together for a holiday. Some of the family stayed with Ben's parents and we had one of his brothers and his family stay with us. We had so much fun with James, Shelley and their four great kids.

Emily, James, Aaron, and Daniel

We were back and forth between our house and my in-laws' home over the days around Christmas. We had lots of family up at our house the Saturday before Christmas and had fun eating pizza, playing cards, watching football, and staying up way too late.

Noah with some cousins - Colin, James, Zach, Jack, Daniel and Aaron (this family is really heavy on the boys!)

Emily and Sarah

Noah and Colin

The Sunday before Christmas we all went to church down in my in-laws' town and took this family picture afterward.

On Christmas Day we opened presents and had breakfast at our house and then headed back down to my in-laws' for the rest of the day. We had a yummy Christmas dinner, opened some more presents, played Apples to Apples (fun game!), and played around outside (nice advantage of Texas winters).

Sam with his Uncle Stan (Sam LOVED Stan and his Uncle James too - I guess they look a lot like his daddy!)

Noah was cracking the family up. At one point, my sister-in-law Shelley said to him, "Noah, I love you so much!" To which Noah replied, "No, I'm Mama's boy." Shelley tried to explain, "Well, you can be Mama's boy but I can still love you too." Noah wasn't buying it and said, "Um, no. I don't think that's possible."

Another time, my 13-year-old nephew Jack stopped Noah in the hall and asked, "Hey, Noah! Can I have a hug?" Noah thought about it for a moment and then said, "Go find my Mama. She'll give you a hug." Jack thought this was hilarious so he found Ben to show him what had happened. He again asked Noah for a hug and this time Noah turned to Ben and said, "Daddy, can you give Jack a hug?"

Despite these two exchanges, Noah (and Sam) really did love having so much family around. They had a great time playing with their cousins, who were all really sweet with them. Ben and I loved having so much family around too!

Christmas Morning

I love Christmas morning! Here are some pictures and videos of opening/playing with presents.

The much-anticipated pink pig...

Christmas Eve

I thought it was high time I do a Christmas recap. In true Amy form, I'll probably do it over a few posts. Heaven forbid I leave any pictures out! :)

On Christmas Eve Ben and I took our little guys to a nearby subdivison which goes CRAZY with Christmas lights. It was so fun to drive around and see the beautifully decorated homes. One house is famous around here for going all out with the lights. And I do mean all out. We got out and spent a good 1/2 hour or more looking all around the yard. There was a bubble machine, dozens of different scenes, and a video screen which would dub passers-by as "naughty" or "nice" (Noah and I were dubbed "the nicest in the neighborhood"). Here's Sam gazing at the house, but this picture seriously does not do it justice and only shows part of the decor (the owner told me it takes them six full days to set it all up).

After we looked at the lights Ben and I got a hankering for egg nog. What we thought would be a quick stop into the grocery store before it closed ended up being a long, 7-store search spanning two cities! What's hilarious is that another couple was doing the same thing and we kept ending up at the same stores. We finally found it though (thank-you, Speedy Stop!). From there we headed to Sonic for our Christmas Eve feast (and waited in line forever!!) and finally got home to read Christmas stories and get the kids in bed. We were up til 2am wrapping presents and listening to Christmas music and putting the train table from my parents together. It was fun though. Ben's brother James and his wife Shelley were staying with us (with their 4 kids) so we had great company!

Jumping the Gun

Christmas came early for me this year. Ben got me this Kitchen-Aid that I've been dying over. WOOHOO!! (I got it early because I'm about to make a truck-load of cookies for our neighbors). It's "buttercup" yellow and it makes me really happy to look at it.



Merry Christmas to me! Oh yeah, and to all of you too. :)

Update: I just made my first batch of cookie dough with my Kitchen Aid. This thing is freaking awesome! Where has it been all my life??? I told that to Ben and he said, "I'm glad the two of you have such a connection." Oh, and here's a cute story for you (because, you know, just about everything ends up being about my kids!). While I was mixing the dough, Noah was standing on a chair next to me so he could help and I had Sam on my hip. Out of the blue, Sam started going, "Mmmm" (the sound he makes when he gives kisses) and leaned in toward Noah. Noah immediately leaned over and kisses his brother on the head and then all went back to the way it was. How sweet, huh? I love my boys.

Sheep Sam, Mommy Noah

This is what Sam wore to church on Sunday:

Noah didn't say anything about it to me, but when he saw Ben at church later (Ben goes early for meetings), Noah said with a chuckle, "Look Daddy - Sam's a sheep!"

In other Noah news, the other night he asked Ben if he wanted to play with a balloon with him. Ben was doing something on the computer and replied, "Sure, Beeju, just let me finish this first." Noah said, in his best parental voice, "Okay, Daddy. You can do that for three more minutes, but then it's time to play with a balloon." Then Noah proceeded to give Ben the countdown until his three minutes were up.

Here's my funny little guy:

Birthday Boys

So I have two brothers named Thomas (one brother, one brother-in-law). It can get confusing. We end up having to much-too-formally refer to them by their full names sometimes. Anyway, one Thomas had a birthday this past Tuesday and the other Thomas's birthday is today. Happy Birthday, Thomases! I love you!!

I don't have a picture with my brother-in-law, but here is a picture of me and my little brother (who is 27 today). Happy Birthday, Bud!!

(This is not very recent - I'm pregnant with Noah here and my brother is still in college)

Santa, Santa, Ho Ho Ho!

Thanks to Mickey Mouse Clubhouse's "Mickey Saves Santa" episode and book (which we watch and read quite often around here), Noah was excited about seeing Santa the other night at our church Christmas party. He was a little sheepish when he actually got to the front of the line though. He wanted to talk to him, but definitely kept his distance!

Santa talked to him for a few minutes and then asked what he wanted for Christmas. Without hesitation, Noah replied, "A purple pig." Huh?? Being that this is the first year he's even kind of understands the concept of Santa (and it's still a little fuzzy for him - he was quite upset when we left the party without the aforementioned purple pig, despite my explanation of how Santa works) - I really want Santa to be able to fulfill Noah's one request. I'm at a bit of a loss, however. I did find something - it's not purple, but hopefully this pig will suffice.

Sam had no requests and was not excited to see Santa.

ZaZa Party

On Thursday night Ben and I went downtown to spend the evening at the Hotel ZaZa for Ben's company Christmas party. The Zaza is a very swanky hotel (one which we saw featured the next night on TV when we were watching this random show called "Houston, Over the Top" as one of the best places in Houston to pick up a rich guy - just so you know). Ben's company had rented out the 12th floor and the holiday party flowed through each of the unbelievable hotel suites on that floor. There was a Texas Tycoon suite, a Rock Star suite, a James Bond suite and a couple of others. The food was awesome (different cuisine in each room) - steak, garlic mashed potatoes, veggie cabobs, stuffed mushrooms, jumbo shrimp, sushi (which, as it turns out, I'm a big fan of!), a brushetta bar, chocolate-dipped strawberries, mini burgers, mini chili dogs, brie with warm raspberries (yum), and of course an open bar (translation for me = bottomless cokes). At first we were skeptical of the set-up since there were so many different rooms to go to, but I ended up really liking it because you could roam around and not feel like you had to mingle more than you wanted to (does that sound anti-social?). Anyway, all in all a fun night. Thanks to Andrea for watching my boys (I watched her daughter the previous night for her husband's work party - gotta love the baby swap!).

P.S. Thanks, Ash, for your help with my new Christmas header! Credits here.

Schmoozer

Tonight Noah looked at me adoringly and said, "Mama, I love you." I got all warm and fuzzy and replied, "Ahhh, I love you too, Beeju!" Noah paused for a brief moment, then: "Can I have some of your chocolate milk in my sippy?"

What a brown-noser.

Party (Potty) Central

This weekend was a little crazy. Fun, but crazy. On Saturday Ben took the boys out of the house for a few hours so I could host a baby shower for a friend. They had a good time playing by (in?) a fountain and eating Jamba Juice. Noah was particularly excited about the bullseye (aka horse) they saw.



The shower was really fun. Good food (I only did cookies and punch and outsourced the rest - now, that's the way to host a party!), good friends, good presents for the mama-to-be. The rest of Saturday we hung out at home and played with the boys. Ben also did some painting. Our kitchen is currently 3 different colors. Two walls are the original tan color; one wall is the grey color of the primer, and one wall is the final green. Noah kindly offered, "Daddy, I will talk to you while you paint," and spend quite awhile doing just that.


Sunday night we hosted a going-away party for some friends of ours. We had tons of people over, which I love. It was so much fun, although we are going to miss our friends Natalee and Lowell. In the middle of the party Noah emerged from his room wearing a turtle that he found at the back of his closet.


So now we're back to another week and so far it can best be summed up as Potty Training Hell. I think potty training is some bizarre form of mommy torture. (CIA officials, take note: forcing terrorists to potty train stubborn toddlers would be much more effective than water boarding). Or maybe it's nature's way of limiting the population. Or maybe it has to do with global warming. I don't know, I'm just thinking out loud here. My child is 3 years and 4 months old and yet he does not seem to be getting this. Please note that I am asking for no suggestions because I have heard them all and done them all and nothing is working. I am especially not looking for, "I don't know what to tell you, my kid just potty trained himself!" That would not be received well in my current fragile state of mind (although I'm happy for you and if you've told me that in the past, there are no hard feelings). Am I a bad mom if I just wash my hands of it and put him back in pull-ups? My only reservation with that plan is that I really don't want to have to home-school him when he turns 5 and can't go to public kindergarten because he still won't tell me before he needs to pee.

Worst Dressed

This morning my MSN homepage enticed me to view the 2007 Year in Review, otherwise known as the year's worst-dressed list: http://movies.msn.com/movies/2007review/undressed?GT1=7701. Sure, it's fun to look and mock and ask, "What were they thinking?," but on some level it almost makes me mad (ridiculous, I know). I mean, these people have money to burn, personal stylists, top designers literally donating the clothes that us common (and much less rich) folk try to find knock-offs of at Target, and despite all of that, THIS is what they come up with to wear? Get it together, people. Really.

Traveling

Sam helping me pack:

Both boys sleeping on the plane!! Lucky, lucky, lucky...

I can't even express how much better it is to fly with another adult when you're traveling with kids! Even at the times when they both wanted me, it was so incredibly helpful to have Ben there. Seriously, the flight seemed so much shorter this time around! The boys were really good on the way out too, but not being by myself on the way home made a world of difference.

Okay, so do you all remember this post? Evidently losing track of his food is a common occurrence with Sam...

All right. Done with the recaps. Back to present-day blogging.

Rare Family Picture

And, of course, our usual attempt at a cousin picture. One of these days we will get them all smiling at once! And, hopefully, one day soon we'll get to have our other three cousies join in.

Noah at Bedtime

Here's a short video of Noah reading the end of "But Not the Hippopotamus." I love the way he says "armadillo" at the end. Unfortunately, he has since learned the correct pronunciation. I hate that! It's so cute when they pronounce things wrong, but I guess it wouldn't be a good idea to reinforce the wrong (but cuter) way. Although sometimes I do anyway.

Another night I came in to check on Noah before I went to bed and this is how I found him, fast asleep.

All About Sam

Something I recently learned is that my baby is a big fan of lasagne. We ate dinner at our friends Mitch and Libby's house and Sam paid Chef Libby the ultimate compliment for her delicious meal: he literally licked his plate.

He's also a big fan of chocolate milk...

and of his toys...

and of sitting with his daddy...

and of playing horsey with his mama...

and of roughhousing with his grampie...