John is 2

Today our baby is officially 2 years old. He has been working on the terrible 2's for a couple of weeks, but has finally reached the age to say that he is in it. We had a fun party with friends and family and it turned out to be a beautiful day. It is a wonderful living in Colorado when your birthday is in February and you get to play outside! We are excited for the next couple of years to see him developing into a full blown kid. He and Nettie are enjoying playing with each other and are starting to do so more often. We hope everyone is having a great February so far!

Is it February already???

Picture 1: Our happy boy
Picture 2: Nettie puts on her own lip gloss
Picture 3: Don't they love each other!

Here we are in the second month of 2009 already. So far, 2009 has been filled with fun travels, and events. January started with a date night for Ben and Tiffany. Our New Year tradition has become an at home date, and this year, Nettie started to understand that when January 1 came, it would be 2009. She like to tell everyone she saw this and each day would say "today is the 5th day of 2009". Thankfully, that only lasted about a week. We baptized our niece Lily on the 11th. It was a beautiful service and an enjoyable time with both families. I traveled to Oklahoma over Martin Luther King weekend to visit my friends Chris and Jen and meet their new baby Alyssa. It was a great trip and it was so much fun to spend that much time with a little baby. It also made me appreciate how far we have come since those days. Ben enjoyed his alone time with the kids, although he was happy to have me return home. Due to me getting strep, we had to skip our annual trip to the mountains with Ben's family. It was sad to miss the weekend, although the quiet weekend was a great way to get better.

Now, we are in February. The month has started busy with Ben traveling to Davenport to visit his Dad for a couple of days. We all miss him, but it sounds like he is getting a lot of stuff done while he is there. We will be celebrating John's 2nd birthday at the end of the month, hard to believe our baby is 2, but he is acting it! He is also starting to talk more and definitely lets you know when he doesn't like something. John loves to build things with legos and blocks, but his favorite this to do is paint or draw. If he has a pen and a piece of paper, her can busy himself for at least 30 minutes. It is fun to watch him just sit and draw.

Nettie is also getting used to having a brother that no longer leaves her stuff alone. He is in to all of her stuff and will do anything he can to get it away from her. We are all learning to deal with this and the best way to keep them from attacking each other. It doesn't happen often, but when it does, it is interesting. Nettie is loving school and is currently working on reading. It is fun to read books with her and watch her figure out words. She also loves to play games and dress up.

Wintertime

I love Winter, and I am lucky enough to live in a place that just as I am getting tired of it, it warms up, and just as I am ready for it, it is here! It has been a little cold the last few weeks and I am ready for one of those great Colorado winter days were it reaches 60 degrees, hopefully we will get that this week. To get past the cold this year, we have (for the first time in 4 years) started using our wood-burning stove to heat the house. This is not a normal stove, it is an insert to our fireplace. It has a blower on it that warms the entire main floor of the house. Our house, which is usually about 65 degrees is suddenly around 70-75 degrees. I love having a fireplace! I am also excited to see what this does to our electric bill since the furnace doesn't come on when we have a good fire going.

On a side note, the kids are having a great time post Christmas. They are enjoying all the new toys, books and games. More books and games than toys, thankfully it seemed a good year for those things. Now we are all just working on the sharing side of life! John has started copying everything that Nettie is doing which is cute to us, sometimes cute to Nettie. She enjoys having a new playmate that will run around the house after her since Mom and Dad are not that fun.

Merry Christmas!

It is amazing that we are halfway through the day. The kids have enjoyed Christmas this year, Nettie fully understanding what Santa Claus is all about. We hope that everyone is having a wonderful Holiday!

Holiday Card Delimma

So, I ordered our Xmas card this year, same as always, and as I completed them last night, I realized that I had a problem. I had not ordered enough cards. I was about 10 short where in years past, I have always had too many. So now I have to decide what to do, do I go get more cards, or do I just apologize to those loving friends and family that will not be seeing a card from us this year. I have decided to take the later, as it is already 12/19. Christmas has snuck up on me this year, Thanksgiving was late and I am not sure where the time went. So if you are reading this, and you have not received a card this year, we are thinking of you and wish everyone a very Happy Holiday season.

We are starting our celebrations this weekend, and are looking forward to lots of time with family and friends.

Babies are great

When John was born, cousin Paige, who was 4 at the time, thought he was the greatest thing. He was a real doll. She would help hold him, feed him and was a terrific helper when anything needed to be done. As John got a little older, and could move on his own, he would voice his opinion, and still does (where does he get that from?) whenever Paige helped him too much. When Paul and Kathleen annouced that in the fall a new Cribari would be joining the family, we knew that Nettie would now be the guardian over the newest baby. It started right away that she wanted to hold the baby. She loves seeing her new cousin, and playing with all the new toys at Uncle Paul's and Aunt Kathleen's. On Thanksgiving, she decided that she wanted to hold the baby, and did it several times. I am sure that in a few short months Lily will be letting Nettie know that she doesn't need as much assistance as Nettie would like to give, but for now, it is just fun to see another baby join the crowd, and her older cousin loving her.

Getting ready for Christmas

We have a neighbor who has one of those annoying signs that actually counts down how many days there are until Christmas. As we drive by every night we look and it and I cringe. Ben and I took a vacation day to shop, and have most of the shopping done. We have a few more gifts to get, but I still have decorating to do and baking to do. We made cookies last weekend at Mom and Dad's which was fun. and now at least those are done.
The kids are LOVING the holiday season. They are enjoying the advent calendars that they open each night after dinner. The lights on houses and on the tree. They play all the musical animals we have in the house ALL day long. It is so fun to watch the excitement in their eyes. Nettie has her Christmas program next week, so video will soon follow. Nettie sat on Santa's lap at school this week, and was excited to do so, what a change a year makes. We will be taking them to sit on Santa's lap soon, special torture for John! We hope that everyone is enjoying the season. IT has finally started to snow in Colorado, so we are getting more in the mood everyday, so if I can just finish the decorations we will be ready.