Children's Garden

Today was our last day with Grandma and Grandpa here.  We headed over to the Children's Garden.  The boys both love to play there.

Dinosaurs Oh My!!

The day after Christmas we went to the State Museum with Grandma and Grandpa to visit the dinosaur exhibit.  The boys loved it!  They both roared like dinosaurs and were thrilled to see the huge dinos!  They really loved playing with the joysticks to make a big dino move. 

We also managed to see some other parts of the museum.  Jack like the electricity displays.  Jack and Daddy both loved the space section!!

As we left we got an annual pass....ALL my boys still have so much more they would love to do (play with) there!!

Christmas Goodies

We did well in the present department this year.  I got lots of camera goodies, the boys got WAY  TOO MANY toys (of course the LOVE them all though), Josh got his "man" goodies....

Christmas Eve we all spent at Oma and Opa's and Christmas day at our house.  The boys did pretty well considering they were overwhelmed with so many new toys at once!

USC Horseshoe

We went to take photos at the Horseshoe again, this time with Grandma and Grandpa.  Family photos remain extremely difficult!!!!  We had tons of fun anyway!

See Jack's smile???

Zoo Lights

We took the boys to the Zoo Lights on the 23rd...the night before we went to Lights on the River so it was our second night out LATE for Christmas fun!  Not too many of the animals are out at night, but we had fun seeing them all.  Jack recognized most of the light shapes. 

Jack was excited to see Santa.  As we stood in line he jumped up and down and kept saying "see Santa"....but as expected he wanted nothing to do with Santa when we got up there!!  The best we could do was get him to give Santa five and a fist bump.

Photo Shoot

This afternoon the boys and I went to the USC Horseshoe to take some photos of the boys.  They are getting slighly better but still remain difficult to capture the perfect picture.  Of course there really is no such thing as the perfect picture I suppose, and they certainly do make great candids!!

Jack was busy chasing squirrels and Ewan was busy eating leaves and acorns!!  Always something to deal with!!

ENJOY

Madness

So it's been complete madness around here lately.  The holidays are far too busy, well maybe it's just the boys as usual keeping me busy!   Where to begin....Friday we took down Jack's crib.  Finally he has more space in his room to play.  Unfortunately, he does't care to stay in bed!  At night I now have to stay with him until he falls asleep, or close to it.  Needless to say he isn't very quick about it.  He is enjoying his new freedom too much!!  Last night I left him at 8:30, still awake.  He took that time to turn his light on and dump all his legos on his bed to play.  He was up til after 9PM!!  Life was definitely easier when we could put him in the crib at 8 and be done with it!  We also have to lock all the doors upstairs and shut the gate....Sunday I forgot Ewan's door and Jack woke him up at nap time.  Ewan never recovered, Jack finally went to sleep much later.  I was stuck trying to bake cookies with Ewan running around downstairs!

Otherwise it's pretty much life as always.  Two extremely active boys...and stuck inside because of rain lately.  They do pretty well with the Chistmas tree, however, every now and then they get obsessed with it and won't stop going to check it out.  After shooing them away for the millionth time or so we head upstairs to play where there is less temptation!!

Jack is enjoying all his Christmas books.  He realizes now that Santa say "ho ho ho"!  He is loving all the holiday decorations he sees everywhere.  We haven't gone to see Santa yet, we'll probably do that at Zoo Lights.  Hopefully it will go better...last year Jack freaked out!!

Tomorrow when Oma has Jack for the morning Ewan and I hope to finish Christas shopping.  We pretty much just have stocking stuffers left.  Unfortunately morning are tricky...Ewan is still holding onto his morning nap.

Last week Josh did get a job offer from the company buying his plant.  SO...he will still be employed after the new year.  YEAH!!!

This evening the boys and I are headed to Oma's for her birthday dinner and cake.  Jack had fun checking out the cake I baked last night!  Josh has a meeting so we'll have to bring him a doggie bag.

That pretty much sums up life at Chez Dalrymple!  Busy chasing the boys and trying to keep the house from falling apart!!  The best news is that my new washer and dryer arrive in ONE WEEK....not soon enough but I'll still party when they get here!!

No new pictures just yet, too busy to take any.  I'm hoping to take some of the boys at USC once winter break commences so early next week if the weather AND boys cooperate!!

Christmas Excitement

Jack continues to be very excited about Christmas, not that he has a full understanding about it!  Sunday night we got our tree and put it up.  The boys each got a chance to put up their new ornaments (following tradition, each of the boys got an ornament for St. Nick's day that morning, and Christmas pjs from Oma and Opa).  Then after they went to bed I decorated the tree.  I wasn't even able to put all the ornaments up...too many, especially since I had to limit the lower level of the tree!

Monday morning when the boys came downstairs they were excited to see the tree decorated.  Jack kept pointing out the ornaments..."I see Santa", "I see snowman", "I see bike"!!  It was quite refreshing seeing such excitement.  Then when we came back from an afternoon walk the lights were on the tree...the timer set off while we were out.  Jack and Ewan were both thrilled to see the tree lit up!

So that's life around here, gearing up for the holidays.  Tomorrow we've got a holiday potluck with our playgroup at our house.  That should be fun and yummy!  We've also got some cookie exchanges coming up and other fun activities.  Time to think if there are any new traditions we want to start with the boys...we've carried on the St. Nick ornament tradition, and of course homemade pizza for Christmas Eve dinner and mimosa brunch Christmas morning.  Time to come up with a new Dalrymple tradition to add to the season!

In other news....the weekend away from the kids, hubs and dog went well.  We ate out and were lazy the whole time!!  Well we cooked some too I guess.  I also got both the boys' scrapbooks done and the family album worked on until I ran out of tape!! Oma started knitting Ewan's hat...the ear flaps are done.  We also got the yarn for Jack' hat too.  They are the most adorable patterns!!  We did end the weekend with drugs and drinking...stopped by the Minute Clinic.  We both have sinus infections!!  So even being sick I got a good amount done, amazing what you can accomplish without the kids!!!

Jack putting up his new ornament (a zebra).

Ewan putting up his new ornament (a penguin).

Ewan checking out the tree.

Oh, the trouble we can get into!!!