Christmas and January

We had a fantastic Christmas this year. Our schedule was very busy, but we absolutely loved every family gathering we attended!

First stop we opened presents at Grandma and Grandpa Willmann's on Christmas Eve. Craig is quite accomplished at opening presents and was ready to go.



Here is Jeremy opening a soft bowling set. Both the boys absolutely love this bowling set and for the most part can take turns playing.



This pic was taken at home Christmas morning. It's a toy vacuum cleaner that is meant for Jeremy, but obviously Craig was excited too.



Craig got a stuffed Curious George. It was one of those gifts where he didn't even notice he had more gifts to open afterward. That good!



Now we move on to Nana and Papa Mantia's house on Christmas Day. Here is Jeremy eating a cookie with his bib on his back like a cape. He wore it that way for much longer than I expected.



Here are the boys opening more presents with Mom.



Moving into post-Christmas pictures, Craig and Jeremy helped celebrate their cousin's birthday at the Transportation Museum. It was a little cold to walk around outside. (And Craig likes to eat snow regardless of its cleanliness) But they had a blast inside. Here is Craig playing with a train set.



Jeremy and his cousin playing at the Puppet Show.



Here the boys are playing with the kitchen they have set up. Apparently it takes hard work to find just the right fake plate. And it appears they enjoyed the fake cupcakes!

Re-living the Christmas hype

So I failed to blog for a couple months now, which means you get to re-live the Christmas season with us! As I was putting the pics together I realized I had enough for more than one blog. So here are pictures from the weeks before Christmas.



Here are Craig and Jeremy having lunch at the mall. Jeremy can eat Craig under the table. He likes to stuff as much as possible into his mouth and then when he (eventually) swallows he stuffs it again!



This is Jeremy riding the bouncing Zebra. Craig likes to try to ride it with him, but clearly that thing isn't built for two little ones to ride it at once.



Yes, that's Craig getting a high-five From Santa while playing Foosball. We went to a Christmas Party that featured Santa! Well, Craig (and Jeremy) were so focused on playing with games downstairs that they refused to come upstairs for pictures. So Santa came down to Craig! It was really awesome, Craig was glad to have a playing partner.



This was our best family picture with Santa.



Next up we went to bake Christmas cookies with Grandma Willmann. Jeremy and Craig took their task seriously.



Jeremy had a good time!



This is Craig and Grandma adding ingredients. They did a great job and the cookies were yummy!

Next time I will get through the Christmas pictures. I promise to blog again before March!

It's 9 o'clock on a Saturday Morning.....

Ok, this here is what we call a "catch up blog." How it works is that I apologize for not blogging in a while, then you go "Yeah, it has been a while. What is the deal?" Then I post 2 months worth of photos and we all leave happy. Everybody got that? Good. Let's get started!

For starters, I want to bring to your attention how Jeremy looks every time he eats spaghetti. No exceptions.



We took the boys to a pumpkin patch a week before Halloween. Craig wasn't excited that day, but Jeremy took advantage of the haystack pyramid.



The boys did have a good time picking out pumpkins. Although most of the time Craig was just practicing for the punkin chunkin competition.



Here is Jeremy dressed as a cowboy with 2 of his cousins.



Here we are carving pumpkins for Halloween night. This is the best picture we had and it captures that "What are you up to?" look parents often have while supervising their children. For the record, Tania was the carving champion that night.



Craig was supposed to be a cowboy with a long sheriff jacket. But since he carried that flashlight all night most people asked us if he was a Jedi. Which made me happy.



Here is the family Halloween night. We dressed Jeremy as Tigger so he'd be warmer, but he turned out cuter. Who knew?



Here are the boys together. Craig has a lollipop addiction now. Curse you Halloween and your ridiculously tasty treats!



We move ahead to Craig's 3rd birthday! Here we have Craig getting ready to dig into some cake. He is all red because he had been playing the Wii for a while before cake and presents.



Craig got Lincoln Logs as a present! This is the first picture of Mom trying to build something and Craig/Jeremy happy to destroy it.



Finally here is a youtube clip of Craig singing and playing the piano at Grandma and Grandpa Willmann's. He had been doing it for a while, but I managed to at least catch the end. Enjoy!

...he sure plays a mean T-ball

I want everyone to know, Tania and I did NOT train Jeremy to do this. He just wanted to be like big brother! Here is a video of Jeremy setting up and "batting" from a batting tee! (That's right, my boy can play T-ball before he can walk! and I'm ok with it!)



And because we don't play favorites around here, here is Craig dressed in Cardinal gear for the playoffs. Go Cards!

Jeremy is one!

Last month Jeremy turned one! While I don't have the pics from his birthday party yet(which was awesome) I do have pics from Jeremy's first year with us!

From his first day


First few days home


Hi, I'm new here.


Halloween '08


Springtime '09


Learning to sit up!


Ready for football season!


Jeremy is still walking around furniture and has stood on his own two feet a couple times. We are still waiting on that first step and we don't think we will have to wait all that much longer!

All Star Weekend with the family

The Saturday before the All Star game Tania and the boys went to the All Star Fanfest with Grandma and Grandpa Willmann. Craig may have liked baseball before this outing, but it is clear he LOVES baseball in the weeks following. In addition to the Fanfest festivities they all went to the new City Garden where the boys played in the fountains.

Here is Craig throwing lefty, which is weird because he throws predominantly right handed. Being ambidextrous is a handy skill to have in life!



This is Craig hitting off the batting tee. He hits off a tee in our backyard pretty often now, although he clearly prefers when somebody pitches to him. Note the determination.



Tania and the boys with the grandparents at Fanfest



This is Craig hitting off a tee with an aluminum bat. Pretty good form considering he is used to using a yellow wiffle ball bat! (He stopped using the big red kids bat at the beginning of summer)



Jeremy playing in the fountains at the City Garden. He was having so much fun and being so cute other people were taking pictures of him too!



Craig had fun in the fountains too!



This youtube video shows the boys playing at the City Garden and the aforementioned fountains.

Tania's Birthday 09

We were able to celebrate Tania's birthday with the family last weekend. The plan was simple: BBQ for the adults, sprinkler for the kids. The result was pure awesome.

Craig and his cousin Lily playing in the kiddie pool. The real hit was the sprinkler. It was the greatest thing to ever happen to Craig.



Jeremy was content playing with the giant blue/green ball.



The cousins are all playing on our swing set. The swing set was our neighbors who gave it to us when they moved. Score!



Jeremy and his cousin Benjamin. Jeremy was a ball hog, every time we gave Ben a ball Jeremy would steal it even if it meant using his feet!



And of course we sang Happy Birthday, which is always a big hit with Craig because he loves to blow out candles. In fact, anytime Craig sees a candle he wants to blow it out which occasionally makes Church a little interesting.