Even superheroes have to go to the ER sometimes, right?

WARNING: SOME GRAPHIC CONTENT

Jack's first visit to the ER was Sunday. This was a small miracle in itself to me, considering how daring and adventurous he is with climbing and exploring. We should have made friends in there months ago! But I definitely didn't expect his first blood-gushing accident to happen during Church.

He heaved himself onto a piano bench during Sunday School, the bench tipped forward, and he cut the back of his head open when it collided with the underside of the piano keyboard. After lots of paper towels; a bandage from the ER-nurse who goes to Church with us; and a friend's willingness to take care of Cat for the foreseeable future; Ben, Jack, and I headed to the ER.

Jack acted like nothing was wrong and was walking around greeting everyone in the waiting room until it was our turn to be seen. After 2.5 hours and 4 staples (which didn't sit so well with the little superhero) we headed home, expecting the worst. But after he slept it off (from 4:15pm until 6am) he was completely fine--apparently no lingering side effects! Let's just hope the removal of the staples goes as well.

(Not such a good picture, I know. But it's harder than you'd think to get a picture of a specific spot on the back of a toddler's head!)

Post-Christmas Snow Storm in Southeast Georgia

The day after Christmas, Ben's brother John brought his family up to our house to hang out for a few hours. As a surprise for everyone, my sister-in-law, Sarah, wrapped a box of tissues for each cousin to open, and then use as snowballs!

5 boxes x 200 tissues = LOTS of fun
(and LOTS of fluff that we were all coughing up for a little while. But totally worth it!)

Cat's first snow angel:

Cousin love!

Jack's Tribute to Kevin Mallone (yep, he did it himself, but he needed a little help walking):

(For any non-Office viewers out there, you won't regret watching this video. You'll see the Kleenex Box Shoes around 0:55.)

A Few More Christmas Pictures

Cat's last day of school before winter break. They all wore PJs and watched "Polar Express" and drank hot chocolate, then parents were invited for a Holiday Party. After we ate more very healthy food, the class did a small musical presentation. Jack sat right down with the class as they prepared, and even grabbed an instrument. He wants to be in Cat's class so bad!

The Sunday before Christmas. This is the best picture I could get by myself, since Ben had already left for his meeting.

The first thing Jack touched Christmas morning was a small board book with a few musical buttons. He was more into that book than anything else for a while. He would push a button, dance to the music, push a button, dance to the music, push, dance, push, dance.
(He did take notice of other gifts... eventually.)

Couldn't resist including this picture... we love this hat that's about 3 sizes too big. It doesn't really matter when you only wear it 5 times during the whole winter, right?

The princess was nestled all snug in her castle...
Whenever we asked Cat in the last several weeks what she wanted for Christmas, at the top of her list was "a real princess castle." This was the best we could do, but she loves it! She even slept in it during her nap on Christmas day, and all night Christmas night (along with the pillow pet and blanket pet Grammy gave her).

Gettin' Down at the Holiday Concert

The last week of school before winter break, the Pre-K kids at Cat's school performed with the 4th and 5th Grade Chorus. Cat did a great job, entertaining not only during the songs she was supposed to, but during the other ones too. She just couldn't keep her awesome dancing moves to herself. This is what she was doing every time she didn't have "choreography" or something in her hand to shake. Good thing she was front and center!

This is Cat after the concert with one of her good friends.
Don't you just love the Rudolph shirts?
(Check out how small Cat's foot is compared to her hands...)

Luvin the Library

A few weeks ago, our library had a couple of great activities. In the morning, the local paint-your-own-pottery place had the kids painting ornaments, and they will fire them and bring them back for us to pick up at the library in a week--for free! Cat was very focused painting her star the entire time, and Jack was pretty well occupied painting as well. When Jack finished painting one side of his mitten ornament, I turned it over and put his hand print on the back.



After the painting was over, there was a small puppet show, and this was my first time witnessing Cat raising her hand to be a volunteer for something like this! She was chosen as the very first volunteer and had to hold the hula hoop while a balloon dog leaped through it. She was laughing the whole time, but she did a great job. I think Pre-K has gotten her all the way out of her shell... she just needed a little more coaxing for situations like this where she doesn't know anyone

The things they learn in Pre-K.

"I can write my name in cur-fish!"

Cookie Monsters

Tonight one of my friends came over to bring some delicious Christmas goodies. I decided to leave the kids in the house while I walked her out to her car. When I came back in the house a few minutes later, this is what I found:

I couldn't stop laughing. At least they were happy!

And they were good enough to save a few crumbs for Ben and me.

Gingerbread

I grew up with the tradition of decorating sugar cookies every Christmas (and many other holidays during the year.) I have tried to continue this tradition, but with the busy-ness of the season, it's just too much to prepare and clean up, so this year I gave up! And we tried something new: decorating gingerbread men/women. It's a much more manageable task (no sprinkles to roll all over the house!) and I only made one large one for each of us to decorate. Perfect for FHE last week.

Can you guess which one Cat decorated?

Last week Cat also got to make a "Gingerbread" House for a family fun day at school. They used graham crackers and small milk cartons--perfect! This is what Cat came up with:

(Side note: I was very proud of myself because I let her do it all herself! Other parents there were telling their children what candy to use, where to put it, and how to put it on. I mostly just advised on the most efficient use of frosting, since there was barely enough for all the kids.)

The Christmas Parade

On Saturday we ventured downtown for the annual city Christmas Parade. We've missed it the last few years for various reasons, and I was excited that we were finally going. Let's just say, it was a great parade for me to go to by myself with the kids, since Ben had to be at a training for Church. It was cold and threatening rain, so there were very few people out watching. That means we got great parking, and no competition for our corner viewing area! Plus, we were right by the library in case anybody needed to make an emergency potty stop. (The library behind the kids also has big windows in the kid section, so we considered just watching from there, where it was warm, but Cat really wanted to stay outside.)


This float got my attention because of all the greenery, and I took a picture before I noticed the man dressed in a white robe. It was Jesus. When he turned around, he waved a peace sign at us. 'Tis the season, right?
Santa came at the end of the parade, and it was great to listen to Cat debate with herself whether this was the REAL Santa or one of his Santa-helpers who goes out and makes public appearances for him.

Cat forgot her coat (I guess it was my fault for leaving it up to her to remember it) so after a little while, she joined us in the beach chair. It was fun to have 2 1/2 kids bundled up with me, and we were all nice and warm! Jack was entertained for a while pointing out all the cars, "Ka! Voom voom!" but then he didn't want to stay still, so the lollipops the parade folks handed out helped him stay happy until the end.

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

We usually try to get our Christmas tree up Thanksgiving weekend, but since we were so busy having fun in Tallahassee, we opted for the Monday after, as an FHE.

Jack thought playing with new, small items was very fun and only broke about 3 ornaments. Not too bad!

He also thought we had too many on the tree, and kept trying to take them off.

Cat, on the other hand, was really helpful.
She took the task of decorating the tree very seriously.

So we rewarded her with the honor of placing the mitten on the "highest bow." (Reader's Digest version of a slightly longer story: our first Christmas, we didn't have a star or "real" topper, so we looked around and saw this mitten. I love this little mitten my Aunt Jeanne gave me as a wrapping item/decoration a few years ago--the front of it has different red rick-rack stripes on it--so we plopped it on our tree, and we've used it ever since.)

I love that the ratio of store-bought/homemade ornaments is starting to lean more toward the homemade side. It's so fun to look back at the things we've made at home, or what Cat's made at school or Church, not to mention the things we still have from when Ben and I were kids making homemade ornaments.

We are so excited for this joyous season!
We hope you are enjoying your celebrations with your families.

Luvin the Toddlerhood

That's at least 30 yards of wired Christmas ribbon. And it provided TONS of fun!

Lesson learned: do NOT attempt to put this away immediately after the toddler makes a mess. Most likely, it has not provided its maximum capacity for fun until after a few days. By the time I did clean this up, Jack wasn't really interested in it anymore, and it was much easier than when I initially tried to clean it up and he kept pulling on the ribbon and fussing.

Thanksgiving Adventures

We had a wonderful time in Tallahassee for Thanksgiving Weekend. I apologize for the volume of photos... believe it or not, this is only about 10% of the pictures we took! So here is my attempt at concisely capturing 4 fun-filled days.

Cat decorated the kids' table with flowers from Mema and Papa's yard, then set to work coloring until it was time to eat. Do you see the crown on her left? Mema gave it to her when we arrived and Cat wore it pretty much the whole weekend.

Jack entertains himself before the meal by, ahem, eating.

Cat enjoying her meal with her adorable cousin Levi. Notice the crown.

Climbing in the fig tree at sunset. Again, the crown.

On Friday we met our good friends Tim and Cassie, and their daughters Lana and Madi at Mission San Luis, a historic park rebuilt to resemble its appearance in the 1600's, when it was the western capital of La Florida, run by the Spanish. Here, all the kids admire a hen with some chicks at the friary kitchen.

Cat insisted on wearing this crown the whole weekend. And the staff at San Luis stayed in character as much as possible, so we kept hearing things like, "Ah, we have a princess in our midst! Where do you hail from, young princess?" Cat didn't seem to mind.

The town was mostly inhabited by Apalachee Indians, so the council house was central to the day-to-day activities. This volcano-looking building held up to 3000 people! Here, Cat and Lana are going into not-for-tall-people entrance.

Outside the fort at San Luis.

Estoy casada a un conquistador!

Near the parking lot of the Mission, there was this great hill! Cat and Lana had a blast rolling on it, but unfortunately, sometimes it was hard for them to roll DOWN.

On Saturday we went to Ben's long-time friends' farm for the annual cane grinding. Here, Ben, Cat, Jack, and Papa are watching as the cane juice is slowly cooked in a giant pot over an enclosed clay oven with a fire on one side. It will be syrup before long!

It might be a little too hot for a bath, Jack.

Cat trying out a chunk of raw sugar cane.

Jack liked the sugar cane.

A lot.

Mmmm.... fresh cane syrup over a warm biscuit.
She's getting royal treatment all over the place!

That night we ate hotdogs and roasted marshmallows around a campfire at Mema and Papa's house, then Papa took us for a hayride in his pick-up truck.

Cat with her cousin Cassy, whom she hardly lets out of her sight whenever she's in the same city.

Ben and Jack all snuggled up on the hayride.

We are so grateful for the fun time we had over our Thanksgiving weekend with family and friends.
It was the perfect vacation.