IceFest

We ventured out to Hamilton's IceFest a couple of weekends ago. It was really cold, so we did not see all the sculptures. We hit a few good ones though. This year's theme was Great Books in Ice.

Lightning McQueen....




Bob the Builder....




Frodo!

Five months old!

Cold

I am a total wimp when it comes to the cold weather. I was not like this before living in Florida for two years. I would now like to be living in Florida again, but only until March when it gets above 85. (I have a small window of comfort when it comes to temperature!)

Anyway, there was one day this month when I did suck it up and get outside with Sean. We start to drive each other crazy being in the house too much.

"Mama, can you....?" (I can't tell you how many times a day I hear this)

Sean loves to hook things together (think trains, trucks and trailers, etc.) - so he asked me to hook his shopping cart up to his bike.

Here it is in action:

Teresa is very quiet outside. At least she doesn't complain about the cold.

Sean also got his hands on a couple of tent stakes and a rope. He spent a long time setting up, resetting, and reconfiguring a "trip wire" in the yard. I think Jeff may have explained to him what that meant. We made sure we put it away when we were done so nobody (like the mailman) would get injured walking in our yard. :)

The days are getting longer, but it is usually still pretty dark when we get up in the morning. I hear someday my children will sleep in and I will struggle to get them out of bed when I want them to, but for now I have a really hard time imagining that. But I digress. Here is a good sunrise ("rainbow" in Seanese) as seen from the back of our house one morning.

Yikes

I got a little behind on the laundry over Christmas "break." "Break" meaning I was still working 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, but I took a little break from the housekeeping portion of my job for a few days. I'm still getting back into the routine of at least one load a day .(I'm sure some of you readers out there do even more than that!)

Christmas 2010

Christmas was a lot of fun this year. Sean is old enough to know what's going on, get excited, but still not get us up at 4:30 in the morning begging to open gifts. Yay! We woke up at our normal time, opened gifts at home, then went to mass. After mass we went to my (Marie's) parents house for a wonderful dinner with extended family.

Nobody minded that I ran out of Christmas-themed wrap and resorted to pink paper. :)

Sean got a real practice drum pad and sticks. We just couldn't get him a real drum - it would have been way too loud. So, he wasn't as excited as he would have been with a real drum, but he does use the practice pad. If we ever build a semi-soundproof room in our basement (which we actually might, but more for movie-watching purposes), then we will get him a real drum.

Teresa got a Sofie Giraffe from Grandma and Grandpa S. She loves it!




This is at my parents' house. Whoa that's a lot of presents!

The day after Christmas we had dinner at my grandmother's house. Teresa sported this lovely dress and managed to not spit up on it too much. (Spit up can be a big problem, especially when trying to dress her up! I don't remember Sean spitting up nearly as much as she does.) She did enjoy licking the bow, which was very amusing to watch.

Thanks again to everyone who made this Christmas so special. We are so loved and feel so blessed by your generosity!