Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and Happy New Year to friends and family near and far! We are enjoying our holiday with family in Pennsylvania, waiting anxiously for Santa to come this evening. We've had a busy couple of months, and I know we have some catching up to do on this blog. But it's all good, just lots of work, travel, and fun play. 

In the meantime, Happy Holidays!!

 

Halloween 2011

I'm a lion, hear me roar!! Griffin was a lion for halloween this year, and made a pretty cute one at that! We started the halloween fun the week before the big day, with our neighborhood kids halloween party. When they were looking for volunteers a couple of months ago, I went ahead and responded. One thing I've learned from moving so often, is that there are two great ways to start meeting people. One is to invite people over (like, anyone you know, even people you've just met...), and the other is to volunteer for stuff. So that's how I ended up chair of the games committee for the party. A party which, I quickly learned, often has something like 150+ kids attend it! Did I mention we live in a very family-friendly neighborhood? Despite being right downtown, you can't toss a stone without hitting a stroller or a dog. Which is why we like it. So here I am, in charge of party games, when I've never been to this party before, and my son is barely old enough to even play games. Oh, and I don't really know anyone in the neighborhood, and was traveling to the Philippines for the main party planning meeting. But of course, I am a former student government president and sorority girl after all, so I dug deep and did my best in my new mom role as neighborhood kids party planner! On the day of the party, I wore an old M&Ms costume my mom made when I was a kid, that still fit (more or less), and I actually won a prize for the adult costume. (although....not many adults dressed up!)

I love this picture because you can see Griffin's top two teeth here, which he finally has- totalling four! But at 16 1/2 months, he still only has 4 teeth! They're funny looking too, because at least at this point, there's a big gap between them!

On the actual night of halloween, we walked over to our friends house, who has a son the same age as Griffin, and a couple other friends came with their toddlers. Griffin walked up the front steps to a house along the way, but didn't really get the trick or treating thing. So we tried a few more times and it was cute, but we felt funny taking candy for Griffin when he didn't really understand what to do when they held it out for him. After we put him to bed, we sat out front and handed out candy to tons and tons of kids that came by. Steve and I figure we gave out over 500 pieces of candy, before we finally threw in the towel at about 8:30pm, even though there were still some kids around! Wow!

He was walking down the street, holding my hand, just at the beginning of the evening. This woman opened her door with her candy bowl and thought Griffin was adorable. So he climbed up her steps, but when she tried to give him a piece of candy, he just looked at her, a little confused! But I guess it was his first official trick or treating.

Patriots Fan

Griffin spent the afternoon last Sunday with his dad, watching the Patriots football game! Thanks to cousin Brady for the great Patriots jersey hand me down- it even says "Brady" on the back!

Fridge Magnets

We're going to have to ask Santa to bring us some fun kid fridge magnets, because Griffin has just discovered magnets. We gave him a bunch of our regular fridge magnets to play with and he loves it!

Sermon on the Stairs

Mr. Griffin has a lot to say these days. The other day as we were going downstairs for breakfast he stopped at the top of the stairs and decided not to follow me down. While I went into the kitchen and started to get breakfast ready, he stood at the top of the stairs, holding on to the sides of the baby gate, and proceeded to preach some sort of sermon or something. Or tell a really long, energetic story.  In complete baby talk. Though at one point I think I heard something resembling "Christie!" - in the same tone that his dad uses to call me- calling me to make sure I was listening to him. He's now 16 1/2 months old and doesn't really talk yet, but we think we're hearing the beginnings of a few words. He's getting "dada" more directed to Steve than before, I'm pretty sure he means it now. And he babbles "mama" randomly a lot, but sometimes he does seem to point it to me. I think "go" might be his first official word- he definitely says "go go go" and goes over to the stroller by the door if he wants to go outside. And I think he's trying to say "ball" when he says "ba" and I think he means "truck" when he looks at a truck and says "uck," and the nanny thinks he's trying to tell the dogs to settle down when they play rowdy when he says something that barely resembles "stop!" So we'll see-  my guess is that once he starts to get those words in order, there will be no stopping him and all that he has to say!

Haystacks, teepees, and a hayride

In the fall in the US, a popular thing to do is to visit a local farm and check out the haystacks and other farm-like stuff. This one was about 20 minutes outside of the city and was frankly a bit disappointing, but I think Griffin still enjoyed the morning out. They had a little toddler's maze made out of hay bales, and the kids could crawl through these big black plastic tunnels. Interestingly, Griffin was really not so sure at first, about crawling into the tunnel. But after a while of watching the other kids, and stepping a foot in and standing in the entrance way, eventually he got brave enough and crawled right through! The animal part of the farm was disappointing too, as there weren't very many and you couldn't pet them. But Griffin still liked looking in at the pigs. We also did a hay ride through the pumpkin patch- and at the bottom here, just for fun, I attached a picture of a hayride we took last year, when Griffin was just 4 months old! 

    

 

Our hayride with my mom and nephew Mason and Griffin, who was 4 months old in this picture!

Weekend away

A few weeks ago we headed out to Deep Creek, MD, so that Steve could do the bike portion of a triathalon relay called "The Savage Man." We stayed in a really nice cabin with our friends who were also in the race, and their children. We had such a nice time, and Griffin really enjoyed playing with the other kids. He's 15 months here. He also has a really nice mark on his forehead in some of these pictures, that is from a mosquito bite that he got when we were on our back patio at home, if you can believe it!

   

  

     

Griffin and his friend Spencer