5 Months!

The days might be long, but the weeks are short, and another month has flown by!

"But what if they can't handle this cuteness??"

"I bet Parenting magazine could handle it! You've been working on my contract, right?"

"Oh! It's Papa's birthday today? Happy Birthday Papa!"

"It's quite simple really, to lure one's parent's into a false sense of success - I simply gave them great nights for almost a week, only waking up once, and then went back to getting up 2-3 times a night after that!"

"Ooohhh yeah, that's a lot of spit up on your shirt there...sorry about that."

"I got a special package from Uncle Jason?!" 

"Communication device? Uh...no idea what you're talking about..."

"Welp. There goes that plan..."

"I mean, no! Uncle Jason and I were NOT planning to sneak me into the theater for Star Wars. Nope. Would never think of it."

"Uhhh...this is kinda awkward."

"So, ummm...how about a snack?"

Christmas Houses, Christmas Trains, Christmas Lights, Christmas Socks

Once again, I'm trying to stay on top of blogging all the fun we've been up to for Christmas. I get to the point where I have way too many pictures on my camera, and I know that it's time for a bloggy catch up post :)

So. First off, we started the month with our annual gingerbread-house-making date night. This year I managed to plan far enough ahead of time (the dough has to chill overnight) AND I made enough dough (you need a lot for one house) for both John and I to decorate our own gingerbread houses. Also, I realized that for a really cool gingerbread house, fun-shaped sprinkles are the way to go. The candy was mostly for eating ;)

In his own words, John went for the 'rustic cabin' look.

He even had a cellar door!

I think the chimney was my favorite :)

I had so much fun with the sprinkles, isn't my wreath so fun!?

Not too shabby this year, eh?

We took the boys to the train garden again this year. The volunteer fire department in our community puts this on every year, and it's free! It's basically this huge display of a miniature town and train tracks. We took Nathan last year and I think he enjoyed it even more this year. Spencer got pretty excited about it too ;)

 
We even got to see the fire trucks!

We also met up with my family down at the DC temple to see the Christmas lights and nativities. It was colder than I'd expected, so we weren't as prepared as I would have liked to be, but we scraped together some extra layers for both of the boys, so at least they stayed warm. :)

We saw this amazing Thai nativity that we'd never seen before!

Can't resist a good German nativity :)

I also finally made stockings this year. (I know, we've been married how long?) I had wanted to make some last year but I was so crazy busy and newly pregnant with Spencer (can you believe that was last year?!) and so. It didn't happen. But I got a screamin' deal on Black Friday at JoAnn's on the exact fabric I had envisioned in my head for the project, so it all worked out. I didn't really follow any one tutorial, I sort of mashed up a few that I liked and made it up as I went along. I tend to do that a lot. But I think they turned out really nice. I used batting on the inside too so they are nice and plushy. :) I cut out the monograms out of this fancy-schmancy gold cardstock I found at a consignment sale. It might have taken me TEN FREAKING TRIES (I was a little frustrated, if you couldn't tell) on my silhouette to get the blade to cut cleanly all the way through the cardstock because it was much thicker than I expected, but oh. The finished product makes it all worth it. I love them. And I found these gorgeous gold glitter reindeer stocking hangers at Target and I finally put up my German Christmas pyramid (I finally decided on top of the media center was the only safe place for it) and the final result is lovely. Nathan loves our "Christmas socks". Soon they will be jam-packed with Christmas candy! And maybe a few other surprises too. :)

Whew! I think we're all caught up on holiday fun. For now!

Thanksgiving 2015

A little late to the party I guess, but I'm here with our Thanksgiving festivities. We spent the weekend at my parent's house and for me personally, was a very much needed break from life. Nana and Papa were happy to take care of the boys and I could relax and not worry about, well, anything. The boys and I came down with my mom on Wednesday afternoon and John came in later that night after work. We basically enjoyed eating, playing and hanging out with each other, and it was great!

Spencer is big enough for the 'space station' exer-saucer! It was a little warm in the house that day so we got to squeal over his chubby rolls.

Oh, he is just so cute. And getting so big! I can't even believe he's almost 5 months already. 

Those arm rolls, though!

Nathan loved being at Nana's house and all the technology that he gets to play with there. They have a really old iPod touch that no one uses anymore, can't connect to the internet and has some random apps and music on it that he now uses as 'his phone'. He loves it.

There was playing cars with Daddy

And Christmas decorating!

We ate turkey (which was good, despite having been in the freezer since last year and my failed attempts to convince my mom to throw it away) and it was so, so nice to be with family.

Black Friday consisted of my mom and I spending most of the day out shopping and it was sooooo fun! By the time we were done I think we'd stopped at Michaels, Target, Old Navy, Charming Charlie, Costco and Five Guys (to get everyone lunch :) ) Whew! Lots of good deals were to be had, we finally finished putting together everyone's outfits for family photos this month and after a few online orders later that afternoon, my Christmas shopping was DONE. Bam. We had some friends over for dessert that night and after the boys were in bed, John and I got to go out and be by ourselves for a little while. And that was soooo nice. :)

We had a few projects to work on on Saturday while we sent all the boys (except Spencer) to Gander Mountain to look at manly man outdoorsy things and pick up some stuff at Lowe's. Then it was time for us to head home.

I've been feeling so grateful for my greatest blessings: my wonderful husband, my sweet boys and my amazingly supportive family. I've been richly blessed! I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving too!

I am Grape. You are Cherry. And the Great Star Wars Conspiracy

So, if you've never heard of Brian Regan, he's this great comedian with this skit about being in Little League. And how he wasn't very good. His favorite part was the snow cone at the end of the game. And he was going to get a grape flavored snow cone. Because it's favorite. He likes cherry too, but grape is more favorite.

This is the basis of an inside joke we have in my family. I, being the oldest, am grape. My brother Jason, the second oldest, is cherry. He's favorite too, but not as favorite. He believes that as the second oldest he's gotten the short end of the stick his whole life. Though if you ask me, being the favorite has less to do with birth order and more to do with the fact that I was the more obedient child growing up. (I'm telling the story Jason, so it's going to be my point of view) ;)

Now that I have a second child, Jason has decided that he is Spencer's biggest fan and support system for being number 2. If you have been following Spencer's monthly pictures, I have a running joke that Spencer really wants to see Star Wars: The Force Awakens this month and that Jason is going to smuggle him into the theater to see it. I didn't realize this was an actual thing until I intercepted some top secret intelligence that was going back and forth between my brother and my second son.

I (or I guess I should say Spencer) got this in the mail this week:

The document contains the following:

Congratulations operative. You have been selected to begin the next phase of your training. 

You will now be referred to as 'Agent 2'.

This family is being overrun by what we call 'number ones'. Recent intelligence has discovered that everyone you currently trust has been named as a number one: Mama, Dada, Nana, Papa, Eryn, and even your brother Nathan. It is imperative that you don't release any information into the number one's communications network. 

Number twos stick together, therefore, the following section outlines the details of Operation Force Awakens:

Phase 1:
Convince Nana to buy a large bag of sour patch kids.
Coax Mama into eating all of the sour patch kids (that should be easy) or at least empty the bag.

Phase 2
Wait for my arrival at the rendezvous point.

Phase 3
One the day of the movie, sneak into the bag.
I will volunteer to harbor the candy (with you in it) and bring it into the movie.

Phase 4:
Sneak out of the bag and sit on my lap and watch Star Wars: The Force Awakens (try not to cry). 

I have included a communication device with this message. Put them on if you need to contact HQ. 

Remember Agent 2, trust no ONE.

Agent II

The pair of socks is the communication device. Or so I assume. I'm going to have to debug them to put them through the laundry. In any case, Jason gets major Uncle points for being so creative and hilarious. We loved it! So glad Spencer has Number 2 support. :)