December

So far the month of December has been crazy despite being in a city with nothing to do. After getting back from St. Louis, we welcomed our friends Jill and Isabelle to Charleston. Isabelle is 3 and one of Emma's dear friends from Cincinnati. We enjoyed some good time hanging out and playing.

Enjoying some time snuggling and reading...one of the few quiet moments of the week.

The girls decorated cutout cookies. The amount of icing and sprinkles everywhere was a good indication that they had a great time. I don't know that I have ever seen so many sprinkles on one cookie.


While Jill and Isabelle were here we attempted to go to the Parade of Boats. Apparently there is a large parade of boats decorated for Christmas through the harbor. We pack dinner and the kids and went. On the way there Jonah projectile vomited everywhere. It was awful. We cleaned him up and since he seemed fine, we kept on going...it is amazing what you push through when there are two three year olds whining in the back seat. The biggest problem was lack of clothes for Jonah. So, we wrapped him in Mike's sweater and put him in the carrier. We arrived at the viewing site and waited for the 5:00 parade to begin. We abandoned the effort when at 6:00 there were still no boats. The kids were so excited to see the lights at the Christmas tree stands on the way home that it made up for no parade.

We enjoyed a few trips to the beach to play in the sand. I was pleasantly surprised to find how delightful the beach can be this time of year with my kids. There is minimal mess to track home when they are not getting wet. Since then we have been back to the beach again since Jonah asks to go everyday and carries his shovel around all day long.

Emma has been enjoying dressing up. She dresses herself up as well as all of her babies...and her brother.

Emma and I had "girl time" with Mariela and Ms. Miller. We went to the holiday lights display at the county park. While it was not the Festival of Lights, it was an amazing display. The girls got to ride the carrousel, roast marshmallows, and ride the train. It was a really fun night and good to enjoy something fun in Charleston.

Warning...they do break. I dropped my phone - completely my own fault and shattered my screen. Thankfully it still works.

Mike joined us for some play time at the beach and built a turtle with Emma. She had so much fun with Daddy while Jonah and I ran around and played ball.

We decorated our tree. Emma hung all of her own ornaments and some of Jonah's. There is a high concentration of ornaments on about three branches. Jonah has done really well leaving the tree alone and just talking to the ornaments. He especially loves the snowmen ornaments. A very special addition to our tree arrived last night - ornaments from Grandma and Grandpa's tree. It brought back memories for me and when I told Emma what they were, she broke into tears and said how special it was. We are all missing Grandma this year.

For Christmas we are headed to Cincinnati to spend time with the Woods family as well as briefly see Ben and Erin and Grammy and Poppa. I am personally dreading the trip physically and emotionally. Emma already has asked if we can just stay at our old home and live there. I know it will be a great time with family and dear friends, but it is going to be really hard to come back to Charleston.

The exciting thing is that once we are home we begin the countdown to welcoming this baby into our family! We have lots to do to get ready for his arrival so hopefully Mike and I will get motivated and finish most of what we have planned to do. Emma is so excited about her brother and with as much as Jonah loves babies, we know he will be excited too. Life is about to get VERY interesting!

As for churches and getting settled...we have decided to settle at a large Baptist Church. We know it will be difficult to get connected there, but we also have come to the conclusion that we will not be getting connected until after we adjust to this little guy and having a family of 5. I am totally fine with that, and it is nice to have some of the pressure lifted to "make friends" quickly. It is a little lonely without having any friends here, but I am also enjoying not having any commitments or obligations for this season after being so committed in Cincinnati. All of the traveling has helped break up the stretches of loneliness and kept us distracted as well as keeping us from really being able to get connected at a church.

Emma and Jonah continue to love BSF and dance class. I think Jonah enjoys dance as much as Emma because he and I get alone time. We have been busy getting ready for Christmas and running errands, but we have managed to squeeze in lots of time at the park and on the bike trail. Our neighborhood park has just been mulched to cover up the sand and that makes it a much more desirable destination.

Here are a few videos to enjoy.

November

November was a busy month to say the least. Here are some highlights from the month. (I did not have my camera in Denver or St. Louis.)

It started off with Grandma going home to be with Jesus and an unexpected trip to Denver. We were blessed to be able to fly to Denver and spend time with the family and celebrating Grandma's life. Mike flew out with us and came home after the funeral while the kids and I stayed for a few more days and came home by ourselves. The time in Denver was tough but also so much fun. I was able to introduce my kids to the New Jersey family and enjoy watching Emma play with Tante Lil and Aunt Barb. I talked with Emma before we went about her "job" while there being to love on people. And, she did that so well! She totally came out of her shell and entertained everyone and sang songs for the while room and would walk up to someone and say, "Hi, I am Emma. What is your name." So much fun to watch her. Jonah was well behaved, but 15 months old. He was into everything and that was exhausting. Thankfully he did not destroy anything, to my knowledge. It was wonderful to have unexpected time with family although the traveling was a stretch and I have no plans to fly with the kids again for a very long time!

Jonah was supposed to be an elephant for Halloween but I forgot his costume, so Noah shared and he was a monkey.

Emma insisted on being a ghost. She had so much fun trick-or-treating with Noah.

On the plane...I don't know what we would have done without Susan's dvd player. Jonah was absolutely awful on the first flight and the returning flights...see the video below for a snapshot of his screaming. I always have been convinced and am now certain that the worst age to fly with is a 12-18 month old. Just awful. I am glad that is behind me.

Cliff built a snowman with Emma. She had so much fun!

Just after getting home from Denver we celebrated Mike's birthday. Emma was so into his birthday this year.

Decorating Daddy's birthday cake

She did most all of the piping by herself

She was so excited to tell Daddy all about the picture she painted for him. She was ecstatic about his birthday and helped decorate the kitchen and make his day very special!

Making coffee for Daddy

Happy Birthday, Daddy!

Thanksgiving was a fun week in St. Louis with Grammy, Poppa, Uncle Ben, Aunt Erin, Uncle Andrew, Aunt Abby, Sam, and Leah. It was a 15 hour drive from Charleston which was actually not too bad. We spent the night in Knoxville both ways and the kids were about as good as we could have asked for.

Bubbles with Grammy

Love those cheeks and lips

Cousins and best buddies. Emma is not that much taller than Sam...bad angle.

Snuggling and reading with Poppa

Jonah climbed into this box to hang out and suck his fingers at Grammy and Poppa's. We especially love that he sticks his puppy's tail in his ear while sucking his fingers.

Random moments around Charleston

My kiddos snuggling with each other and their lovies. I cannot imagine what it would be like to have a child that is not a finger sucker with a strong attachment to a lovie. They love to spend time together and play together a lot. Emma is so sweet with him and he loves her to pieces. Notice the shorts in late November...we didn't turn the heat on until December and did have the air on one day in early December.

Jonah watching Daddy use tools.

Love that face!

Enjoying a cupcake from our local cupcake store. She sent this picture to Sue-Sue who is her cupcake partner in crime.

Ducky comes along to BSF and Dance class every week in the pocket of the backpack.

Classic

Just one picture of the enormous amount of painting we have done. These are the doors on the first floor. I still have two more on that floor to do. Every surface in the house must be painted...and I mean every surface...ceiling, molding, doors, etc. While I spent the day painting I listened to the canons fire from the civil war reenactment happening a mile away at the plantation.

Along with working on the house, we have just been making the most of the weather with bike rides and trips to the park. Mike also had his first business trip and we survived! We are enjoying the lack of bugs as we enjoy cooler weather.

Emma is just loving BSF and she pretends to be her teacher Ms. Beauford. As I was laying on my bed trying to survive the afternoon, she was teaching me. I was Emma and she was Ms. Beauford. Towards the end of it I realized that I could capture some of it without her realizing what I was doing. She is so funny. She just lines up her babies and teaches them every day.







Jonah on the plane...yikes

October

Shaving cream letters that turned into "sunscreen"

Making applesauce

Emma went on a breakfast date with Daddy and came home with her own starbucks cup. She thought it was just the coolest thing. She got chocolate milk in a cup like Daddy! Very fun!

First pizza experience for the little guy...the veggie shreds aka fake cheese are awful but he seemed to enjoy it. He is really struggling with wanting what we have and not understanding why he can have some things and not others. We are really working to find foods that include him. Pasta and brussel sprouts and apple sauce are among his favorites these days. His absolute favorite food is potatoes. It is really hard though if we are somewhere with fast food because there is not a fast food restaurant that has fries he can safely have. Good thing we don't eat out much!

Our fall activity...we have been learning about the clues of fall and went on a walk to gather leaves. What a horrible activity here. This is all we found in 45 minutes, but it was enough to do the project and she had fun, so it was a success! We still have all of our leaves and even have two flowering trees and some new purple flowers that have bloomed in the back. I have to say that the new flowering growth is confusing her a little. :)

This is Emma's first self portrait. This was the first time she really drew anything very intentional. It is really fun to see her art skills coming out all of a sudden. She was drawing her bones after watching an episode of Curious George when the kids did that. So the lines are her bones and the circles are obviously her eyes. I just love it!

Emma has been loving painting. She is really learning how to create things and growing in her creativity and skill. I am running out of ideas of what to do with her masterpieces!

Jonah drives us crazy at learning time. He wants to do whatever Emma is doing and screams when he cannot do it. He is not happy to finger paint because Emma has a paint brush. He won't color with crayons because Emma has markers. So, we give him almost "dead" markers and finger paints with a paintbrush. He is happy as can be for a while with those things. He just squeals and chatters away.

This kid is ALL boy. I had a grandma at the park comment that there was no way anyone could mistake him for a girl. He is not out of control or crazy, just busy and into everything. He is a climber and has no fear. He is fascinated with the way things work - marker lids, blocks, lights, electrical outlets, garage door, swings, tools, lawnmower, etc. In this picture he took the parts to the shop vac and made them into a tower. The most recent thing for Jonah is Thomas. He discovered Thomas and is obsessed. He stands in front of the screen and screams for Thomas. When he doesn't get to watch him it usually ends with him on the floor screaming and kicking...did I mention he is opinionated and strong willed...hmmm...wonder where he gets that!

We went on our adventure to the pumpkin patch. After much research, I have been really disappointed that there are NO fall activities around here. I guess that is because it really isn't fall here. There is one pumpkin patch in 100 miles and thankfully it is just 5 minutes from our house. So, Jonah, Emma, and I made our way there this week. Emma was so excited to see the animals and when she realized that all they had was goats she was disappointed to say the least. Most of the activities were too old for Emma and all of them were too old for Jonah. It was pretty frustrating, but true to what I am learning about Charleston - it is a great place for kids above age 5. We did get to go on a hayless hay ride around the plantation which was fun. The kids enjoyed seeing the big kids on field trips and were ready to go when I suggested it.

Jonah on one of the tractors. He was most excited about the pumpkins though. He is completely obsessed with pumpkins and he just ran in circles screaming, "pumpkins, pumpkins" for the first five minutes we were there. It was quite entertaining for the moms chaperoning school field trips.

Emma was able to do one of the bouncy things and enjoyed that for a few minutes.

All Jonah could do was run around the sand, yes I said sand, and look for pumpkins.

Aside from the pumpkin farm and art projects, we have continued to settle in here. We think we have found a church but are still in the beginning stages of that process. We still do not have any friends or feel connected in any way, but BSF has been a great thing for Emma, Jonah, and I. Emma is LOVING BSF and has gone from crying the whole time to running into the building to see Ms. Beauford. She spends her week pretending to be her teachers and lines up her babies to "teach" them. Jonah continues to talk an amazing about and repeats everything he hears. He is cutting 8 teeth at once and is quite miserable with that. He went for his 15 month appointment and is in the 85% for height and 38th for weight. He was able to get his flu shot although we had to stay longer for observation. He is growing and we are thankful for the progress in his weight and development. Both kids are so excited about the new brother and Emma prays with him at night and Jonah likes to point to my belly and say baby and kiss it. - just sweet! He will be here before we know it, so Mike and I need to find some energy and motivation to get some of these house projects done quickly!

Day to Day

Cutie

Enjoying a family walk on the beach


Last weekend we walked the big bridge and decided that it was not a great fit for the kids. It was gorgeous but too crowded and the jogger was cramping the style of the super serious exercisers. We made it a third of the way and abandoned the effort in exchange for the park. We went to the big county park near us and tried out the playground. It was a gorgeous morning and fun to spend that time together. The kids loved getting to play with Daddy.

Playing with Daddy - they loved the teeter-totter

Jonah loves to wear his Red's hat from Uncle Ben and Aunt Erin

Watching the Steelers with Mommy and eating pretzels (Daddy and Emma have their own football watching tradition)

Jonah stands at the window calling for Max, the dog next door. He is able to see Max when he comes to the corner of the yard. That is often the highlight of Jonah's day.

This guy uses any object he can find as a sword. It is another reminder of the innate differences between boys and girls. No one has taught him to swing sticks around as a weapon, but he has figured that out on his own. He terrorizes his sister and growls the entire time.


Check out Emma's face. She is constantly asking me to help her stop him. It is exhausting but also a little humorous as is evident by the fact that I got the camera instead of helping her.


This little guy loves to snuggle. He has only developed a love for cuddling since we moved to SC, but now that is one of his favorite activities, especially with Mama! On this particular night I was laying on the couch after dinner and all he wanted was to lay with me. Very sweet!

Jonah's first finger paint experience. If you look closely you will see paint in his mouth. He is still pretty young for it, but we gave it a shot since he just wants to do what Emma is doing.

We got the paints out for the first time in a LONG time. She was excited to use the paintbrushes and painted three very intentional pictures - a picture of our neighborhood with the path, a picture of her Jesus class with the rope that they hold onto to walk through the hallway, and a picture of Mommy, Daddy, Nana, and Papaw. I was really impressed in the growth of her ability and creativity since the beginning of the summer.


So he doesn't cooperate with the talking, but I love how he is again terrorizing his sister with yet another "weapon".



Showing off...



The boy loves pretzels...and Mama...and football!