Pancakes!

Last Saturday, Carter helped us make pancakes (I like to make a big batch and save them for his breakfasts during the week). The next day, my mom asked him if he wanted soome pancakes. He immediately ran to the kitchen and climbed up into his tower, ready to do more stirring and pouring. He was most distressed when he realized he was expected to sit at the table and eat pancakes.

Operation Big Boy Bed

Inspired by the Kimbro's O.B-B.N-N. posts, we're going to give you ongoing updates on how Carter's transition to a Big Boy bed goes. Park and Ashley came by this afternoon and helped us get the bed set up. Carter immediately began doing flips over the newly-installed railing (video to follow), so we were somewhat worried that he might want to play and not sleep in the bed.

After reading stories, I put him in the bed, and he, surprisingly, didn't reach for his bears or his water (his usual bedtime comforts). He just flipped right over on his stomach and sighed (as if to say... "Ah, a bed in which my feet don't hit bars... it's about time"). We, very smartly, planned this first night in a big boy bed to coincide with my mom's visit, so we left her with him while we went out to dinner. We just returned home to find out that HE HASN'T WOKEN UP AT ALL! (What a waste of a grandparent visit:) I'm not sure how the rest of the night will go, or tomorrow night, or subsequent naps (when he's much less inclined to sleep)... We'll keep you posted! Mom took this pic of him in his bed a couple of hours ago...

Update, 7am: Carter slept until 6am. That's earlier than usual, but pretty good, all things considered. At 6 he fussed a little bit, and then got himself out of bed and opened the door, where he met the baby gate. Mom met him at the gate, and he pointed back to the bed and said "Uh-oh". Not sure if he was claiming that his getting out of bed was an accident or if he forgot that we changed beds and thought that it transformed overnight. Mom convinced him to choose a book and take it back to the bed, which worked for a few minutes. We'll see how nap time goes today...

Update, 4pm: An hour and a half of climbing out of bed, rattling the baby gate, playing with his toys (WHY don't musical toys have off buttons?) and fussing, until, finally, we had success...sort of:

Update, 9:30pm: It took him a little longer to go down in the bed tonight than it did last night - but nothing compared to the difficulty of nap time today. Since he went down, we haven't heard a peep. He may be napping in the crib tomorrow. We'll see how brave his nanny is feeling...

Mama Helen is here!

My mom is here for a visit this weekend. She planned a long layover here on her way to Orlando for work, and we are very happy to be seeing her again so soon. Last night, Carter helped us make brownies, and we taught him how to lick the spoon. He seemed to enjoy it.

And he insisted on wearing my new purple coat around the house. When I started taking pics of him, he became quite dismayed that he couldn't wear my big purple coat and use the camera at the same (because of the sleeves being so long).

Zoo Freeze

It's finally, actually, starting to get cold here. So we celebrated with a trip to the zoo yesterday! Unsurprisingly, very few other people thought to visit the zoo on a cold new year's day, so we had the run of the place - and the animals were very active! Here are a few pics of our visit.

Happy New Year!

There are, thankfully, no photos of me attempting to finish the gigantic Medieval Times-goblet-o-beverage that Thomas made for me last night, so we enter 2008 with a few cute family photos...

Farewell 2007

We were pretty okay with saying goodbye to 2007. With two moves, intro to toddler-dom and busy work, we had a pretty stress-filled 2007. We're really looking forward to a more comfortable '08.

We ended 2007 with a good bit of housework. We had childcare, so Thomas and I were able to get the final Christmas decorations put away, unpack the last boxes that have been taunting us from the basement and to fix up Carter's room.

We took our Christmas tree to the local recycling pile, where it will meet the chipper on Saturday.

Next year, we want to take several friends with us so we can have a proper Christmas tree throwing competition.

In Carter's room, I did a little painting and we finally hung pictures.

We also rearranged to make room for a big-boy bed - coming to a blog near you in the next week or two... (I'm personally thinking we should introduce the real bed right before my next business trip ;)

Christmas!

Sorry that it has taken me so long to get a Christmas post together. To make up for it (and to save myself from some serious photo editing), I've created a slide show of our holiday for you.

Christmas was -hands down - the BEST day of Carter's life. He was so excited about his new toys, he loved unwrapping gifts (he helped everyone unwrap), he got to go to the airport to pick up Mama Helen and Daddy Phil (where he was allowed to run around the large hallways) he ate LOTS of really good food, and was generally the center of attention all day.

I'll try to post a video of his discovery of the gifts from Santa later this weekend. You can hear him saying "Whoa. Whoa. Whoa." as he walks into the room and sees what is waiting for him. Santa brought him some cardboard blocks a wooden tool set (one of a couple different one that he got for Christmas - he loves them all!) and a thing called the Learning Tower, which allows him to stand at counter height safely.

As for us, even though Thomas and I had agreed to get each other small, boring gifts, he surprised me with a new digital camera (sorely needed) and really beautiful, fun, sparkly, gold, wedge heels.

My parents were here until yesterday afternoon and we had a lovely time together. We don't have any New Year's plans - or any plans between now and then so we are going to enjoy some down time for a few days.

Here's the slide show for you!

Photo with Santa

For those of you who've been awaiting a picture of Carter with Santa, this is as close as you're going to get:

I've been getting some measure of grief from some of you (who shall remain un-named ;) who think we're grinch-ish parents for not wanting to sit in traffic, fight for a parking spot and force our toddler to stand in a long line to do something he doesn't understand...

I have no problems with parents who do take little ones to see Santa. I just prefer to avoid the mall at all costs, so until Carter wants to go - we aren't going! (We were somewhat hopeful that we'd be able to easily see Santa at our town bonfire and marshmallow roast last week, because I do think Carter would enjoy the Santa getup, but, alas, it rained - of course, we can't really complain about rain these days).

I promise we will take Carter to sit on Santa's lap when he's old enough to get it. For now, you get a picture of Carter on Cart Cart's lap, with a Santa doll. This, he enjoyed immensely.

In Staples

We're moving up in the world of head sutures: from stitches to staples... all in one month!

Carter had a little accident this morning that warranted another trip to the ER, and three staples in the back of his head. As usual, he's very resilient and is doing fine. One of the discharge instructions suggested that we keep him calm and have him play quietly for the next 24 hours. HA! These instructions clearly weren't written by anyone that has had an 18 month old!

As a side note, head wounds bleed profusely. I really wish I hadn't decided to wear cashmere this morning...

WBFP

For those of you who haven't spent hours pouring through ads looking for the perfect place to live that included a Wood Burning Fire Place, you may not find this that exciting. But for those of you who understand the search for the elusive WBFP (the little extra that makes the place-where-you-keep-your-stuff so much more special), we have the best news: our fireplace is suitable for wood burning! And burn wood we did!

We were so eager to enjoy our first fire that we weren't fully prepared (the grill tongs got a bit of an unexpected workout pinch hitting as a poker), but we had a lovely fire this evening. Park and Ashley were over to enjoy it with us (check out our niece-to-be - she's coming along very nicely, eh?)