The kids were pretty excited to light the menorah on the first night of Chanukah. Cameron got Dylan’s old wooden one and, check her out! She’s lighting the shamash first!
This year, we let Dylan light his own.
Then, the kids got to open their little gift before we all dined by candlelight. We all love watching the candles burn down. I love having the kids sit through an entire meal, too. We should eat by candlelight every night!
The kindergarteners at Dylan’s school put on a super sweet holiday show where they sang a few songs and then got to eat some treats. The kids in the other two classes wore plain ole red or green elf hats, but Juan’s class, they got to make super cute, custom elf hats! Dylan was so stoked to be wearing his….
And, he was so excited about his show. We’d gone to Taliana’s performance the previous week and he had been so disappointed that he wasn’t performing on that same night!
Then, his bell off his hat and he was a very sad elf, too distracted to even sing much. =(
Luckily, Juan was kind enough to sew a new one back on once he was apprised of the situation. This made for a much happier little Dylan.
Cameron very enthusiastically carried our cookie contribution (mint chocolate chip, Dylan’s favorite) over to the classroom. Look at that sweetie with her hands in her pants pockets!!
Dylan’s world was “right” again.
Here’s the back of Dylan’s hat…with bell (of course!)!
Overall, it was a sweet show. Juan played guitar for many of the songs and his kids opened the show with “Ghost Riders in the Sky”! We did take video, but it will take me a while to get to it, I’m sure….
We actually planned to get our tree early this year…and we did! The only problem was that we had some issue with our electricity in the living room, so our decorating was delayed for an entire week beyond our got-tree date!
After Tom and I strung the lights, we pretty much let the kids take over the decorating for all the parts of the tree they could reach.
Cameron even strung beads!
Tom hung up his special espresso ornament (thanks, Auntie Christina!)….
Dylan was really good at finding “just the right spots” for stuff.
And, here’s a shot of the tree with the lights on…not quite done yet, but getting there!
…Annnnnd, a week and a half later, just in time for xmas, the tree is finally done!
Despite our best efforts and early planning, we’ll only enjoy these decorations for as long as we did last year! Oh, well. Maybe next year we’ll have everything done early!!!
Cameron fell asleep on the way home from SJ yesterday. We couldn’t rouse her for dinner and not even the din being made by Dylan, Taliana and K. could shake her from her slumber! We hoped she would sleep through until at least 4 or 5am, but she woke up at midnight!
Tom took a nap while I took her downstairs to feed her a little something (some veggies, apple, and toast) and to try to tucker her our. We played with tents and beads and play-doh, but by 3am, she was still wide awake.
Tom took his turn trying to tucker out our little gal and, finally, at about 5, she came upstairs for a little morning nap!
Well, she didn’t sleep in much beyond 7:30am since we had to start getting Dylan ready for school, but she was an energetic little gal all morning! Look at her, all geared up for some outdoor playground time at the school!
I thought I would be way too tired to take her to her last gymnastics class (she has not been as focused at this class as she is at Junebug’s), but she was so adorable, I thought I’d try to power through to hang out with her.
She was cheery and energetic throughout class, too!
It was only when I had to drop her off at school that she started getting a little moody. She told me she wanted to just rest on my shoulder, so I carried her in (my is she heavy!). She told me she wasn’t happy about going to school at all, but luckily, Samantha was setting up an art project and when she enlisted Cameron’s help to set up, Cameron jauntily said, “bye mom” and I was off!
Quite surprisingly, she didn’t nap at school today either, but shortly after dinner with the girls and Assaf, she sacked out right on Tom’s shoulder. Hope she gets some good rest tonight….
Last weekend, we went to The Best Company Holiday Party Ever! This party was totally geared towards the kids. There was a gingerbread decorating station, a sticker/ornament craft table, a totally amazing balloon animal guy and, of course, there was Santa….
Dylan was waiting patiently alllll evening for Santa to show up (turns out the guy got lost on his way to the office!) and boy did those brussels sprouts start going down quickly as soon as Santa entered the room!
Dylan has exactly 2 things on his holiday list: walkie talkies and Snap Circuits.
I knew about the walkie talkies in time for the party…so that is exactly what he got from Santa!
We’ve been communicating daily with the walkie talkies ever since! And, luckily, Taliana still comes over after school twice a week, so we have been getting a little break while she steps in to fill the void.
Since Cameron doesn’t really grok the concept of Santa yet, we had to come up with something for her list and that something was her own Leapster (so she wouldn’t have to argue with Dylan over his old hand-me-down one) and a couple of new games and a carrying case. She was a little nervous about that big ol’ Santa, but she recovered at gift-unwrapping time!
After Dylan opened up his walkie talkies, another kid his age came over to play with him and I was impressed by how easily Dylan got along with him. They ran all over the office, yapping over their walkies!
It was definitely a fun time….
Here’s Dylan busying himself with crafts while he waits for Santa.
This one he called, “Winter Valley”….
Cameron was busy, too. Again, it was a no-nap day, but she cheerfully powered through like a champ.
They had all sorts of gingerbread kits available and, of course, Dylan chose the train! Here it is in the very early stages of completion.
Cameron decorated gingerbread people…one was completely covered in holly and berry sprinkles and the other was just a pile of bubble gum! I’m sad I forgot to take them home and that I didn’t even get a picture of their completed works! But, I guess, it’s the process that matters most….
Here’s Dylan’s train a little farther along.
And, of course, here’s Tom helping them out!
Our IT guy, Joe, played music for the evening. You can see his big bass in the background–when Dylan first saw it, he leaned over and said, “that’s a really big violin!”
The menu included quite a few vegan options, including quinoa salad, roasted potatoes, roasted brussels sprouts, a yummy arugula salad and vegan apple and berry crisps for dessert. The chefs also prepared special plates of vegan appetizers for us: spring rolls and crostini with cranberry topping.
Cameron gobbled up tons of brussels sprouts and potatoes!
We were having so much fun at the party, we totally lost track of time! In total, we were there from 4-9pm. Gratefully, the kids sacked out immediately on the way home!
So sweet to see the excitement on these kiddies’ faces during the holidays! Dylan’s feeling pretty confident now that Santa will bring him Snap Circuits. That’s probably the only downside to having met and gotten a present from Santa already!
Last Friday, we also celebrated Taliana’s 7th birthday…at the roler rink! I didn’t think Cameron would enjoy just watching the other kids fly by from the sidelines, so Tom picked her up later in the PM and brought her in for the tail-end of the party. But, wouldn’t ya know? She wanted to get out there with the other kids as well!
Dylan had already taken his skates off (for cake time), so he went out there to “help” Cameron. He is such a sweet and loving big brother…!
Dylan had a great time when he did have his skates on! He didn’t even need anyone’s help this time.
And he did the limbo all the way to the bottom rung!!
Cake time was good, too….
More pictures on flickr!
Last Friday, Dylan received his first Dragon Skills Award. Over the course of the year, I think every student eventually gets one, but we are still so happy for our little guy. They had a special assembly first thing in the morning to recognize the Dragons for having been particularly good at x, y, or z “Dragon Skill”.
The assembly itself was pretty sweet (and short!). The kids opened with their Dragon song (about the Dragon skills–responsibility, respect, etc.) and then Dylan got to go up to accept his award, a certificate and a pencil he was so totally stoked to get! You could tell he was pleased to get one!
So, we had no idea what his award would be for…and we were kind of surprised that it was for “Motivation and Effort”!! I mean, Dylan hasn’t yet struck us as the “academic type,” you know, the one who sits still and quietly colors, writes, or reads; he still prefers playing his made-up games above all else, and that clever little monkey actually stopped bringing home his “work” when he caught on to the fact that I was checking it out and encouraging him to finish any incomplete activities (we will now have to check his cubby more regularly)!! But, one of the classroom moms actually told me Dylan has pretty good focus in the classroom. Hopefully, this will always be the case!
This week was really the kick-off for the holidays. Earlier in the week, on Taliana’s actual 7th birthday, I met the kids and Heather and her parents at the movie theater where they were watching “Arthur Christmas”. Then, on Saturday, it was Winter Wonderland and today, we picked out our holiday tree!
Dylan was eager to set up the Polar Express train way back on Thanksgiving weekend, so that and some of those Holiday village ceramic buildings from Lola were already set up! But, he’s also been eagerly anticipating tree set-up; he’s made a few foam ornaments to hang already and he’s been asking us when we were getting it pretty much all week.
We were super stoked for good weather this year! The kids didn’t even need their jackets and Dylan peeled off his scarf about half-way through the excursion!
This was a huge difference from last year when it was cold and wet and freezing!
Dylan was eager to help, so we let him pull the cart with Auntie Heather. He also talked her ear off with all of his plans….
We were about 45 minutes late leaving home because Dylan wanted to bring his biking gloves (“to protect [his] hands from poky needles”) and we had to dig through stuff to find them. Turns out they came in pretty handy!
Cameron just loves being outside. She had a blast running along the trails!
I just missed this sweet moment where Taliana was adjusting Dylan’s scarf for him. These two are really such good friends to one another. Dylan can barely go a couple of days without seeing her before he starts opining on how much he misses her.
There were some conflicts between Cameron and Dylan as to who got to pull that darn cart. But, Dylan finally gave Cameron a turn. This is not to say he usually has difficulty giving her turns–poor guy is also having to acquiesce to little sister’s demands (yes, demands), so one really can’t blame him for being frustrated about sharing most of the time. It’s tough having a headstrong (and articulate) 2-year old sister! To Dylan, it still feels mostly one-way, although Cameron, with coaxing can actually be pretty good about taking turns as well.
As always, we were the last in our group to find our tree! When we did, Cameron initially couldn’t care less. She found a great stump to plant her rump! Look at how happy she was to find it!
When she heard Tom tell Dylan we found our tree and he needed the cart, Cameron “found” her own tree as well.
It was the perfect size!
Here’s Tom cutting our tree down for us…!
Once we got home, we promptly stuck the tree into the base and the kids sat down to watch the train go ’round.
As you can see, Cameron likes those bear slippers from Papa Willard!
And, she does listen to big bro, you know. He’s her “best” teacher, for sure (for better, for worst!).
Also, she’s sportin’ undies. I had planned to take the big, long Thanksgiving weekend to focus on potty training since we were going to have a stretch of full-time time with her, but then she was sick and I was downed by my tooth, so I kind of gave up on the plan. As luck would have it, though, she decided on her own that she wanted to sit on her potty herself, so she’s been regularly doing so since then.
Like Dylan, she often wakes up totally dry! She takes way more pride in peeing in her potty than Dylan ever did. So far, she’s needed very few incentives to do so…she’ll just grab a book and plop herself on there! Just goes to show: every kid is different.
This past Saturday, we missed seeing a bunch of friends at the downtown holiday parade (not enough motivation on anyone’s part to get out the door in time), but we did finally make it to the 3rd annual celebration for Junebug’s Gym. Dylan, who appears to dislike any organized activity, promptly declared that he was not going to participate if they did obstacle courses, but he’d do free play.
Lucky for everyone involved, it was ALL free play–and, we’re thinking to ourselves that this independent streak of his will surely be an asset as an adult…!
The day before, Dylan participated in his school’s walkathon and he completed 13/15 laps, totaling a distance of over 2 miles in 30 minutes! By Friday evening, his left leg was a little achy in the knee and ankle, but by Saturday, clearly, he was mostly better.
It’s always way more difficult to get a decent cameraphone picture of Cameron–she moves way too fast! But, she had a great time as well. Like Dylan, the foam pit is the play area of choice!
After gymnastics, we headed to Santa Clara to check out a Winter Wonderland event where a bunch of giant silk Chinese lanterns had been set up for display.
Cameron only slept for about 30 minutes in the car, so she was pretttty cranky when we got there.
But riding another one of those rip-off, instant amusement park train rides brought her right back into the spirit of things!
Here’s the Dragon Boat lantern. Pretty impressive when you think of it as a giant silk lantern!
We brought our double-stroller, but by some odd fluke, neither kid used it (and Heather’s kids — who usually walk — did!). Cameron wanted to be carried a lot…and Dylan actually walked.
A lot of my pictures didn’t come out–I tried the no-flash approach and it was sometimes challenging to hold still with a kid at my leg! But, some of them came out alright. As usual, the rest of the photos are on flickr…
Just last night as I was cruising through headlines, etc., I saw a blurb about a train expo happening right over in San Jose this weekend only! Well, of course, we had to check in with our resident train fan to see if he wanted to check it out and, of course, he said yes! So, today, we packed up snacks and headed over the hill.
The train expo was relatively small, but there were enough layouts on display to keep both kids pretty engaged and enthusiastic. Cameron had actually awakened at 6:30am (ugh) and she woke everyone else up, too, so the kids were fairly tired (especially poor Dylan), but they really managed to keep up a good energy level (especially Cameron!) at the train expo….
We saw N-gauges and Z-gauges and O-gauges and who knows what else. And, Dylan even got a chance to control one of the toy trains on display.
Once we’d exhausted the possibilities inside, we headed out for a games day at Sarah and Anthony’s, but the kids wanted us to shell $3/kid for this cheesy motorized train ride outside! Tom did his best to dissuade Dylan by telling him it wasn’t a “real train” because it didn’t travel on rails and that it would be like putting a train “shell” around our own car and driving it around, but Dylan still wanted to ride.
You had to be at least 36″ to ride alone, otherwise, you had to ride with a “responsible person.” Tom and I briefly pondered whether Dylan was “responsible” enough to manage Cameron…in the meantime, Dylan was angling Cameron over to the height bar to see if she could ride alone (“nope, too short,” he said)
Cameron was clueless on the various conversations about her height that were taking place.
Finally, Tom and I decided the car doors closed and locked so it was probably ok to let her ride with just Dylan, so we loaded them up into the tender and watched them smile!
Short but sweet ride! Anyway, shortly after disembarking, we headed to Sarah and Anthony’s for an afternoon of gaming and playing. Cameron didn’t nap (again), but she and Dylan played really well together nonetheless! She was really upbeat until her final diaper change at about 7 where she complained about her outfit until she sacked out over my shoulder! Today seemed like a good way to end a lovely, long, family weekend….Family weekend, we’ll miss you! It’s definitely weekends like this that make going back to work feel like a real grind!
