Cutest Santa Ever

Merry Christmas!

Do you recognize Santa? Jackson did.

Intramural Football

Tyler's dental school puts together a team for almost every intramural sport. They are all very athletic and have a lot of fun. Last Friday their football team, The Gold Crowns, was in the championship and won! They got to play the final game in the Husky Stadium on the actual football field, pretty cool.

Celebrating after one of Tyler's many interceptions throughout the season. I never appreciated the defensive aspect of football until I watched Tyler play. I don't want to brag, but he's pretty amazing.

Congrats, Gold Crowns!

Fearless

Last year when Jackson met Santa, it didn't go so well. But everyone has to have a picture of their toddler screaming on Santa's lap, right? Last night was my work Christmas party. I was the Santa photographer. I have never seen so many screaming children. Luckily, this year Jackson was not one of them. In fact, he sat on Santa's lap twice. And when Santa asked what he wanted for Christmas, he gave his classic answer of "presents." But then remembered Buzz Lightyear and quickly changed his answer.

Making gingerbread houses. After the party I told Tyler it was time to go and asked him where their gingerbread house was, thinking we could use it as a cute decoration. His answer... "We ate it."

Fall Pictures... sort of

After a failed attempt at professional pictures with the daycare here at our apartments, I decided to take Jackson outside and try to get some pictures with the fall leaves. Let's just say... photographing a 2 year-old is hard.

The serious look. Isn't he dashing?

Without snow plows...

Monday was Seattle's first snow storm in years. Apparently, this city is not equipped to handle snow. So after we got 2 inches, if that, on Monday, the entire university was shut down on Tuesday and Wednesday even though they were both sunny, calm days. We won't complain because we are getting a nice long holiday weekend. And since I work for the university, my office was also closed on Tues/Wed, even though my office is about 20 steps from my back door. I went in for a couple hours both days anyway because I had stuff that needed to be done, but for the most part, we've been relaxing and enjoying the time off.

It turns out, Jackson kind of loves snow. Too bad we live in Seattle.

He had a hard time with the snowball concept. Everytime he tried to throw one at us, he ended up hitting himself in the face, which is what all the snow on his hat is from. It was so funny to watch, and I still can't figure out how he was doing it.

Like every other kid, Jackson is REALLY excited for Christmas. It's fun to have him understand that it's coming and be able to look forward to it. This is him reading the Target Toy Catalog. He took it to bed with him the first night it arrived, and carted it around the whole next day.

Gratitude Giveaway

So my all-time favorite blog, Pocket Full of Prose, is doing a Thanksgiving Giveaway for some adorable bread pans. Go here to enter. And check out the rest of her blog if you haven't already. She writes about adoption, infertility, parenting, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, basically anything and everything. Like I said, it's my favorite blog. She's great!

Pier 57

Last Friday night, we went with our friends to Miner's Landing at Pier 57. I thought it would be kind of cheesy (although I do enjoy cheesy), but it was actually really fun.

This was the best picture I could get of Jackson once the carousel actually started moving... holding on for dear life. If only he had used this same caution later in the evening (see pictures at the bottom of the post)

The great thing about taking 2 year-olds to an arcade is that you don't even have to put quarters in the machines. He "played" this game for a long time and didn't really care that no one was with him.

Of course, no arcade visit would be complete without a little healthy competition between the big boys (Tyler didn't win. In fact, Mike ended up beating the high score)

This picture isn't even posed. They really were that excited. Kirsten and I tried the stupid dance game...

...and failed. Literally. Two big, fat "F's"

And more competing... I think Tyler lost again :)

And then to finish off our evening, Jackson decided to try to scare one of the twins. He ended up wiping out on the slippery sidewalk. It was pretty bad. Recovering at home with a movie and some M&M's

Meticulous

Jackson has become a meticulous colorer. It's still just scribbles, but it's carefully calculated scribbling with attention to tiny little details. It's adorable.

See that concentration face? His dad has makes the exact same face when he's drilling teeth.

So proud of his work See what I mean? I know it's still just scribbles, but look at those perfect little scribbled circular shapes! I know that everyone says this, and everyone else rolls their eyes when someone says this, but I think he is incredibly talented :)

A blog of a book of a blog

Have you seen these? We decided to have our blog printed into a book periodically. Our first one just arrived. I'm not perfectly consistant about journaling... or scrapbooking... or printing photos for an album, so this seems like a good way to have something tangible. You know... in case the internet ever explodes.

We used www.blog2print.com and were pretty happy with the results. Not too expensive and it arrived quickly. Plus we didn't really have to do much. You just type in your blog web address, tell them the date range to include, and they do the rest. Then you can preview the book and delete posts, add comments from blog, etc. I do wish there was a way to do page-by-page editting for fixing a few little things, but I couldn't find a company that uploads for you and allows you to make design changes to individual pages.

"I So Cited!"

This was Jackson's favorite phrase of the weekend. "Mommy... I so cited!" He was very excited about everything, and he told me so over and over again. Tyler had to go to Chicago for the weekend for an ASDA conference, so we enjoyed most of the Halloween festivities just the two of us.

Setting up for my work Halloween party on Thursday night. These are the two ladies that I work with.

Friday night was a party with friends, but Jackson didn't last very long, so we went home and had a "date night" and rented How to Train Your Dragon. What a great movie! We're adding it to our Christmas wish list. Jackson has been asking for it constantly. Jackson enjoying a donut after Trunk-or-Treating on Saturday. We also went to the pumpkin bash at the zoo on Saturday, but Jackson was a little stinker the whole time, so I never bothered with the camera.

And finally, on Sunday, Daddy came home and got all decked-out for some last minute trick-or-treating.

As a funny side story, Tyler forgot his wallet for his Chicago trip. He managed to get on the airplane anyway, but had no money or ID all weekend. Jackson and I ordered online and sent Domino's to his hotel room on Saturday night so he wouldn't starve to death. But really, when traveling across the country, you should take your wallet.

I also learned that Jackson's snoring sounds exactly the same as Tyler's. It was almost comforting to have him sleep in my room all weekend.

Just a Weekend

Some weekends are particularly fabulous. This was one of those weekends, and I'd like to document it for my own memory.

Friday Night:

Tyler had an intramural football game. I have been really impressed with how good he is. His team is all dental school guys and they are pretty funny to watch. Plus, I'm pretty sure we're the only intramural team that has 5-10 kids running around on the sidelines at any given time. Anyway, Tyler scored the final touchdown of the game for the 2nd week in a row. They were up by several touchdowns in both games, so he didn't technically win it for them, but it still makes me proud. After the game, we picked up a $6 Dominos Pizza and a $1 Redbox... my kind of date night. Tyler read Jackson his favorite book "Tanka, Tanka, Skunk." (If you haven't read it, you should. Jackson giggles everytime we read it. It's a simple, silly book, but still fun.) Tyler has been really busy with his 2nd year, which we knew was coming, but it's still hard to only see him for a few hours before bed each night. Jackson has been particualry missing him, so I think he enjoyed having a little extra time with his dad this weekend. After Jackson went to bed, Tyler and I watched the new Robin Hood. I REALLY love that movie.

Enjoying story time

Love the smile. He's way too happy to have all of his dad's attention.

Saturday:

Saturday we decorated pumpkins. It's one of my favorite traditions, but we skipped it last year since Jackson was too young to really get it. This year we let him do paint and stickers and he definately enjoyed himself. He did NOT want his picture taken. He hates having his shirt off, but it's just easier for messy projects.

Tyler carved the joker from Batman.

And the results... They turned out quite nicely.

Jamie's pumpkin. Jackson requested Shrek.

Tyler's pumpkin. (which also happens to be the back side of my pumpkin... I love being poor college students) Jackson was a little nervous about the scary face.