Simple Joys

This little man gets so happy about finding himself in a well-lit hallway with a book in hand. Cue the happy baby dance!

Dinner Sans Daddy

When Rich is gone on a work trip I don't usually make dinner because I don't want to do the dishes by myself. In the end we usually have "brinner" (breakfast for dinner). Which includes a lot of Devin drinking/licking the syrup. And Landon trying desperately to reach the food I am not giving him in a timely manner since I am busy refilling Devin's syrup container.

Ward Dessert Party

Saturday night was the ward dessert party. Eric got Devin a whole plate of treats, which Devin enjoyed just looking at. Seriously. He was so excited about all of the goodies, but the only thing that was touched was the cupcake he let me share and the M&Ms on the cookie that he licked. The rest he just kept looking and talking about.

This is right before Sue tried to take Devin's picture for an activity in Primary the next day. She probably took 15 pictures and even then the one that was used prompted the Primary kids to say, "Devin looks mad." So we're glad he's smiling in these!

I was supposed to read a story at the party, but I forgot the books. Rich is the sweetest and went back home to get them for me. In the end it wasn't that big of a deal, but it was fun to share some Christmas stories. Probably the best part of this picture is Ally re-reading the snowman book all by herself. Devin is not pictured because when I told him Santa was coming after I finished the book he took off like a flash and told Daddy he wanted to snuggle.

Then it was Santa's turn in the chair. Prior to this evening Devin informed us that he would not be sitting on Santa's lap, rather he would "just sit on the floor in front of him and tell him I would like toys and goodies." But he came around--mostly due to the promise of a candy cane--and ended up sitting on Santa's lap to deliver the news about his desired presents. No crying involved.

I wasn't even going to try Landon on Santa's lap considering this was the second late-night in a row and Landon is a Mama's boy, but I decided we had to at least try. A lot because I ensured Landon was eating a cracker when the hand-off occurred, and a lot because he never turned around to see who was holding him, Landon did great on Santa's lap.

Santa success!

Light Parade 2012

The Kelseyville light parade was really good this year. We love this tradition to help us kick off the holiday season. This year, Devin was super excited and danced around the living room all day singing "We're going to a light parade!" We bundled up the kids and met up with the Watsons and the Redfords. 

 

Landon didn't really change expression until the truck blowing it's horn came by, then he started screaming. He was happy once he was in my arms.

Santa Letter

For family home evening this week Devin wrote his letter to Santa. It's really hard to write with a crayon while holding Devin's hand in mine. He assured us that he was definitely not naughty and that Santa was going to leave him lots of candy.

 I really love that he never asks for anything specific, just "toys and goodies and candy." He consulted with Daddy about what he thought Santa might like us to leave him. Chocolate milk was the eventual winner, but only because Devin wants to have some on Christmas morning.

Every day is one more day closer to Christmas!

A Little Bit of Movement

Landon's not-quite crawling yet, but just because he's not crawling doesn't mean he's not mobile. He does a sort of frog hop/belly flop movement. And though he's slow, he's deliberate.

And he's really happy when he reaches whatever it is we're trying to entice him with.

This video is unexciting, but I'm adding it for Wendi, to whom I was trying to describe Landon's movement.

Holiday Crafting

Instead of just pinning thousands of activities and never doing any of them, I decided to actually do something. This wasn't actually something I saw on Pinterest, but I figured this would be easy for Devin to accomplish and at least I was doing something. 

He did take an interest when I told him there were marshmallows involved, and immediately stuffed almost 2 cups worth into his mouth, but after gluing about 10 marshmallows onto the paper he was less than enthusiastic until I brought out the pretzels. Then he ate a million of those. 

Afterward I asked if he had fun; he told me, "No. But I liked eating the marshmallows and pretzels." So I'm blogging because we may never do anything crafty again, instead I'll just give him the handful of marshmallows.