Merry Christmas!

This was our first X-mas day we have spent alone, just the five of us. We thought of everyone and missed everyone. Zoe and I started a project a few weekends ago that ended up taking weeks; it would still be going had we not ran out of supplies. We made individual snowflakes with each "family" members picture on it and push pinned it into our dining room wall to make it feel like everyone was with us. It's tough to see, but every relatively close family member has a picture including Auntie, Doug, Devin & TK, though it's hard to identify the pictures in the shots below. We will hang them every year, but hope next year we will see some of you in person.

We spent X-mas eve with Uncle Tom, Aunt Jan, Jenna and Jeff. Thanks to Grandma Sue, we enjoyed a delicious ham dinner and we were glad to spend the evening with family. With the arrival of Santa and the generosity of the other family members Christmas morning was eventful, and the kids made out as usual. We didn't see Kellan most of the day as he still enjoys Legos immensely. We just hope Dexter has the same passion. Zoe got a new bike as her old one was run over by a neighbor on Halloween. We still have not had any rain or snow, and though the temps are in the 40's and 50's (to compare to CA/WA feels like 60's) we went for a short bike ride. As you can see in the pix below Zoe is still not too impacted by the weather. When the sun went down she actually admitted to being cold...I was wearing a down jacket. Dexter wasn't quite too sure what to make of everything. He had some long moments with some of his gifts and also loved to "play" with Kellan & Zoe's gifts. Everyone was very good to us once again. We feel very blessed to live the life we live and have the people we do in it - ***Jim only hopes for a life with sleep & less fighting***

X-mas picture outtakes

X-Mas Eve

X-mas Day

We left the training wheels on for the day...

Misc.

Enjoying our bottles

Zoe got a Hannah Montana karaoke machine for X-mas. We all know how Zoes loves to sing, but we seemed to have forgotten Zoe still lacks the ability to read...so we played music in the background & she rocked out on the mic....YouTube video gets a little long, but there's a lot of passion there, unfortunately I grabbed the camera a few songs in and enthusiasm began to wain.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LyDXu0uVvVM

A "Christmas" Conversation with Kellan

I know it's not quite Christmas (I wrote this a week back and never posted), but tis the season to talk about things I just can't always come up with the best answers for, especially when driving. I think I've mentioned this before and I probably don't even need to record it here, but Kellan Loves to talk. As I was driving Kellan and Zoe home the other night, Kellan initiated a 15 minute conversation below (paraphrasing of course)...I really needed Papa Frankie, Uncle Cam, Aunt Jessie some other source of information in the car other than myself...The train of thought of a 7 yr old is classic...lucky for me Kellan is more interested in asking the question then always hearing the answer.

Kellan: "Mom, Jesus!"
Mom: Looking over my shoulder observing a blow up nativity on some one's lawn
Kellan: "Why every time Jesus is around people have those plus signs"
Mom: "Plus signs? You mean crosses?"
Kellan: "Yeah crosses. When I was at Sean's wedding they had Jesus nailed to a cross. Why did those bad men want to kill Jesus?"
Mom: "People didn't like what he was saying, people were afraid of change."

Kellan: "Do all churches have pluses so they can nail Jesus up?"

Mom: "Yes, all churches have crosses, but not all of them have Jesus nailed to them."
Kellan: "Jewish people don't believe in Jesus."
Mom: "People believe in different things."
Kellan: "Do all people believe in God?"
Mom: "No."
Kellan: "It's not fair Jewish people get to open a present everyday for Hanukkah. Who do Jewish people believe in?"
Mom: "Abraham"???
Kellan: "Abraham Lincoln?"
Mom: "No" (to myself - "please don't ask because I am really not going to be able to answer")
Kellan: "Why did that bad man shoot Abraham Lincoln in the back of the head?"
Mom: "Kind of for the same reasons the people killed Jesus, he was afraid of change."
Kellan: Well, Presidents don't get shot anymore these days that was a long time ago.
Mom: "Actually 2 Presidents have been shot since I was born. 1 died, 1 did not." (note: I said this at the time and it took Jim reading this and correcting me that Kennedy died quite a bit before I was born, slipped my mind at the time).
Kellan: "Do you die if you get shot in the leg?"
Mom: "Sometimes."
Kellan: "What about Kwanzaa?"
Mom: "What about Kwanzaa?"
Kellan: "What do the Kwanzaa people do? I bet the Kwanzaa people know. Do the people that live next to Josh celebrate Kwanzaa?"
Mom: "No, I don't think so." (they are from India, which is not to say they don't celebrate Kwanzaa since I have never talked to them)
Kellan: "The guy in Three Amigos didn't die when he got shot in the leg. How come they had guns in 3 Amigos? They were actors."
Zoe: (who has been quiet the entire time). "Please stop talking about killing and guns. I'm going to have bad dreams."
Kellan: "Zoe do you believe in Jesus?"
Zoe: "I believe in Santa."
Kellan: "I think you should believe in Jesus too."

The Bean, The Bean, The Magic little Bean is 5

...as Jim so affectionately likes to call her. Our little Zoe Bean turned 5 on Friday (12/10) and she's already acting like she's 15. We had a fun filled weekend planned for her. First off, her teacher let her bring the class's prized "brown bear" home for the weekend. There was a lot of anxiety during the day leading up to dinner and we realized after awhile she was very uptight of being the center of attention and didn't want anyone singing her the birthday song. Once we convinced her the b-day song was not a requirement of the night, things improved. I was able to cut out of work early and took her and Kellan to "Color Me Mine" to do some serious pottery painting, followed by meeting Tom and Jan for dinner at Red Robin.

Zoe has been wanting an American Girl doll forever. All her little friends have one (or more). I hadn't been able to come around to buying a $100 doll when her $10 dolls look like hell. G-ma Chloe & Papa Frankie went halvzies and Zoe was able to go the The American Girl store on Saturday and buy "Rufie" (Ruthie). Just because of the name I was trying to get her to purchase another one, but no go. So now all we here is "Where is my Rufie?"...OK, maybe not exactly, but that's all that goes through my head. If you haven't been to an American Girl store, that's one experience that needs to be on your bucket list. We'll make sure anyone who comes to visit, gets to go.

After we bought Rufie we went to see Disney On Ice. The kids loved it and as we wonder sometimes if Kellan is too old for things, he constantly surprises us with how into things he gets. "Surprises" may not be the word, maybe more like embarrasses (jk, really though Jim and I get a good chuckle out of his movements). He was singing and dancing with all the little kids. Zoe of course loved the princesses and Dexter was so excited to see Mickey Mouse and his favorite Buzz.

All and all we think Zoes had a pretty good birthday and we hope this is the best year for her yet.

How she measures up

Ht. 44 and 1 quarter inches - 75%

Wt. 46 lbs - 75-90%

I need to keep in mind when I am filming what's being said and done - but really what's the fun in that? I think everyone's personalities are pretty much represented here, though Jim's may surprise people. If you listen close enough I have a few moments of disgust.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wlFIA-ecGtw

Wearing her new "Demi Lovato" outfit from Target

Last kids quote..

Kellan commenting on Zoe's Poodle Skirt Halloween costume..

Kellan- did people really dress like that in the 50's?

Jim- well, they sometimes did

K- were you in the 50's?

Jim- no

K- wow, I didn't know you where that young...I thought you were old.

Jim- (silent)

K- is Papa Jim from the 50's?

Jim- yep, he was a kid back then.

K- Yah, I knew Papa Jim is really old.

Bean Video (unrelated to Zoe Bean)

See previous blog as reference. I did not get this posted last night; had to post on You Tube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f5M2_FcCEDM

Beans, beans, beans...

I'm posting this for the folks that read the blog at work (G-ma Sue :)), because by the time I post about Zoe's b-day it will be the weekend. I have lots of pictures to post, but not a whole lot of content. The weather here is still muy mild. 60's & no snow (obviously). So we've spent some time outdoors here and there.

A couple weeks back we went to a store - Outdoor World. It's for the most part an enormous outdoors/sport department store by the Bass Pro Shop people. It's decorated crazy...with a motif like a hunting lodge if the Disney imagineers designed it. The kids got a real kick out of all the mounted animals. Coincidentally Santa was there and the kids got a picture taken (I will scan it in one of these days). Dexter really didn't want any part of the man, but I was able to crouch down, hide, and hold him up for the camera. I asked Zoe what she asked Santa for and she said "I ordered for Dexter and told him to surprise me."

We made it to one of our favorite parks recently. Way off in the distance we saw this "dog" - it was the size of a wolf and we really weren't too sure what it was because there wasn't anyone around it. For some reason we decided to go for a closer look. I mentioned to Kellan it may eat us and he responded "That's OK at least we'll all die together." Ah, how sweet. It turned out to be a huge wood cut-out of a wolf. Hmmm, we have no clue why it's there.

Dexter loves books. Typically he reads in his room or the family room, but this night he decided to get away from it all, enjoy the lights and curl up on Duke's couch with a good book. It took a few days before he stopped noticing the ornaments on the two trees. It was a long two days for Jim chasing him from one tree to the next. I think we only lost one ornament and that was due to the seven year old.

Dexter still loves the beans. If anyone had any question what type was messier, black beans or chili beans?...you can take a gander at the below pictures and make your own decision. Luckily he still loves his bath and now his next favorite thing to do is brush his "teef".

So lots of excitement about turning 5 around here; on that note...another post soon..