A Merry Christmas

December has been a tough month after losing Ryan's father only 11 days before Christmas, but we did our best to have a nice Christmas together. Wade definitely helped put a smile on everyone's face. He doesn't understand Santa yet, but did help a little with the opening of gifts. He was anxious for his toys to be opened (and put together) and had fun playing with all of them. I think the biggest hits so far are his kitchen (and accessories), standing keyboard, and slide. He received several other great gifts, but some may stay to the side for a few months until he is older or until he gets bored with the other toys.

 

Great Wolf Lodge

 

We spent the weekend at Great Wolf Lodge in Kansas City, Kansas. Great Wolf Lodge has a 38,000 square foot indoor waterpark where the temperature is 84 degrees. We visited the waterpark on Friday, twice on Saturday, and again on Sunday before we left.  We also had a couple dinners out and visited the nearby outlet mall. It was a fun weekend and a place we hope to visit again in the future.

Wade had fun swimming in the big pool (so warm!), riding the lazy river, and most of all, going down the toddler-sized waterslide. I wish I could have caught the smile on his face as he went down the slide, but one of us was helping him get on the slide and the other had to catch him, so there was no chance to take a picture.

He climbed into a beach chair on Saturday night, obviously exhausted. It was time for bed for sure!

Swim Lessons

Wade has been taking swim lessons since early fall. He enjoyed the pool over the summer and we wanted to keep that going. Last night was the last lesson of this session, but he's actually signed up through April.

Class starts with practice jumps into the pool..."1, 2, 3...jump!"

Swim to the ducky!

swimming with noodles

 

 

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween from our cute little dragon!

Halloween Party

Last night we had friends over to celebrate Halloween. We were all excited to see the little cuties in their costumes. The kids enjoyed Halloween games and an outdoor viewing of It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. The adults enjoyed good food, good company, and a Cardinals win. It was a great night!

Chaquita Banana lady, dragon, Hamburglar (in case you couldn't tell)

Our Big News

As you can see from the shirt, Wade is going to be a big brother.  He is, of course, unaware that his life is going to change big time in the near future. In the short term, he'll soon have to deal with my expanding belly and not being able to pick him up and carry him as often. After that, he'll have to share all the attention (and toys) with a little brother or sister. And in the long term, he may never really have a birthday to himself again!

Wade was due 4/10/10 and our new baby's due date is 4/12/12. While we wanted a spring baby and liked the idea of them being two years apart, we never thought it would work out so exactly.

We're very excited about the news. I'm 12 weeks along and have been fortunate to feel fairly normal this whole time. Looking forward to April - but I just hope it doesn't get here too quickly. I feel like I need to get some things done before I officially become a mother of two.

Balloon Glow

We went to the Forest Park Balloon Glow last night. It was even more crowded than I expected but also a lot cooler than I remembered. We went down early and had a picnic dinner. Close to 7, we started walking towards the balloons. They were starting to raise all of them and we were able to get so close and walk around them while this was happening. You could even feel the heat of the fire.

Ryan and I may have been more impressed than Wade, but he did enjoy looking up and waving at the balloons.

It was so pretty when the actual 'glow' started. The area around the balloons got more crowded and it was time for us to head home. Someone had already stayed up past his bedtime.