19 MONTHS

Phin turned 19 months just after the start of the New Year.  It is hard to imagine that just last year he was starting to eating solid foods and just starting to sit up on his own...a year makes a huge difference.  Right now this little guy is obsessed with with shoes.  He was delighted when his cousin Holly came over to visit and took her boots off.  Phin can take off his shoes and likes to put his socks on his hands and pretend like they are mittens.

He is a great sleeper and almost always sleeps through the night.  His naps are getting shorter which also means that he is going to bed a little earlier at night.

He loves the toys that he got for Christmas and moves from toy to toy for an extended period of time.  He also loves non-toys and can often be found carrying around the attachments for the vacuum or spatulas.   He is all boy and often pretends like things are swords or guns...all I can say is that he came that way.

He continues to love pancakes and waffles.  He will also eat bananas, oranges and discovered a love for asian pears this month.  He snacks on veggie sticks and dried mango.  He likes cheetos but has gotten into a bad habit of licking all the cheese off and spitting the left over chip out.

He doesn't like when his hands get cold.  The picture below was taken after I took him outside to help me shovel.  His hands got cold and it was all over.

He wants to be right next to me most of the day.  One day I was organizing our pantry to fit our haul from a recent case lot sale and he decided to climb right into the pantry.  He also likes to sit on my lap when I am blow drying my hair.

He seems to understand most of what we say and sometimes gets a wicked little grin on his face when he is doing something we have told him not to do.

He went through a phase this past month where he would squat whenever we pulled out the camera.

He loves to be around other kids and would be happy if he could hang out with his cousins everyday.  He especially loves when they bring yummy treats like sugar daddies to share with him.  Happy 19 months Phin!    

Christmas 2014

I think I may have been more excited about Christmas than Phin was.  Mostly I was excited to see him play with his new toys and experience new things.  Phin loved his race track and squealed with delight.  We have taught him to say ready, set, go before letting the cars loose.

Phin also got some superhero masks.  He mostly likes for us to wear them.  He has started to learn the moves that Spiderman and Iron Man make.

He also got some play-dough and a Transformers set.   I know a lot of parents hate play-dough...but it really hasn't been bad.

He also got a marble run.  He mostly likes taking it apart...but on the rare occasion that we actually get the marble going...he follows it all the way to the bottom trying to grab it the entire time.

We really had a wonderful Christmas.

In the afternoon we packed up and headed over to my parents.  We had our first real snowfall and played a little in the snow as we headed to the car.

My mom was brave enough to watch all nine grandchildren while the rest of us went to the movie Unbroken.  The movie was good but I hate that they left out the whole story of redemption at the end...to me that was what the book was all about.  We spent the rest of the night eating yummy food and playing games.

Christmas Past

Last year I found some Potttery Barn stocking holders on clearance at Downeast Home.  They have a spot for a photo so this year as I put them up I searched for some photos to put in them.

Phin's was easy to find...his Christmas picture from last year.   

I think next year I will put his picture with Santa in the frame.  

I searched for some pictures of Seth and came across a few little gems of Seth in a Christmas sweater.

 I also found a few of myself.

I think I am going to really enjoy these stocking holders that hold pictures from the past.

Christmas Eve

We had a delightful Christmas Eve.  It was a warm day and Phin and I were going to spend most of the day inside...so I dressed him up in his cabana boy outfit.  We made gingerbread cookies and sugar cookies...and Phin ate lots of cookie dough.

My new years resolution is to be in more pictures with Phin...so I set up the tripod and set the timer for the picture below.  The camera makes a little noise when the timer is on so Phin looks at the camera...perfection.  He is also quite obsessed with the tripod so it has become a little toy for him.

Seth got home early from work so we took a family Christmas Eve nap.

Then we headed up to my parents for the traditional Christmas Eve Sing-a-long at the Capitol Hill ward and homemade pizza back at my parents.

Jungle Jim Joe was in town and gave helped the kids do all sorts of flips.

The little kids love the window bench at my parents and can frequently be found leaving hand...or mouth marks all over the glass.

We all gathered in the living room as the grandchildren opened gifts from Nona and Papa.

They got pajamas!  The picture below kills me.  Benny is in a classic Spiderman pose...Aaron, James and Kate are in the classic let me go pose...and Phin is in the back row delighting in the fact that no one has their arms around him.

The four youngest boys all had the same polar bear pajamas.  You would never guess that these four are related...right?

After opening pajamas and eating a few more cookies we headed home very excited for the next morning.

Dinner and Carcassonne

Jamie and Jotham's family were down this way for a family Christmas party and stopped by for a visit.  They brought dinner with them...which was delicious.  They also had Seth teach them how to play Carcassonne.  Phin loved Hollie's pink boots and insisted on carrying them around the apartment and trying them on.  Thanks for the visit!

Draper Tree of Life

Seth's work hosted a party on December 19th.  Beth and Philip were kind enough to babysit Phin while we attended.  We decided to meet them at the tree of life at Draper City Park for the trade off.  The tree did not disappoint...we just wish it wouldn't have been quite as cold.

Seth's work party was a blast.  They had a casino night and we were each given a certain amount of casino chips at the beginning of the night.  We played blackjack and roulette and tried one hand at craps...but didn't get that game at all.  We spent the most time at the roulette table and really had a great time on our date...with all of Seth's co-workers.

Echoes of Christmas

One of my friends had posted a picture on Instagram about their favorite holiday tradition which is Echoes of Christmas.  I looked it up online and found out that it was a 40-minute live nativity walk through and at each stop the actors sing songs and act out their parts.  I was very intrigued and ended up dragging Seth and Phin down to Liberty Park on a Tuesday evening for the event.  We arrived about ten minutes before the event started...which meant we were near the beginning of the line.  Seth followed our wandering Phin around while I stayed in line. 

My pictures aren't great...no flash allowed and I didn't have my good camera but I wanted to give you an idea of the event.  We were split up into groups of about twenty and were lead to each station by a shepherd.

I have to say this will definitely become a family tradition.  It was a nice way to invite the spirit and to ponder on the true meaning of Christmas.  Once we actually started walking with the group Phin loved the event as well.  He sat still and watched all the actors singing...he also loved all of the live animals...donkeys, sheep and a camel.