happy 2012!

Happy New Year! 2011 was an amazing year for our family as we welcomed our little Elliott just three weeks ago! Wishing you and yours the best for 2012!

And Oliver helps ring in the new year . . . 

December 2011

I wanted to post a few more pictures from 2011 before we ring in the new year. With Elliott's birth, Nick's birthday, the holidays and visitors, December has been a very busy month!

sleigh ride with Grandma at Swanson's Nursery

Somersault! Oliver was so proud of himself when he learned how to do them on his own this year.

getting stamps after class from his gymnastics teacher

kisses for Grandma during class

Elliott and Grandma by the Christmas tree

he loves to peek over our shoulders

We've been wearing Elliott in a Moby wrap a lot, and Oliver wanted one of his own. He wanted to have Elliott in his, but we thought a doll might work better.

Daddy's little helper. Off to Home Depot to measure parts for a new bathroom. Notice his tape measure clipped to his pants.

time for the activity gym

my three week old can already turn onto his side, he'll be rolling over in no time

and he's growing fast! over 9 lbs already. I forgot how fast newborns grow! Elliott has gained 2 lbs in the past 3 weeks!

apparently toddlers can still enjoy activity gyms as well!

snoozing away in our bed

the birth of Elliott James

I finally finished Elliott's home birth video. It took me three weeks to go through all of the footage and pictures. It's long but I didn't want to leave anything out. Enjoy!

3 weeks

Elliott is 3 weeks today! Here he is enjoying story time with his brother and daddy.

Oliver Winston

Nick and I were Googling our sons' names the other day to see who's is more popular. "Elliott James" came up with far more results than "Oliver Winston", like I suspected. But what we did find when searching Oliver's name is that it is a brand of eyeglasses carried by JC Penney. Here's how the brand is described:

 The Oliver Winston man is confident and successful, but never stuffy. The name stands for value meeting classic, dependable styling and quality. Oliver Winston is about looking polished without being taken to the cleaners!

Just like our little Oliver :)

Christmas 2011

We hope everyone had a very merry Christmas! We sure enjoyed our day! It was so much fun watching Oliver get so excited about his presents and Santa Clause. Holidays are definitely more fun once you have kids. We had Jim and Cynthia over for brunch and presents this morning, played, napped and hung out during the middle of the day, and finished up with dinner at Jim and Cynthia's and dessert at Val and Simon's (their neighbors). Here are a few pictures from our day:

Penny loves to open presents

and Oliver is getting really good at playing tug with her

opening wooden toy eggs that I gave him. he loves to play kitchen when we are cooking.

Elliott spent a lot of time with Jim, he was awake almost the whole morning

the best Christmas present of all!

more presents

matching pjs and a kiss for brother (so what if we had to put chocolate on Elliott's lap to get Oliver to leave his toys for a photo op!)

finally a picture of Elliott with big sister Penny

boys opening presents

and finally a nap on Cynthia's shoulder

my little Christmas baby!

shirt reads "I heart Santa"

irresistible!

Merry Christmas!!

Christmas traditions

Now that Oliver is old enough to start understanding Christmas and because we are staying home this year for the first time, we decided to start some of our own Christmas traditions. Because things have been a little busy with a new baby we didn't get to as many things as I wanted to, but we did have time for a little fun :) Here are a few things we did to celebrate Christmas this month:

Cookies: Oliver and I made gingerbread men this week. I found a delicious gluten and grain-free recipe (click here) and made cinnamon frosting died green and red for him to decorate with. He had a blast decorating and eating cookies! This evening we made a fresh batch of chocolate chip cookies to leave out for Santa Clause. Oliver piled a plate high for Santa when he went to bed. He also left him a glass of water (Oliver's choice of beverage for Santa).

Elf on the Shelf:
This is a newer Christmas tradition that I heard of a few years ago. Basically, an elf hides in the house for the whole month of December, reporting back to Santa each night. Every morning he is in a different place, sometimes getting into mischief, and Oliver has a blast finding him each morning. Tonight (Christmas Eve) he will report back for the last time and won't return to our house until next December. The children can't touch the elf, or he will lose his magic.

PJs: The boys will get new PJs each year. This year they came from Grandma, so she gave them to Oliver and Elliott before she flew home Tuesday morning.

Reindeer food: I came across this idea earlier this year. Oliver mixed together oats and glitter to make reindeer food. He then scattered it out in our yard to make sure the reindeer find our house tonight.

Christmas light walk: Last night we walked around our neighborhood searching out the best Christmas light displays. Oliver loved all the blow up Santas and snowmen (they are quite popular in our neighborhood).

Movie and hot cocoa: We didn't have any plans for Christmas Eve night this year, so we decided to stay in and watch a Christmas movie. We tried to find a movie that Oliver would enjoy on the Amazon Prime instant movies, so Nick picked out Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol. However, Oliver only wanted to watch a train movie, since he's slightly obsessed with watching trains at the moment. We tried to get Polar Express but it wasn't available, so Oliver ended up picking out Thomas & Friends: Merry Winter Wish. Let's just say it wasn't exactly the most interesting movie for Nick or I to watch, but Oliver thoroughly enjoyed it. I also made this yummy peppermint hot cocoa to go along with the movie.

That's it for now! I need to go to bed so Santa has time to stop by our house. Merry Christmas!!

two weeks

Here are a few pictures from Elliott's second week. He's already starting to look so much different than he did a week ago. He's a wonderful, easy baby, and we love him so much! His big brother Oliver loves to walk over to him and plant large kisses on his forehead, often with food of some sort (usually mayonnaise or applesauce) all over his mouth.

chillin' on Grandma's lap

cuddle time with Daddy

more cuddling

tummy time

this boy seriously loves to be on his tummy, and hates to be left on his back

cuddling with Grandma

looking at me suspiciously

wide awake! he's often awake for several hours at a time now

I love the sleepy, stretching pictures

so peaceful!

naked

Elliott turned two weeks yesterday, an age that Oliver had been waiting for because we told him that Elliott's umbilical cord would fall off around this time and that he would then have a belly button that looked like his. Well, Elliott's cord actually fell off a week ago, but Oliver still points to his belly button and says "two weeks."

Since he is now two weeks old, we decided it was time for his first bath tonight. Rather than using the infant tub in the sink, Oliver and I hopped into the bathtub with Elliott. I must say Elliott enjoyed it way more than Oliver enjoyed his first bath in the infant tub two years ago. In fact, Elliott loved being in the bathtub. He was wide awake and practically smiling. It was special for me too, because the last time I sat in the bathtub with Elliott was right after he was born. Here are a few naked pics just before his bath. You can see that all of his wrinkles and extra skin are starting to fill out.

More pictures from the week later.