Christmas Day

We had a wonderful Christmas day. Very relaxing. Henry opened a few presents, we went on a walk and ate a wonderful lunch. Henry is really enjoying playing with the toys here both old and new. Here are some shots from the day....

On the walk in a nearby woodsy area.

Family portrait. Too bad it wasn't in time for the Christmas card. Grandma Janet does a nice job with the camera too!

Henry enjoys looking at the car magazines with Grandpa.

The tower that Henry and Grandma built.

Henry's (and Derek's) favorite toy as of now...Automoblox. Very cool. I'm not sure who's spent more time playing with them.

Destination #1

Well, we made it to our first destination on our holiday travels. We had to leave a day early to avoid bad weather. Henry was amazing traveling. Every time we're a bit worried about how he'll do and so far we are always pleasantly surprised. He is enjoying playing with all the "new" toys at Grandma Janet and Grandpa Delmar's house. Derek is still playing with the camera he borrowed and getting some nice documentation of our time. We have tons of pictures to choose from so I will probably be able to post a lot over the holidays! Here are just a few of the many options....
When he's busy, it seems he has started to stick his tongue out.




I (Tina) had a toy semi when growing up (probably because Todd had one) so now Henry is enjoying it. He played with it for about 45 minutes last night.




The play nativity scene is also very popular. Although earlier today the donkey and cow were using the roof as a slide!



The other "child" (furry child) traveled well too--as always. She is enjoying all the smells of things cooking in the kitchen here.

Fun Pictures

So I managed to borrow a co-workers really sweet camera setup for the holidays. It's going to be sad when I have to return it. Anyway, I'm still trying to learn all of the equipment, but I did manage to snap two pretty cool pictures so far.

Henry and Levi were playing on the couch and I finally got their attention long enough to snap this picture. Less baby and more little boy every day.

In this shot, Henry was actually trying to remove the ornament from our tree. It turned out pretty cool 'cause it looks kinda like he's decorating the tree.

That's all for now.

Didn't make the cut....

As in these photos didn't make the cut for the Christmas card to be sent out...soon.. maybe even before Christmas! We're a little slow this year. Today we tried taking some photos for the card and these didn't make the cut but I still liked them.
We went to see an indoor holiday train setup. Very popular although Henry was concerned about the trains that were not moving.

This is why people don't usually try to have pets and kids in the same photo. There is always one that is never looking at the camera!

Or no one is looking at the camera!

Thanksgiving

We were very thankful and excited to have Grandma Janet and Grandpa Delmar visit for Thanksgiving. Henry had so much fun with them--lots of singing, reading books and playing Legos.

Derek created another wonderful turkey again this year for all of us. We ate too much in general and really enjoyed relaxing together. We did manage to make it to the zoo on a warm day and to get a Christmas tree. Henry was very sad yesterday that he could not go in the airplane with Grandma and Grandpa. This morning he woke up and said "Grandma? Grandpa?" I said they were at home. He got a big grin on his face and said "went home in AIRPLANE." The child is crazy about transportation vehicles of any sort. I'm guessing Grandma and Grandpa were a bit happy to have a break from car, truck, and construction books!

Grandma Janet and Henry looking intently for Goldbug.



At the zoo with our little polar bear. He didn't want to leave that when the picture was done.



Henry reading a new favorite from the library (Thanks Trent!). The other day he fell asleep with the frontloader (to the right of him) and his dump truck in his hands.

Big boy

Also, for those who don't see Henry often (and care about numbers) we just went in for his 18 month appointment (a month early for the flu shot). My thoughts that he was big kid for his age were confirmed:
33.5" tall and 29.1 lbs (both 89% for his age--yikes!) I keep thinking he will slow down but it hasn't happened yet. However, maybe we should not be surprise after looking at pictures of Derek around the same age. He was also not on the small side!

Long overdue

Wow, I realized the other day that we haven't blogged since the Halloween pictures. I was going to blog but realized we hadn't really taken any pictures lately. I do have some videos to post but then need some editing first. I'm not sure how we every did this almost every week last year.

Here are some random shot Derek took the other evening.

Wearing Dad's cycling hat--always a favorite activity.

Looking a little mischievous!

Taking a "picture" while he's getting his picture taken.
His camera is the bottom of a broken excavator. He saw it one night and said it was a camera and starting taking pictures of things. When it's missing he says "where's digger camera?" (as in where is the digger/excavator that is now my camera since the top part was broken off) He has quite an imagination these days. I never know what things will look like to him--it's quite interesting.