camping crew

 We love this bunch.  10 kids, 10 adults, 1 dog.  Lots of fun.

spring swing

Natester swinging into spring...

natester on piano

Nate wishes everyone a Merry Christmas ... and Feliz Navidad ... in February.

this-n-that...video

Just a little glimpse into evening activities chez nous.  Nate has learned how to march.  He does love marching so!  Meanwhile, Abigail is trying to figure out what song we're listening to...

  
PS - bonus points to those who catch Nate's sign language sign for "more".  

PPS - Yes, we played the teapot music song over and over and over tonight. Lots and lots of marching.

sillies

Even after a trip to the playground, these two still had some sillies left in them.....

the new walker

Nate took his time learning how to walk, but once he started he got good really fast!

bunny

Halloween spoiler alert!  Abigail is going to be a bunny....she tried on the whole ensemble today....  Last year, Abigail learned about trick-or-treating and got her first taste of candy..and she is looking forward to a repeat performance this year!

crawler

Oh the Natester, and after-dinner friskiness.

 PS - our recent splurge to upgrade our internet connection from "stone age" to "21st century" makes a huge difference with video upload speed - WOW.

piano man

Little Natester takes advantage of big sister's naptime to bang out a tune on the toy piano, which when Abby is around is referred to as: "MYYYYYYYYYYYY piano!!"

Play us a tune, Nate.

rice cereal

Big day for Nate-o! Rice cereal! Nate had been looking at our food longingly for weeks so we finally gave it a go. Abigail was thrilled to be a part of this milestone. Nate's not 100% sure what to think about food, but it was overall a pretty positive experience for our little hungry man.

Doesn't seem like that long ago that Abigail was just starting on the solid food adventure.... Abigail didn't start rice cereal until right around 6 months. Nate's a little before 6 months, but oh so curious about food food food. And it's telling of our busy-ness of late that we have not yet gotten a highchair for Nate....oh second child that he is! Abby would like him to have the same chair that she uses, and we will probably do just that. Bumbo seat for now though!.

farewell january

Farewell (almost) to January! We're hoping that February is a healthier month (Christmas cold lingers on!) and brings us a little closer to a new rhythm with our days now that we have two worker-bees in the house again.
We stuck close to home this weekend......Abby tries on Papa's gloves:

You may also notice that Abby is wearing her swimsuit over her clothes. You probably wouldn't have guessed that she also slept in it (over jammies) on Friday and Saturday night! Tonight she is snoozing swimsuit-free upstairs in her bed. Maybe she's still dreaming of summer though. Even after hearing a couple of months ago about fellow troublemaker Annabelle's sudden wintertime love for her swimsuit, we did not tuck Abby's swimsuit far enough back in her closet for it not to become an item of interest.

Nate plays a tune on the piano with Papa. Remind you of someone else we know?

Nate and Abby share an intense gaze over morning waffles.

Abigail fingerpaints the world's largest blueberry. (World's largest strawberry already completed.)

Blue hands!

The artist at work.

do

A fun video from Christmas day in Atlanta.... One of Abigail's favorite songs is "Do Re Mi" from Sound of Music. Never in her wildest dreams did she think that there might be a video of it being sung! She very enthusiastically sang right along for many viewings.

major milk milestone

Nate took a bottle! At home! From papa! It was only about 1.5 ounces, but we all celebrated this big achievement....Nate in his bouncy seat!

Nate's a man on the move.

Highest unassisted bouncy seat bounces ever witnessed. (Abigail has been known to "help" Nate bounce higher.)

We thought he was going to get himself flipped from back to front, but not this time...

sing sing sing

Lately, Abigail spends lots and lots of time singing. All sorts of songs . . . Oh My Darlin', ABC's, Old MacDonald, Mary Had a Little Lamb, Baa Baa Black Sheep . . . the list goes on.

Some blog readers will remember a recent failed attempt to capture the ABC's on film. When Grandma was in town, she got it! With piano accompaniment no less!

Also, wishing Dee Dee a very speedy recovery!! Abigail loved singing the ABC's to you over the phone last weekend!

abc's

Mommy was away in Colorado all week and missed Abigail (and Jamie) very much! So it was a treat (for mommy) to have a 6 am wake up call this morning from Abigail who was lying in bed singing the ABCs over and over. Later in the morning, we tried capturing the ABCs on film, but life interfered. We remain in pursuit of the full-version alphabet in video form.....

".... next time won't you sing with me!?"

bgb

Guess who's been sleeping in her big girl bed a lot lately??? In fact it's probably been over a week since A has slept in her crib. Here she is waking up from a nap:

Of course crib is not far away. We're still formulating a plan for how the crib might seamlessly make an exit from A's room, freeing up a little more floor space.

Abigail sings a wake up song. "I wake you up in the mooooorning!" This is not a familiar song to us, so either A made it up, or one of our faithful blog readers will name that tune.

adventures in handwashing

While washing her hands for dinner tonight Abigail found it impossible to resist tasting what looked like delicious soap bubbles on her hands. Her response and the faces she made afterwards lead us to conclude that our hand soap is not tasty (we'll take her word for it). Once her hands were rinsed and she had a sip of milk to get the soap taste out of her mouth, Abigail continued to debrief on the situation:

In case you didn't catch Abby's logical reflections:
"Soap does not taste good."
And in response to a question of how milk tastes: "Good."

call dee dee pop pop

Abigail's mama has been meaning to call Dee Dee and Pop Pop (her grandparents, A's great grandparents), and thinking about that reminded her of Abigail's phone "conversation" with Dee Dee and Pop Pop back in November.

Now we just need to call them for real!

happy new year (from abby)

Abigail pauses, mid-grilled-cheese, to wish everyone a happy new year.

running bee

One more Halloween scene. Watching this video clip gives Abby the giggles, so we figured it should be up on the blog for everyone's amusement.