Welcome to 2012!

Robin crawled into bed with us New Year's morning, cuddled with Dean, and went back to sleep.  Aren't they cute?

Using a funnel, I made pancakes in the shape of the numbers 2012 for breakfast.  We also had mulled cider and pomegranite.  Yummy way to begin the new year!

Robin's plate wasn't big enough for the whole year, so he started with just the '12.

Liam playing with the new bath toys he got for Christmas

And Robin building with his new castle blocks, whilst wearing new pajamas as well

Both the boys in Robin's big box.  Liam looks like he's not quite sure about this turn of events.

We built a tent with bed sheets, chairs, and clothespins in the basement, and left if up for several days.

We all had fun inside.  We even ate dinner in here once (although that made quite a mess.)

Robin had the idea to put these rubberband bracelets on the wheels of his car to make caterpillar tracks.  He really seems to be developing an analytical mind.  I'm frequently impressed with the things he comes up with...

...like this, when he started building his train tracks up the stairs

He needed a lot of help making it reach this high, but he had a lot of great ideas for how it should go together

Let me out!!!

Gonna have to take advantage of this for as long as it lasts!

Putting his ducks and a spray bottle in with the fake snow in the sensory bin

After removing the Christmas tree, Dean set up the breakfast bar so it can actually be used.  Robin has been enjoying it immensely.

During a recent trip to Home Depot, Liam got to help drive the car cart for the first time.

The other day, when Liam fell down and started to cry, I picked him up and kissed him as usual.  However, I was surprised when Robin came up, said "you're okay," and then gave Liam a kiss and a hug.  It was so sweet!

Liam has learned to nod his head.  This is unusual, since babies have such heavy heads so they usually learn to shake "no" before nodding "yes."  Liam doesn't exactly use it to mean "yes" all the time, although we all think it's funny when he does do it at appropriate times.  Mainly he just likes to nod at us.  Or just to himself.  He's doing it a lot.

That's all for now, folks!

Look at what he can do!

I had a handful of posts scheduled for the next few weeks, but I'm pushing them back a bit.  Look at what Liam figured out how to do last night!

This kid is crazy!  He hasn't even figured out how to get into a sitting position by himself yet, but he's already standing!  He even managed to cruise along the crib side a short distance.

Of course, he loves to walk.  He never tires of taking somebody's hands and walking all over the house, so he's had lots of practice.  I think he's going to almost skip crawling.  After all, it was just last week when he started scooting:

In the last few days he's made a few more typical-crawling movements, although he mainly tends to get up on all fours, move his legs forward, maybe he moves one arm, and then he just flops forward.  But it's progress.  He occupied himself on the ground for a while tonight, probably because he was able to explore his surroundings by himself.

But again, I think once he figures out the walking, he'll ditch crawling in a heartbeat.  He prefers two-legged modes of locomotion.

End of 2011 Happenings

I felt really on top of things during the time leading up to Christmas.  Perhaps it was all of the deadlines and things to do related to Christmas--often having other obligations makes one more efficient.  At any rate, I was keeping up with photos, writing, blogging, etc on a daily basis.  Then I relaxed after Christmas and just haven't been in as much of a mood lately.  Because Christmas is such a family-event-oriented time, and I take photos during such events, I'm already behind on photos and blogging.  But we'll see if I can catch up and keep up.

Here's a cute one my Aunt Jackie took during her visit in early December.  Love smooching the baby!!!

A nice family photo

My grandmother and my aunt both arrived for a visit a few days before Christmas.

Liam and his Great Nana

"Open it.  It's a train."  *sigh*  "Robin, you're not supposed to tell people what's inside the present."  (This was a train magnet, with a picture of Robin and Liam inside.  Robin helped me make them so he could give everyone gifts of his own.)

Del's birthday is a few days before Christmas, and Dean's family came over to celebrate it on Christmas eve.  We didn't give him the suitcase, but Robin sure enjoyed pulling it around the house for him.

I delivered some Christmas cookies to the neighbors and thought I'd take a picture at my attempt at artistic food arrangements.

All of our combined Christmas loot.  Is there enough here, do you think?

Here's what our house looked like the day after Christmas, before all the toys had found new homes.  What a mess.

Dean promised Robin he would sleep in his bed once, which he did a few days after Christmas.  I couldn't help but sneak in and take a picture after they both fell asleep.

We went out to Cinzetti's for dinner while my uncle and grandmother were still in town

Liam with his great uncle

Both the boys are wearing their new shirts from Great Aunt Catherine.  Robin's says "Liam's Brother" and Liam's says "Robin's brother."  However, I didn't think about white shirts and italian food.  Oops.  Thank goodness for spot treatment.

Liam with Great Nana and Great Uncle John

Liam riding on Dada

The basement got set up in a very elaborate manner, with an airport at one end, a town with roads in the middle, and the train yards at the other end.

Let the fun commence!

What a way to end the year--both boys being read to by Grammy and Grandpa!

Some Robin-isms for your enjoyment:
He calls steering wheels "turning wheels"
He ends questions with "is."  For example:  "Where Dada is?"
When Robin likes something a lot, he'll say he likes it "every day!"  And when he enjoys someone's company he'll say he wants them to stay "all week!"

That's it for 2011!  Time to move on to pictures from the new year!

Christmas Pictures

We had a very busy time of Christmas, and I've been taking a bit of time to relax and enjoy since then.  Without the chaos of an upcoming holiday, Robin has settled back down into his normal self.  I think all the hustle and bustle was worrying him.  On Christmas Even he told me he didn't want Christmas to come--but starting Christmas morning, when he realized Christmas meant presents, family, and breakfast sitting on the floor, he had a wonderful time.  He did a good job of waiting his turn to open presents and enjoyed handing them out too.  He did go a little nuts, but we all had fun.

Setting out cookies for Santa

Helping to pour the egg nog

Our tree, with all of the gifts we were planning to give each other and our family

All the swag that Santa brought

Robin really wanted Annie and Clarabel, the coaches that Thomas the Train pulls, to go along with his Thomas.  We suggested early on that he could ask Santa for them, and he did.  And Santa came through!

Liam wanted something to bounce on, because he loves to bounce.  He also wanted something big to climb on, like the lion Robin has in his room.  Robin interpreted this to mean that Liam wanted a bouncy castle.  That obviously didn't happen, but Santa did bring Liam a bouncy cow

We had our traditional breakfast of Sticky Buns, with fruit and Little Smokies to balance it out

Ah, to get excited about something like an umbrella!

Mmm, new train tastes good!

The musical train that Robin wanted to give Liam (mainly because he wanted to play with it himself.)

Dean's family came over to exchange gifts after we'd had the morning to ourselves for a few hours.

Dean wanted to play a trick on his sister.  We gave her a wii for Christmas (and for her birthday, and their parents chipped in too) and we also got her a little figurine.  Apparently Dean kept the box from our wii, so he put the figurine and a weight in our box and wrapped it up in addition to the real wii.

"Yay!  I got my wii!!"

"...  Oh."

"Is this really a wii this time?!"

We also brought Dean's parents into the 21st century by giving them a 3D bluray player to go with their fancy 3D TV.

After opening our gifts with Dean's family we all trucked down to Longmont and had dinner with my family.  (I didn't take my camera out once while everyone was there.  Phooey.)  After the meal Dean's family trickled out.  After that, before we opened gifts, I gave the camera to Robin for a while.  His random shots sure can be artistic sometimes.

Getting his Poppa and Great Uncle

He also got this one of Dean and Liam

And this one of Mama and Great Nana

At last, as the long, exciting day drew to a close, we opened gifts with my family.  Robin squashing his new Thomas pillow

Mom crocheted Peep, Chirp, and Quack from one of his favorite shows.

The book by Glen Cook we got for Dad at MileHiCon.  Signed even!

Mom got new circular knitting needles

Nana got her traditional "Rhoadarmer boys" calendar.  (Lots of other people got them too)

Liam with his Poppa and Great Uncle, showing off his Santa Baby outfit

Apparently I need to hand the camera off more often (or perhaps give it to Dean and say "take a picture of me") because there aren't any photos of me opening presents this year, and only one of me helping Liam.  I do believe Dean took video of me though, so there's something.

After this gift opening we loaded everything into the car and headed home, at a very late hour for three-year-olds and six-month-olds.  It was a wonderful day.  I hope everyone out there had a Very Merry Christmas too!