Here are a collection of photos from our recent snow week. Monday's snow day turned into a full week of no school. Now Christmas Break begins, so we will go 3 weeks without teaching. Crazy! The downside of the extra week off was that we were pretty well stuck in our house and weren't able to plan any extra trips, since we never knew from day-to-day, whether there would be snow. Also included are photos from our trip to see the "Festival of Lights" parade. Kjell threw a fit when it was time to leave the parade - he loved it. Enjoy the photos. Kjell was VERY excited about making a snowman, because he's currently obsessed with Frosty the Snowman.
Kjell's first Christmas, Labon and Katie McCoy gave him two little Christmas toys that sing and dance. He loves them both, but particularly enjoys dancing and singing with the Santa toy. Here's some video:
Wow. It's been two months since we updated the blog? Sorry. We'll try to make up for it with some photos from Halloween and Thanksgiving.
Kjell was an alligator for Halloween. He was mostly intimidated by the whole "trick or treat" thing. We only went to three houses, and then he wanted to go home and give out candy. He much preferred to give the candy than to take it. His pumpkin is a little hard to make out in the photo, but it's Thomas the Tank Engine. Live everyone else in Kjell's demographic, he loves Thomas.
Thanksgiving was also very nice. We had a very nice crowd for the festivities. Jamie's parents, Grammie and Boppie, came up from Roseburg. Maija's mom, Grandma Judy, came over from Astoria and our dear friends - Allie, Brian and their boys Jeffrey and Thomas came to join us. We had entirely too much food, but loved our wonderful company.
While we had everyone in town, we also went to get our Christmas tree. Then we went to the Salem Carousel, where we waited for Santa's arrival.... BY TRAIN!! Kjell was quite excited to see a train from up close and Santa was just a nice little bonus. Of course, when Santa got off the train and came over to give Kjell a pat on the back, our little boy recoiled in fear.
Maija, Kjell, Jamie and Grammy Sara went to the OB's office yesterday for our second ultrasound. While there, Kjell learned that he is going to have a little brother! His initial reaction was disappointment. He had convinced himself that there was a girl in mommy's tummy. So, when we said "Kjell you are going to have a little brother", he replied with a loud, "NOOO!!! SISTER!". Today he is much more comfortable with the idea of having a little brother. Good thing he has until February 8th to get used to the idea.
We had such a good trip to Charlotte. It did our hearts good to see all of the friends and family out there. Kjell and his "brother" Cade as he now calls him had so much fun playing together. We got to meet Tyler and Nate and had such great visits with our friends. These few posts showcase just some of the fun we had.
We're a little late with this news, but I've finished my MAT program, received my master's degree and even lined up a job for next year. I received my license in the mail this week, so now I'm official. Since I'm a new teacher, I have to start back to work a week before the rest of the teachers (Aug. 18th). Kids start the day after labor day. I'm excited to have lined up a job in the grade level and subject that I was targeting. I'll be teaching math to middle school kids (mostly 6th graders). I'm sure that I'll have lots of good stories to tell. In the meantime, here's a few photos from my graduation.
We have lots of good stuff to share from our trip to Charlotte. So much good stuff, that we'll have to post it in stages. To start, photos of Cade and Kjell playing in the first annual mini-golf extravaganza. A little history.... When Jamie and Cory were young, we would visit Poppa and Penny P each summer for about a month. On the last night of each annual trip we all would play mini-golf as one last fun event.
Penny thought it would be fun to start the same tradition with her grandsons. It was a lot of fun. The boys wore matching putt-putt t-shirts and we all had fun. Kjell's version of playing golf was to hit the ball once (in some random direction) and then pick the ball up and drop it in the hole. Cade's version of playing golf was running full speed all over the course while his parents did their best to keep up.
A few weeks ago, our good friends D'mitri and Kara came over for dinner and brought their two boys Andreas and Athan. We caught a funny little moment on video when the boys debated who was the king of the mountain. Enjoy!
We have had such a great March and April. We've had visitors galore and many good photo opps. We've had Auntie Anna and Grammy Penny, Grammy Sara and Bop, and Grandma Judy all visit with us. Most recently, Cory, Leslie, and Cousin Cade made a visit and we all had a really awesome time. The boys are now so big and they played nicely together--unless Kjell was expected to share. "Mine" is a new word in our house. Kjell is now also using a lot of sentences. We've heard "dinner done cooking Mommy," "more broccoli please," and many sentences using colors and descriptions of various and sundry automobiles like "blue car, Mommy"...etc. Kjell had fun talking with his cousin Cade too. He would mimic all of Cades noises and words back to him. It was so good to see the two boys play and love one another. They shared lots of kisses and hugs and pats. Cade was practicing patting the "baby." We look foward to catching up with all of our family and friends soon---maybe the day after school is over!
Kjell woke us up early this morning. We started our Easter Egg Hunt prior to 7:00 AM (ugh). Kjell really enjoyed it and was pretty speedy at finding the eggs. Looks like the Easter Bunny will need to do a better job of hiding the eggs next year.
Kjell is growing and picking up new words like crazy. The last few weeks have been all about language development at our house.
These are a few photos from the last couple of weeks. Kjell is getting really full of personality. He tells jokes that keep us laughing. These ususally consist of a funny word that Kjell says at the wrong time. We laugh, and then it is the new joke of the week.
This weekend he decided he was into being wee little baby again. He wanted to carry the pacifier around--something he rarely did even when he was very little. He was giggling and laughing about being a "baby." He also got a charge out of clapping his hands up to his cheeks and looking surprised. We thought it was too cute to miss for a picture opportunity.
The photos outside were from an unseasonably balmy day. We decided to "grill out" North Carolina style and enjoy the brief respite from the rainy weather. It was lovely and Kjell and Daddy played the game where Kjell tries to bounce on Daddy hard enough to make him revisit what he had for dinner. Kjell is also very much into wearing hats, especially Daddy's hats.
