Getting Ready for Christmas

We are hosting a neighborhood Christmas party next weekend, so we spent the day getting the house ready and all of our Christmas decorations up. I'm always so excited, until I remember how much work it is.

I have a ton of stuff stored - some of which I don't even use :)

Ayden was quite a trooper - I think he had fun just hanging out outside.

Our pretty house

Happy Birthday Aunt Sarah

Trying to get Ayden to cooperate was a little difficult - but it made for a cute video!

Happy Thanksgiving

Here's a happy turkey day wish for everyone!

Back from the cruise....

We had a wonderful time on our cruise! We enjoyed the sun and lots of family time - there were 18 family members on board (plus 2 longtime family friends that might as well be family). So, we were quite a force....Ayden was so cute because every time we saw someone we knew (at meals, in the hallway, or just walking), we would get totally excited, like it had been weeks since he had seen them. Here's a rundown of our little vacation:

Thursday - We boarded the plane to San Diego, then grabbed the shuttle to the cruise ship terminal. After waiting in many lines, we finally got on the ship and found our room. We were surprised to find a bed instead of a crib for Ayden, luckily the room steward fixed that quickly - this was not the time to try a "big boy bed." Then it was time for the muster drill - Ayden was super cranky since he had not had a nap - so it was quite difficult to keep him quiet. We finished with that, took Ayden back to the room for a quick nap, then went to dinner.



Friday - Ayden woke up bright and early at 6am (ugh!). We were on the ship all day, so we hung out in our room, wandered around the ship, went for a swim, and at a ton of food. We tried to drop Ayden off at Camp Carnival in the morning and they paged us after 1/2 hour because he was crying. That night was formal night - luckily Ayden successfully went to Camp Carnival so we could enjoy our evening with the adults.

The kiddie pool was empty most of the time. Probably because other people followed the rules. There were signs everywhere that said kids in diapers were not allowed (even swim diapers). My question is why they would have a "children's pool" that is only 1 foot deep if it's not for babies and toddlers. Needless to say, we broke the rules.

Saturday - We woke up in Cabo San Lucas. We waited in a long line to get off the ship, then walked around Cabo. We shopped a little, ate lunch at Cabo Wabo, then hiked for what seemed like forever to get to the beach. We swam a bit, had some drinks on the beach, then took a water taxi back to the dock to catch the tender back to the ship. Ayden wasn't real thrilled with the ocean - it was pretty rough and the undertow was pretty strong, so it was good he was afraid. We adults had lots of fun swimming in the warm water!

Ayden is a two-fisted drinker too!!

Sunday - Another day on the ship - we swam, read, took naps, and packed up our suitcases to go home. Because we had such a large group on board, we got to attend a hosted (ie. free alcohol) cocktail party. It was tons of fun and we took lots of family pictures. For our last dinner, we had cakes brought out for two of my uncles' birthdays (Bruce & John). They were a little less than thrilled.

Ayden made friends with many of the staff members.

These are all of my cousins that were on board (and my brother)

Monday - We woke up bright and early (5am thanks to Ayden) and ate, got our stuff and waited on the deck for out group number to be called to debark. We took a taxi to the airport, checked our luggage and then had a great lunch with a family friend to lives in the area. Luckily, Ayden took a quick nap in the airport - it made for a much more pleasant flight.

Watching the ship get loaded for the next cruise.

If you've made it this far - thanks for reading...this blog was partly so that I could get all of my memories out so they're down "on paper"!

Fun times with a toddler

Lately it's a constant fight to get Ayden to eat anything but crackers or fruit. We thought this was HILARIOUS!! You'd think we were trying to get him to eat something strange and disgusting - NO! It was the biscuit topping from the chicken pot pie we were eating for dinner. Ayden eating it was apparently too much to ask.



Oh, and I have the funniest story. The other night was the first pretty cold night and I broke out the fleece "footy" pajamas for Ayden. When I put them on him, he was so confused. He just kept saying "jammies? jammies?" When I told him that these were his jammies, he started laughing, holding his feet and saying "jammie shoes! jammie shoes!" Even as he laid down in his crib, he just held his feet saying "jammie shoes!" He was completely amazed by them. The mind of a toddler makes me laugh every day.

Belated Thank you

Ayden got this awesome birthday gift in the mail from Katie. Here he is saying Thank You! Too bad we didn't have enough AA batteries for him to play with it the "real" way until the next day :)

We can't wait for you to come visit so Ayden and Katie can play together! While the mommies play with Ryan!!!

Two-Year-Old Pictures

I finally got Ayden's pictures back from his 2-year-old sitting. He was the most cooperative he as ever been. I think he would have stayed in any way that the photographer posed him. The results were some GREAT pics!

Excuse the bad pictures - our scanner wasn't working, so I had to take pictures of the pictures.

Halloween Fun

We carved pumpkins on Thursday night. I copied Shannon and got the Mr. Potato Head pumpkin accessories. It's a good thing because Ayden was thoroughly disgusted by the pumpkin "guts." I think he may have tasted a little bit because he kept spitting and saying "yucky puntin". After that, we couldn't get him to even get close to them.Our finished product....probably could have used a bigger pumkin.
This is about as close as Ayden would get to the pumpkins.

The finished products

Halloween was quite a day. Ken took Ayden to work with him for their big party. Afterward, they came to visit me at work. Then, we headed to trick or treat at Aunt Beth's and at Vicki's (his day care provider). He wasn't sure about the whole trick or treating thing. He said it, then just barged into their houses. I guess it's a good thing we didn't go to any strangers' houses. Next, we went to our neighborhood Hallween party. It was tons of fun - Ayden had fun playing with all of his neighborhood buddies.

Heading up the driveway...

I think this look says "you want me to do what?"

My feeble attempt at getting Ayden with the pumpkins - my little Monkey wasn't very cooperative.