Will's 1st Birthday - December

We had a nice little family birthday celebration for Will's first birthday.  He didn't really know what was going on, but the girls had lots of fun spoiling him and celebrating him!

His favorite gift was an Elmo from Aunt Gretchen.  He really did think that Elmo was in our living room.  He was in awe of that thing!

He's still not walking but getting closer.  Hoping he takes him time :)

Reindeer!

We went to see real live reindeer at a local greenhouse last weekend. We got to see Comet an Dasher. The are pretty cool. We also saw Curley the camel and some fish in a pond. The kids had fun running around. Will got to sit forward facing in the car for the first time and he thinks it is awesome!!

Santa Visit

Nate's mom, Sharon, was in town over this past weekend.  We were thrilled to see grandma arrive!!!  The kids counted the minutes until she came.

We decided to try to do something fun and Christmas related.  We headed to see Santa downtown in Seattle at Macy's on the 6th floor.  It was awesome since we hadn't been down in that area yet.  It was so full of life.  The Santaland was on the 6th floor of Macy's....near the china...poor planning!  But it was super fun to ride all the escalators.

The kids were excited to see Santa.  Grace told Santa that she wants a Novi Stars doll and a stuffed monkey toy.  (No idea where that came from!)  Then Evie told Santa that she wants a toy fish.  (What??!)  Clara hardly sat still for a second but we did get a picture.  Will sat with Santa and tried to cry right away, but held it together.  By the end he was just staring at Santa and crying.  It cracks me up when the babies cry when they see Santa. 

Nate and I headed to Kansas City on Sunday to check out potential schools for next year.  It was a great trip and we found several schools that will be great.  Sharon managed the four kids at home perfectly and made it look easy!!  Unfortunately for her, all of them had colds, but she worked her grandma cuddle magic and made it through! 

Here is our Santa photo!!

Clara's 2nd Birthday

Our crazy little Clara turned 2!  She's still been crazy, but has had a lot more sweet moments the past few weeks.  She has started singing her ABC's, the Itsy Bitsy Spider, the Elmo's World theme song, the Diego theme song and the Dora theme song.  In addition she'll try to sing anything she hears.  We were on our way to pick out our Christmas tree and I had sang "Oh, Christmas Tree" before we left, and she starting singing it in the car.  She does it with her sweet little 2 year old pronunciation, but it is so stinkin' cute!!!!  She is still throwing her tantrums and doing "butt bombs" all the time.  She does have her sweet moments.  She calls Will, either Willy or Buddy, she calls Evelyn, Ebbie, and Grace is Gaycie.  She says her own name like "Care-wah".  She can communicate quite well for a 2 year old.  She's still climbing all over the place.  Last week she took a tumble down the entire flight of stairs.  The stairs where we are currently living are long and wooden.  She cried when she got down to the bottom, when Evie saw her she started crying and freaking out, then Grace came around the corner and started yelling at the top of her lungs about it.  I came down the stairs with Will who then got scared from all the screaming and he started bawling.  It was a loud morning.  Clara was just fine luckily.  Then a few days later she fell in the kitchen and didn't get her hands down and nailed her forehead on the floor and ended up with a big goose-egg on her house.  She generally falls off a chair or the table once a week.  She climbs up on lots of things, and will not listen or be careful.  She's a busy-body!!!  Here are some of her birthday photos.

Will's Fall Photo Shoot

I got a new camera last month.  I need to figure out how to use it, but I still decided to go ahead and take some pics of Will to update our Christmas card.  I would take Clara's too, but she's been soooo moody that I don't even feel like trying right now.  We did get a few minutes of sunshine so we headed upstairs to my bedroom and tried the best we could.  Evie joined in with pics and helping Will smile.  

My favorite

 

All Done!!!!

Halloween in Seattle 2012 10-31-2012

We had a great and fairly relaxing Halloween this year.  Both Grace and Evelyn had parties at school.  Will and Clara joined me for Evelyn's party, and we had a babysitter watch the 3 youngest for Grace's party.  We got all dressed and made up prior to dinner.  I took pictures of the kids while we waited for Nate to get home from work.  We went trick or treating then all together for the first half-hour.  The babies and I went home while Nate and the older girls kept trick or treating.  Everyone had a great time.