Christmas 2011

This year, we opted to stay home and relax on Christmas Eve. We lounged and ate soup :) We put the kids to bed at the normal time and then woke them up at 10:45 to head to Gus' brother's house for the midnight celebration. I accidentally left the memory card at home, so we didn't get any pictures of our giddy children at midnight, but they certainly had fun!

We slept late Christmas morning and then the kids opened the gifts from us and a few relatives who sent things. Nathan is our early bird and was wide awake, even after our late night.

Emie really liked passing out gifts, but wasn't a huge fan of tearing them open.

Nathan was really excited to give us a star he made at school.

We found this great kitchen on the side of the road! It just needed a few new screws and a wipe down and it was ready to go. We got Emie some play food and dishes for her Christmas present.

She has been "cooking" a lot this week already!

I think Nathan's favorite gift was a bat cave given to him by his Tita Grace and Uncle John.

After gifts, we had a big breakfast, took a walk, played with our new toys for a while, took long naps and then headed to Grandpa and Grandma's house for dinner and another gift exchange.

Isaac watched all of the action this year. It is crazy to think he'll be right in there ripping open gifts next year!

Emie loves playdoh, so I know she'll enjoy this playdoh ice cream set.

Mommy and Isaac

We had so much fun spending time with both sides of our family, but we were pretty tired when Monday morning came and it was time to head to work/school/babysitter. I really wish Americans celebrated Boxing Day!

Prepping for Christmas 2011

Advent at the Arceos was a lot of fun this year! Nathan is understanding more and more about the significance of what Christ did for us and Emie is just starting to grasp some of these truths. Having a baby in the house was helpful with this as Nathan was very fascinated that someone so powerful could be helpless like our little Isaac. He also couldn't believe he would sleep in an animal feeding box - yuck! We tried to spend time each day of advent reading about the Christmas story, learning songs and Bible verses and of course, making those oh so beautiful homemade ornaments to adorn our tree.

Here is an attempt at getting a picture of all three in front of the tree after decorating. No smiles and one blurry foot, but better than the other attempts!

The older kids had fun making salt dough ornaments this year. They especially liked the painting and glitter. I absolutely love that when you are two or three you just can't have too much glitter. Nathan asked to put more and I told him I thought his star was already beautiful. He told me "but Mommy, more glitter will make it more beautiful!". Knowing that Jesus would absolutely love these excessively glittered decorations for his birthday, I gladly handed him the bottle and let him have at it.

I always thought I'd detest all of the homemade ornaments when they started pouring into our house, but secretly I really like them. The kids are just so proud to see their work hanging on the tree, that I can't help but like them.

An early visit from the tooth fairy

We've had our first visit from the tooth fairy! Poor Emie took an unfortunate spill at the playground last summer which left one of her front teeth pretty loose. It held on for a while, but she took another unfortunate spill a few weeks ago and it came completely out. So it looks like she'll follow in her Aunt Kelly's footsteps and be toothless for quite a while.

It wasn't too painful for her and she got over it pretty quickly. And we think she is still pretty darn cute!

And she has a crisp new dollar in her piggy bank :)

Busy bags

One of the best things that I did to help prepare for Isaac's arrival was to participate in a busy bag exchange. A friend of mine organized it and was able to gather 30 women to each make 30 of one activity for either toddlers or preschoolers. It was a lot of work at 38 weeks pregnant to make the bags, but soooooo worth it! Our box arrived when Isaac was about 2 or 3 weeks old and we have been loving exploring all of the different activities. They keep the big kids occupied and I don't have to plan out as many things for our learning time. Here are some pictures of the kids doing some of the activities.

Nathan is shaping play dough into numbers and Emie is doing it with shapes.

Emie is matching felt popsicles with the stick with the appropriate color on it. The other side of the sticks have the name of the color written in black, so Nathan can work on his sight words.

Nathan is doing a bug match game. He has to find the appropriate matching bug and they are a few layers, to challenge a bit more. I helped Emie with it and it was good for talking about big/small, the type of bug and colors.

Emie is stuffing pom poms through small holes in a plastic container. Great for keeping her occupied and good for fine motor practice too!

Nathan is working on patterns with pom poms. They start basic and get more complicated.

I know the kids have enjoyed it because Nathan was wondering if Santa might bring him another box of "activities"!

When people ask me for advice on preparing for a second baby, I always recommend putting together activities for your older child. Someone recommended this to me when Emie was born and it was a life saver. While it was a lot of work to put together my 30 bags, it would have been far more time consuming and expensive to do 30 different activities.

Here is the link to where we found all of the busy bag ideas, in case anyone wants to make any of their own.

http://unsolicitedadvice-n-such.blogspot.com/p/busy-bag-swaps.html

2 months

Isaac was 2 months on the 22nd! He has grown so much! Here is a little picture overload from the last month.

While hoods on baby outfits are a bit of a nuisance, they are so cute!

Daddy and Isaac snuggle time. He loves to listen to music!

He did not love his first bath, but is quite comfortable in the water now.

The boys trying on their winter wear when the weather suddenly turned cold. Nathan's still fits from last year. Yay!

Isaac loves to be on his tummy! I have a feeling he'll be a tummy sleeper like his big brother and sister pretty soon. He is able to roll tummy to back now.

He is smiling and "talking" a lot now. It seems that he wants to be a part of the constant action in our house.

Morning snuggle time with big sister Emie!

Overall, Isaac is doing great. He has been our easiest baby so far, which is very nice for a third! He takes 4 naps a day and eats every 3 hours. He sleeps an 8-9 hour stretch at night, eats and then sleeps another 3-4 hours. I love still having him in the bassinet in my room! I think I'll be sad when he moves upstairs to his own room :( He is also our biggest baby so far. He weighed 12 lbs, 6 oz and was 23.2 inches long at his two month appointment.

In the next month, I have to go back to work. So Isaac will be starting with our babysitter in 3 weeks. Our project now is to make sure he takes his bottles well and to savor our one on one days these last few weeks.

An Asian twist on Thanksgiving leftovers

We hosted Thanksgiving for the first time this year! It went very well, but with a house full of 17 people (7 of whom were under 5) and managing my own three children, we were too busy to take any pictures. We had a wonderful time catching up with my aunt and uncle and cousins and the food was comforting, as always.

The true advantage of hosting was that we got to keep the turkey bones! Perhaps that isn't so exciting to most people, but we are a soup loving family. Gus transformed it into a fabulous Asian soup which was so good that every bowl at our table was emptied quickly. He boiled the bones for a few hours, added green onion, sweet onion, carrots, bok choy, bean sprouts and pepper. Of course, it was served over rice!

We hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

My head hurts!

In the 15 minute ride home from swim lessons this morning Nathan asked all of the following questions:

How can God be with Daddy at work and with me at swim lessons at the same time? Does he send Jesus with one of us? But then what about while you are upstairs watching my swim lessons, how is he there too?

Why does Jesus have a birthday, but God doesn't?

When will my life end Mommy? I would like to meet God. But if he is soooooooo big, will he be able to see me? And hear me? I want him to answer all of my questions. Daddy said he knows the answers to EVERYTHING.

May God give me the right words to answer these little questions! And keep 'em coming buddy! Those who seek truth will find Him.

And he is seriously cute saying "omnipresent", by the way.

Halloween fun

We had a great Halloween this year! It was fun to have two kids who were really into it and it made for a great family memory. We started early, by trick-or-treating Saturday at Gus' brother's house and on Sunday at my parents house.

They were not about to let a high doorbell stand in their way!

On actual Halloween, we hit the neighborhood around 4 or so. We have a ton of little kids on our block, so it was fun to see all our friends out and about too.

They made it around the whole block. Pretty good for being 3 and 2!

After that, we headed to our friends' house for a little Halloween gathering and back to a neighbor's house for a bonfire. It was a long evening, but lots of fun!

And for good measure, here is a picture of our sleeping lil' pumpkin!

A beautiful fall day!

We have had a lot of beautiful fall days lately and there are some gorgeous red trees at our nearby park. For some reason, the playgrounds have been empty the last few weeks. I don't understand why people think 50 degree days are too cold for outdoor play! We know the cold is coming and are planning on enjoying any and every nice day before it gets here!

Here are a few pictures of one particularly beautiful fall day.

The best part of playing outside on a brisk fall day is coming home to some hot cocoa or hot apple cider!

1 month

Isaac was one month old last Saturday! Obviously, our hands and hearts are very full right now!

Here are a few pictures from his first month :)

Isaac is a very alert baby. He is generally quiet when he is awake, but he is always looking around to see what is going on and he loves staring at big bro and sis. He has just started smiling and "cooing" to try to be involved in all of the action.

He definitely has the Arceo cheeks and he is currently working on his third chin!

Isaac had his one month appointment earlier this week. He currently weighs 10 lbs .5 oz and is 21.5 inches long. He has continued to be a very easy baby and is eating and sleeping well. That is all you can ask for at a month!

Our Cubbie

Nathan started AWANA in September and has really been enjoying it. They play games, hear Bible stories, sing songs, do a craft and they work with their parents to memorize a verse each week. Thankfully, Nathan has a really good memory and usually learns the verse quicker than I do! This is a good thing as I'm teaching him in a sleep deprived state these days.

He has a wonderful teacher named Mrs. C who does such a great job with him. She told me that she raised a "spirited" little boy as well and Nathan reminds her a lot of her son at that age. She assures me that God will specially use his spirit, determination and strong will. We are very thankful for Mrs. C!

Nathan really loves to sing and the Cubbies song is one of the house favorites these days. Here is a little video of the Cubbie in action.

Emie is looking forward to next year so she can be a Cubbie too. But she is rather insistent that she will have a pink Cubbie vest, so we'll have to see about that!

Livin' it up!

Our mission in early September was to pack in as much family time as we could before Isaac's arrival. We spent a ton of time outdoors, skipped naps in the name of fun, and laughed until we cried on many occasions. Here are a few pictures of some of the things we found to do.

We went to a fall festival at the county nursing home (where Gus and I met!) and went to a wild petting zoo. There were WAY too many animals in this small area, but the kids still had fun.

Our neighbors gave us their old wagon. Gotta love freebies! The kids like their new ride.

We dressed up in random costumes just for fun!

And after realizing that the zoo closes at 6, we spent an evening at the mall. We played in their arboretum themed play area and got some frozen yogurt!

We also met some friends at Enchanted Castle and the kids got to experience some arcade games, a huge climbing structure, and go-karts.

There was plenty of other fun, but we are pretty bad about taking pictures. We were so glad to have had a lot of fun adventures as a family of four and we know it will be more fun with five!