Weekend

Considering Christmas is 4 days away, we had a pretty relaxing weekend. I'm not sure how, but we were actually fairly organized and ahead of schedule this year. I'm sure it's because of the long hours Ed spent at the mall, shopping for presents.  

Friday night we went to see the lights at the zoo. We had a good time, but not sure if Thomas got much out of it. He was bundled up so tightly he couldn't turn his head to the side to see the lights!

The refrigerator is a new favorite toy. Every time we open it, he zooms over and stands up, holding the drawers. I tried letting the door close on him as you see here. He didn't care. At least ours doesn't have a handle, so he won't be opening it himself for quite a while!

A New Friend

Thursday night we visited our friends Carrie and Justin and their 3-week-old son, Ethan. He's adorable and so sweet! It's hard to believe Thomas was ever that small!

Thomas was more interested in the toys on Ethan's bouncy seat than in Ethan...wait a few months and that'll change!

Mommies and their babies

Justin shows Thomas how to cut ribbon on packages with a pocketknife. Clearly, as a new parent, Justin hasn't gotten to the "don't let toddlers play with knives" section of the baby manual! :) Seriously, though, Carrie and Justin are already great parents, and so organized, too. Carrie had all her Christmas shopping (including this present for T) done in November. Well timed, considering Ethan was 3 weeks early!

Random pictures

Our neighbors Holly and Tobin came over to play today. The boys had a great time crawling all over each other, under the stroller, and trying to drink from each others' cups. 

Thomas likes to help Ed play guitar.

New toys for Thomas in the kitchen

Thomas doesn't sit in the bumbo anymore, but it sure makes a great step so he can knock DVDs off the second shelf as well as the first. As you can see from his face, he's very proud of himself for doing this.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

Last weekend we went to Eckert's, an apple/pumpkin/tree farm in Illinois, to get our tree. Santa was there, and the whole place was decorated for Christmas, so we took some pictures. Inspired by the holiday atmosphere there, our house is now decorated inside and out! 

Posing in his cute hat

We thought Thomas would be okay with Santa since he willingly goes to people he's never met before. It must have been the beard...the minute we sat him down with Santa, the pouty lip came out and he started crying. So I got to be in the picture too, and even then he wasn't so sure about the man in the red suit!

Thomas and his gingerbread friend

"Twenty-five thousand Italian twinkle lights..." Courtesy of a fantastic sale at Target after Christmas last year, our outside decorations have stepped up several notches. Ed (and Tucker) did their best to make our house look like the Griswold's in National Lampoon's Christmas vacation. This picture doesn't do it justice--our house lights up the entire block and is fantastic to look at! Now we just need some snow.

Our tree

Knowing Thomas would not be gentle with a tree or ornaments, we decided to outsmart him by getting a shorter tree and setting it on a table, out of reach. Little did we know that Thomas would dislike pine needles as much as grass and leaves--he's not interested in touching it!

Ed helped Thomas put an ornament on the tree. This is about as close as he wants to get to the pine needles.

Grandpa visits

Thanks to a business meeting in St. Louis, Grandpa Tom spent two nights at our house. Thomas was feeling a little under the weather, so he and Grandpa had some quality snuggle time on the couch.

9 months!

In amongst the Thanksgiving holiday time, Thomas turned 9 months old. He's got a turbo crawl now, routinely climbs the steps, pulls up on furniture and "walks" around holding onto it, and is continuing to explore non-pureed foods. He's got two teeth and two more about to break through. He's into everything, and the most common words in our house are "no no!" Despite that, he's a lot of fun!

Our traditional monthly picture

Yes, his new favorite place to play is the bathroom. First he learned how to unroll the toilet paper. Then, he discovered the plunger. I never thought one of my most frequently used sentences would be, "Thomas, put down the plunger!"  Yuck!

And another frequently used sentence..."Thomas, stop gagging yourself!"

And then yesterday, he figured out how to flush the toilet! What fun!

Random pics

I have no idea what the context of this picture is, but it cracks me up!

Wearing Aunt Jenn's boots

I plan to encourage this interest in the washing machine...maybe I can get him to wash his own diapers! 

Nakey piano playing!

Thomas' philosophy seems to be "why go around when you can go under or over?" This applies to legs and feet, rungs on chairs, pillows...really any obstacle in the path from point A to point B. 

Thanksgiving

We had Thanksgiving at Mom and Dad's house...good food, good company, good football!

Our family

The Thanksgiving table (minus Mom, taking the photo)

Jenn and Pat, with a framed photo of where they got engaged.



Thomas in his turkey hat and his turkey bib. The turkey on the bib is actually his hand traced, made at 11 the night before. 

This single step between family room and kitchen was perfect for Thomas. He figured out how to go down it (head first, with a slight roll), and spent much of the week going up and down, up and down. Now we just need to teach him not to go down staircases head first!

He was not a huge fan of the turkey headpiece. But it was so cute!

A pre-meal game of football. See the pine tree overshadowing the slide in the background? When I was a kid, I was taller than that tree. Yikes! 

Niki and Thomas tickle the ivories.

Grandma and Henry joined us for Thanksgiving this year.

A week in Milwaukee

Thomas and I spent the week leading up to Thanksgiving in Milwaukee.

Cheering for the Packers with Grandpa (in matching hats!)

with Grammy and Grandpa


Riding Grandpa around the family room

Trying to catch Oz's tail. I wish I had video of this; Oscar's tail was going back and forth and Thomas couldn't quite keep up--he was about half a second behind. Oz was extremely patient with T, especially considering how often Thomas none-too-gently grabbed at his fur.

Abby, my cousin's daughter came over with Aunt Diane so Thomas and Abby could meet/play. 

Football Saturday!

I have some blogging to catch up on...

Last Saturday we headed to Evanston for the Northwestern-Wisconsin football game. The weather was beautiful, especially for mid November, it was great to revisit our old stomping grounds, the tailgates and game were so much fun, and to top it off, it was my birthday! 

Thomas skews the balance in our favor within the family: 3 NU fans vs. 2 UW fans. 

Check out his NU bib! Under the fleece is a purple shirt as well. We were prepared to cheer for our team!

Ed watched the Ohio State-Michigan game in the back of mom and dad's car. Ohio State won, so he was happy, and then he switched to purple for the afternoon game. 

The scoreboard says it all! After a very exciting back-and-forth game, Northwestern pulled out a win!


Thomas hung out at Rachel's house in Evanston while we were at the game. He had fun exploring her house and chasing Scooter the cat!

Jenn and Pat pose in their matching leopard-print Snuggies, our engagement present to them. (Congrats again guys!)

The Many Faces of Causing Trouble

As Thomas has gotten more mobile, he's started finding more spots in the house to cause trouble!

Wine tasting

Why are my pants on my head? Check out my chubby thighs, too.

Thomas is always interested in reaching this doorknob when he's on the couch.

He fits almost perfectly under the dining room table. 

Trying to crawl over Ed's computer for the box of baby wipes.

Swinging outside!