Sunday, December 23, 2007

1 Year and 3 Weeks- Starting Christmas Celebrations



This week marked the end of Caleb's first semester of school, complete with our first-ever parent teacher conference. You'll be glad to know that he does get to stay next semester :) His teacher said he was right on track developmentally and loves music and rhythm. He also likes to spend solitary time working on stacking cups and blocks or sorting shapes. Looks like he's going to have my musical intuition and Aaron's spatial reasoning - ha!

He had a very fun and messy week at school, coming home several times very dirty and even slightly damp from snack time using a cup instead of a bottle. As I told a friend, if how dirty he comes home is any indication of a good day, he must be having a blast! In fact, Wednesday they switched him out of his filthy shirt but decided his jeans were fine so this is how he looked when I picked him up...maybe he'll start a new trend- onesie on the outside. (PS- Can you tell how much Caleb and the dogs love the back door? Take a look at how smudged it is!!)


Thursday night our friends Nick and Laura came to watch Caleb while we attended Aaron's work Christmas party. Apparently it went pretty well, if Caleb's snoozing in his lap is any indication :) And Nick looks like a natural here, huh?


I faced a bit of a dilemma this month as far as when to cut Caleb's hair. He could have used one before his birthday party and 1 year photos but then it wouldn't be freshly cut for Christmas. Well, I held off and do have say that my child was getting a bit scraggly looking by this week. I tried to spike it up one day when we were headed out to run errands and Caleb ended up looking like Pee Wee Herman it was so high in front. So, I did what any logical mother would do: put some gel in it and scrunch it! He looked so cute and got a lot of compliments on it at Walmart (which is not exactly like getting compliments on it at Saks or anything, but we'll take what we can). Thankfully, he did get it trimmed up on Friday by his fearless stylist, Michelle.


Aaron's parents and sister and her family from Texas arrived on Friday evening. We had a fun weekend with them, including dinner and presents with Aaron's other sister and her family and the out-of-town relatives on Saturday evening. Here are several pictures: one of the presents on the piano (and these were mainly just the ones for Aaron's side of the family), all the presents distributed but not yet opened, and Caleb enjoying the gift-opening process.




By the end of the evening, Caleb was a little overwhelmed by all the new toys (what generosity from aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandparents!!) and was past his bedtime. He has also really been enjoying quality time with his Dad lately so I thought this one of my boys in red was cute. There are times when I think I sure could get a lot more accomplished if Caleb wasn't so clingy and cuddly, but then I have to remind myself that the day he'll have no interest in being held and giving hugs will come WAY too soon.


A few more "firsts" this week: First time eating corn on the cob and he loved it!


And first time using crayons. He kept trying to put these in his mouth while we were out to eat but Santa told me Caleb's getting the new Crayola crayons for toddlers in his stocking so hopefully those will work a bit better.


We will do Christmas Eve service with both sets of grandparents and Aunt Mo tomorrow night(Aaron's sis and her family leave early tomorrow morning), then stocking-opening and breakfast with my fam followed by a mid-afternoon feast and presents with the grandparents and Aunt Mo at my parents' house.

Hope that you all have a joyous Christmas! Be safe in traveling and can't wait to see pictures of everyone's celebrations!

1 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ethel says, for some reason I had it in my feeble mind you all were out of town. I love Caleb's spiked hair and the Daddy hug picture was tooooooooo precious.