Christmas 2011

Shawn and Nolan on Christmas eve before we headed to our annual Christmas Eve Seafood dinner. This year we went to Ocean Grill and had lobster, oysters and seafood chowder. It was delicious. After dinner we headed home to make cookies for Santa. Nolan got a kick out of frosting the cookies and kept saying "coocoo, coocoo."

Nolan started to understand Santa a little this year, and he really understood opening presents!! We put him in his Santa PJ's and let him open one gift on Christmas Eve. This year it was Mickey Mouse. He loves the Mickey Mouse ClubHouse on Disney, and he calls Mickey, HotDog. It is seriously so cute. He took Mickey right over to the couch and started to hug and kiss him. It was so sweet to see him so excited about his new stuffed animal.

The Knicks had their season opener on Christmas Day, so we didn't open the rest of our gifts til the late afternoon. This is Nolan Christmas a.m. with Mickey.....good thing at one he didn't understand that Santa had been there to deliver more gifts!

My dad flew in on the red-eye from CA to celebrate Christmas with us. Nolan was so happy to have his Papa here. Papa takes such great care of Nolan and they have a beautiful bond.

After the game I cooked a big Christmas dinner. It was the perfect ending to a great day, including a Knicks win over the Celtics!

Santa...not so much!

We went to see Santa at Macy's. We went on a Wed a.m., so we really didn't have much of a line, but as you can see, Nolan wanted nothing to do with Santa. Last year we got off so easy. I had a feeling this year would be more of a challange. At Macy's they have a bunch of huts, and each one has a Santa. I think it is a great way to keep the line moving. I do have to say that Nolan was not into Santa, but Santa was ot into Nolan!

Yea for 21!

I've been counting down the days until Nolan turned 21 months.  We had a rough go with 20 months, so I   am truly hoping that 21 will be better.  As we deal with a lot of fun things like new words, more adventure and gearing up for the holidays, we were also dealing with Nolan's frustrations.  He was dabbling in some hair pulling, pushing, hitting and worst of all biting.  When I say biting I don't just me Shawn and I, but other kids in his classes and playgroups were becoming victims.  Normally I can see the look in his eye and stop him before he makes contact, but sadly that was not always the case.  I was so upset that I bought Toddler 411 in hopes of some much needed guidance.   Luckily that book is filled with good advice, and I was able to start disciplining in a more effective way.  If he was mean once, he was removed from the situation, put in time out, then back to the kid to say sorry.  The second time we left.  As for biting and other physical things at home we were putting him in a time out chair, and it just didn't work.  We started to put him in his crib, because we really have no other safe place in our small apt, and that has been very effective!

So here's to 21 months and more of the cute stuff and less of the stuff that puts this very tired mom in tears!

Chicago Thanksgiving

Miles and Nolan loving the "ball pit"

OK, Now you sing Uncle Phil

Bath Time

It was a little cold, but the boys had a great time at the playground

Yum, Thanksgiving Dinner

Bennett Album Cover. Downtown Chicago

I love the boys in matching PJ's.  Clearly getting a posed shot of the together was out of the question!