Christmas Break

I took a full week off for Christmas this year to spend some quality time with Lucas. Unfortunately, both Lucas and I had colds over the long break so It was not much of a fun vacation. However, it was still nice to be home with him and get ready for the holiday. The main event from the week besides Christmas, was transforming Lucas' room into a big kid room. More on that in a separate post.

I literally felt so bad on Christmas that I did not take a single picture on my real camera on Christmas day (which I still can't believe). What an epic fail! The only thing I got was a few pics on my iphone and a video of Lucas coming downstairs to see his train from Santa.

Santa left Lucas' train table in "the study" as Josh refers to it - haha. His other gifts were left by the Christmas tree in our family room. We had a good day and Lucas got spoiled with lots of toys, books and movies. Later in the day, we had family come over for dinner. It was a very nice Christmas minus being under the weather.

Here is a video of Lucas finding his train table from Santa:


Here are a few random pictures of the trees and stockings:

Decorating for Christmas

Lucas was really into decorating the Christmas tree this year. He had several favorite ornaments that would take off to look at and then put back on the tree. We set up our "fun" tree in the family look area and our fancier tree in the study. Our tree in the family room is filling up quite nicely with a combination of handmade ornaments as well as our growing collection of Hallmark ornaments. Lucas was most obsessed with my singing Sebastian (from The Little Mermaid) who sings Under the Sea. We also bought him a Mickey Mouse Clubhouse ornament from Hallmark which he also loved.

Santa Photos

We took Lucas to see Santa early in the season (I think it was the weekend before Thanksgiving). We wanted to go before lines got long and he had an excuse to run away and not take a pic with Santa. That Sunday, after church, we headed to Pentagon City for our Santa visit. We both expected that it would go horribly and we would not get a single decent photo. Lucas really surprised us! He was definitely apprehensive of Santa at first but warmed up when Josh and I joined him.

Here are a few of the pics:

Thanksgiving

We traveled to West Virginia to see Josh's family for Thanksgiving. Josh's parents came up from Louisiana with HeeJin and the kids as well. We had 2 meals on Thursday, one with Josh's mom's side of the family and one with his dad's side.The next day we decided to take all the kids to Chuck-E-Cheese to burn some energy off. All the kids had a great time including Lucas who loved the ride-on cars and trucks.

Lucas on the road trip:


Nancy, Charlie, Josh & Lucas


HeeJin, Noah, Mia, & Alex


Lucas & cousin Alex at Chuck-E-Cheese:

{Recap} Fall Fun 2013

Here is a recap of our fall fun (true confessions- this post is being written in February). :-)

I am making a pact with myself to start updating this blog regularly so I don't have to do 3-4 months worth of stuff in one blog post.

Butler's Orchard:

We went to Butler's Orchard for Billy's 2nd birthday party. We had never been before and it is definitely a place I would love to return to. The apples were fantastic! The party included a tractor ride into the orchard and we got to take home a few bags of apples. Lucas also enjoyed playing on the playground equipment and old tractors.











The Reston Zoo:

Josh went out of town in September and I recruited my mom to hang out with me for the weekend. We took Lucas to the Reston Zoo (a petting zoo) and we had a great time. I definitely plan on taking him back this spring. The goats were our favorite because they were so friendly. We also loved seeing the bulls, camels and zebras.










Nulls Pumpkin Patch:

There is a small nursery/produce stand close to us. They set up tunnels every year for the kids to climb in. It is a nice free activity in the fall.






Great Country Farm & Bluemont Vineyards:

In late October, we headed out to Great Country Farms with our friends Knute and Liz. We had such a fun time there. Lucas loved being able to run around and play on the slides. He also loved the animals there. After we selected our pumpkins, we headed across the street to my favorite winery, Bluemont. We enjoyed some wine and snacks before heading home.

Halloween

Here is a recap of our Halloween Activities.

The Saturday before Halloween, Lucas was invited to a Halloween party. Adrienne is his cute and sweet little friend from school. She is such a sweetheart. It was so nice to be able to use his costume more than once.









The next day we painted pumpkins outside. Lucas loved it and had a major temper tantrum when the fun was over.





Every year, Lucas' school has a parade around the shopping center they are next to. The stores and restaurants in the shopping center hand out candy and treats to all the kids. It is so cute and I go every year to take pics. Sadly, Lucas was sick on Halloween so I just took him there for the parade and then took him back home. He didn't get to participate in the party afterwards.





That evening, we put on his costume again... Since he wasn't feeling well, we just went to a couple houses with the neighbors just so we could grab a few pics.

Here is Lucas with our neighbor friends:
(Photo courtesy of Amy & Greg)

Lucas' Mickey Party (2nd Birthday)

As we all know, Lucas loves Mickey Mouse so we decided to plan a Mickey party for his 2nd birthday. This year his birthday fell on a Thursday so I took a half day on Thursday and took off Friday. Thursday afternoon, we celebrated with a party at Lucas' school.

1st Birthday at School versus 2nd Birthday at School:


Lucas' Kitchen he got on the night of his birthday:


As always, parties are a bit overwhelming on the kids. He was not in a great mood for most of the time.
He was given so many nice things from our family and friends. We are very greatful for everyone who came and celebrated with us.

The party on Saturday:


Josh's mom made the cupcakes and cake:


The aftermath of the food (I took this pic pretty much when the party was coming to an end).
We had a lot of mickey themed food that I did not seem to get a picture of.