(Begrudgingly) Welcoming Winter

As a family that spends a lot of time outside, these first weeks of too-cold-to-even-bundle-up-to-play-outside weather have the potential to be a little rough.  But even below-average temperatures can't deter the spirit of a 3 year old for too long.

Before it got too cold out, we did manage to make some mischief in the backyard with Bear and Maisy.  Maisy is always a willing playmate, and it's rare that she runs out of energy before Wes.

One morning, Wes woke up to find a light dusting of snow on the ground.  It took all of his toddler patience to make it through breakfast before we bundled up to play.  I seemed to be the only one who was discouraged by the 30 mph winds.

Once we came back inside, the pups cuddled up and Wes had his first experience with hot cocoa.  Needless to say, it was a hit.

We've filled our time indoors with our favorite activities as well as some new ones.  Wes is still a willing participant in trips to Coffee Hound, and recently, the barista gave Wes his milk in a real coffee cup.  It might have been the proudest moment of my life :)

Going Uptown isn't quite the same in the winter, but Wes likes to check out the water(less) feature anyway.

Wes continues to love to "work" more than play, so he has been repairing everything in our house that he considers broken.

Thankfully during this busy quilting season, Wes has been more willing to nap outside of our house, and he often packs his bag and travels (3 doors down and across the street) to my parents' house for an afternoon snooze.

On days when we have a little extra energy to burn, we head to one of Sean's schools.  We explore the halls, sneak into music rooms to tinker with the instruments, and of course, run, run, run in the gym. In a stroke of sheer luck, we found the school district's coolest (and largest) toy hidden in a furnace room.

Over the long Thanksgiving weekend, we decided to show Wes his first movie.  Not being a kid who likes crowds, loud noises, and dark rooms, we knew going to a real theater had the potential to be disastrous.  So we bought some bagged popcorn, headed to one of the new classrooms where Sean teaches at IWU, and had a private showing of Curious George's Christmas special.  It was a gigantic (and adorable) success.

We spent Thanksgiving as a family of 3 at home and were particularly thankful that Bob Evans was serving not only turkey dinners, but delicious pie.

 We wrapped up the holiday weekend by bringing out our Christmas decorations. Wes loved pulling things out of boxes, and never has our house been decorated so quickly or...uniquely!

This is the first year that Wes has a (slight) grasp on Santa Claus.  We ran an errand at the mall a few days ago and came across Santa's house.  Wes took me by surprise when he became curious about this stranger he has read about in books, and in Wes' own way, he visited Santa.

I've always preferred candid photography over posed pictures, but I needed a family picture for a yearly mailing I do for my quilting business.  With the promise of Skittles in exchange for smiles, we corralled everyone for a few seconds and got a quick snapshot of our family.  I have to admit I live with some good lookin' mammals :)