Welcome little one!

Scenes from Christmas

The beginning scene, after breakfast

Somewhere in the middle when I'm behind in picking up the wrappings

Later, testing out LEGO starwars

Listening to a personalized book on CD

Time for bed, more book listening

Construction! (and a fun game link!)

We were introduced to a creative way to let the kids practice their construction skills this weekend - styrofoam! While at a friends' house, the boys were given screwdrivers, hammers, nails and screws and big pieces of styrofoam to create whatever they wanted. Both went to town and had a great time making creations. The fun continued when we brought home some styrofoam! Here are some photos I snapped of Dinoguy working hard today on a new creation.

I was also sent a link to a fun Christmas tree puzzle where you have to connect the paths to light up all the lights on the tree. We have had a lot of fun playing it today. Trainboy loves it, Fixitman loves it... it is just a entertaining puzzle! So check it out! :) Link Hope you had a lovely weekend too!

Art museum fun

Palestinian dress nativity

There is a fun free exhibit at a local museum here of a presepe - a Neopolitan Nativity scene from Renaissance Italy. I enjoy seeing different and unique nativities - my own are special to me, and olive wood set and a traditional palestinian dress from the Holy Land, and some small sets from my mom.My olive wood nativity

So the chance to see giant (about 2 feet tall I'd guess) poseable figurines, over 70 of them brought together in an exhibit? Created over 200 years ago? Seen together rarely, usually displayed individually since no complete sets exist? Put into a display by a family that has been installing the figurines for generations? This was an exciting thing to me and so off we set on an adventure, with a little bit of trepidation, as I hoped that all the driving didn't put me into labor.

(Becoming a nightly news story as the lady who delivered her baby in a traffic jam on the freeway was not my goal!)I took the camera and was nicely told that no pictures were allowed in the room where the presepe was displayed. But I could purchase the book of photos! Oh well. Click the link to see sample photos from a news story. It was awesome to see, and we got to visit and check out a museum we hadn't visited before! The boys seem to appreciate the sculptures we saw more than paintings. We had a nice time looking at the art and talking about where it came from. Then we ran thru the garden on our way out. Good times.

Happy Birthday Trainboy!

My little boy turned 4 this week! He's pretty excited about it too! Most of the day was spent playing with the Christmas train. Then we had his requested dinner of cheese pizza and macaroni salad before feasting on train cake. We had fun decorating the trains - here is the one we used while we sang to him. Originally it was to have blueberry sauce on it, but then he decided he wanted candy wheels and it went from there. So we had blueberry sauce on the ice cream instead. He got many lovely presents from family and we had a wonderful day playing as a family.

Texas Snow!

The weather has been erratic here the past few weeks. We alternate between days in the 70's and then the 20's a day later.We had some icy weather and a few flakes fell one day, to the delight of the boys. They suited up for the snow, though sandals still adorned their feet! Here they are checking out the tiny flakes (which you could barely see) and examining the icy frost it created on everything.

Christmas train fun

I pulled out our Christmas trainset this past week, to the delight of the boys. Toy trains and dinosaurs came to play with this train as well. Hours of fun have ensued.

Mama blessing

I was blessed to have some dear friends join me one evening for a mother blessing. It was a wonderful uplifting time, full of positive thoughts and wishes. I was very grateful to everyone and all they brought to share. Stories, food, thoughts, energy. It was a very uplifting event to help buoy me up in preparation for the upcoming birth of my baby.

Everyone brought a bead with a positive thought to add to a birth bracelet for me to have during the birth to remember the circle of supportive women I have thinking of me during the birth. It brought tears to my eyes to hear and feel the well wishes of my friends. They also brought yummy food to share, a book with some of their birth stories for me to read and treasure and lots of good vibes. They also brought henna to decorate my belly for good luck. We had a wonderful time and I am so grateful to them all. The positive vibes will be wonderful to reflect on in labor.

Santa's Village

We went to Santa's Christmas village in our area and had a great time. The boys loved it, running from building to building to find out what fun was inside each one. There were cookies from Mrs. Claus, coloring with Frosty, ornaments at the toy factory, trying on Firemen clothes at the Fire Station, writing and mailing letters to Santa at the post office. The final excitement was waiting in line to visit Santa. It was a great time.

More ornament painting

We are having a lot of fun decorating ornaments for the tree. At the dentist the boys saw a tree with train decorations and requested train and dinosaur ornaments for our tree. Simple cut outs from the craft store, lots of paint and glitter made for a lot of decorating fun.

Trainboy used approximately 50 paintbrushes painting his trains. He was having so much fun! I washed a lot of paintbrushes.

Dinoguy took a different approach, painting each dinosaur side one color and then applying glitter. Later he added stripes and spots to the dinosaurs as well. He also painted a couple pictures and cut out some shapes with the paper cutter while Trainboy finished his trains.

The ornaments are already resting in the branches of the tree, though I plan to have Fixitman put little holes in the top and hang them by strings, the boys were excited to put them in.

I am also trying to make these cute little stars and then teach the boys, but I think I have to be successful first!

This morning Dinoguy asked if we could make a popcorn garland for the tree. Of course!

Home Depot art easels

The project this month was art easels. It was simple and quick, I managed to help Dinoguy without messing up; he was able to do it pretty much on his own. When we got home, the addition of a clipboard made it an excellent painting easel, which is more what Dinoguy envisioned, while I think the project designers saw it as a display holder.

So we had an art session, full of painting and play dough. Later in the day we made more Christmas cookies. We also went to the library. It was a full and lovely Saturday.