More Pictures from Christmas

Checking out the ASU hangout, the Chuck Box. Great food!!

Saying goodbye to the Weiss:( Somehow Wouter stayed behind the camera....

Christmas 2009

Christmas was an exciting day. We started out the morning with an early wake up call from an excited Willem.

Your big present from Santa was a kitchen, which was the first thing you saw when you ran into the living room.

Tia Julie, also in the living room thought Santa came a bit too early.

You whipped us up eggs and pancakes and who knows what else. You were so pleased cooking, you didn't leave the kitchen for at least a half hour.

Grandma made us a delicious breakfast. Afterwards, she gave you your Christmas present (which you'd already been playing with for several days), but still, you were very excited to play us a song on the keyboard.

After awhile, we all started getting ready for Christmas lunch and the arrival of the Weiss' from California.It was all hands on deck to prepare Christmas supper, even you were put to work:)

We were all so excited to have everyone together on Christmas! The Weiss' arrived, after a long drive on Christmas morning so we could all be together. The Torry's came over as well and you were just in heaven with all your people around. We had a delicious lunch and then Daddy announced to everyone that we will be having a new bundle of joy joining our family in July. Everyone was very excited!!

Some pictures of you enjoying your gifts from Santa:

Oom Rik wanted to make sure you were dressed in style for the big bowl game, so he gave you this good luck jersey, which we believe had something to do with USC winning a few days later:)

. A few hours later it was time to put Daddy to work in finishing his Christmas Soup, Pork Posole
Kissing the cook:)

Merry Christmas 2009

Christmas Eve PJ's

Growing up Julie and I would always get new pj's for Christmas, so we decided to keep the tradition going. Each of us opened our Christmas PJ's on Christmas Eve so we could wear them to bed that night and for breakfast the next morning.

By this point you were very into the spirit of unopening gifts.

You loved your PJ's because there were cars on them. All of the sudden you are very into cars!

Then of course we read Twas The Night Before Christmas, which you really enjoyed.

What a wonderful Christmas Eve!!

November: The Month of Learning New Skills

This month you are definitely focused on doing whatever we are doing. You like unloading the dishwasher, helping with laundry and you have tons of computer work to do each day! The computer piece has helped Dad and I realize we may be on the computer a bit too much... Same with the phone. A 19 month old mastering the iPhone could mean you are a genius or that you've just seen it use a bit too much.

Halloween 2009

This year we decided to color pumpkins and you did a great job decorating your pumpkin. At first you were being very careful and then your true artistic ways came out and you were being silly with the crayons but the pumpkin looked great.

When it came time to Trick or Treat you had quite the entourage. Paw Paw started you out with some treats in your bucket and we went to the house across the street from us. You weren't really sure what this fuss was all about but when they handed you a piece of candy, you politely pulled out one of the candies in your bucket and handed it to the neighbors. They were so tickled!

We continued on with to another neighbor who was expecting us and by this time I think you were noticing that you had three cameras flashing at your every move so you acted a little cheeky at this house. We knocked on the door and the neighbor gave you a bag of popcorn. You again gave her a piece of your candy and then promptly went inside her house, gave us a mischievous look and closed the door. As much as we all enjoyed our trick or treating adventure, I think we provided a great deal of amusement for the neighbors as well.

Eventually you rejoined us and we went to a block party nearby where we saw lots of other kids dressed up, which you seemed excited about.

Fun times with the Weiss Family

Opa, Lita and Oom Rik visited for Halloween and you were thrilled. The weather was perfect and they took you on tons of walks and a bike ride and let you sit in the car and pretend to drive. You were in Heaven!

You had a new view of the world riding on Oom Rik and Opa's shoulders as we explored Scottsdale.

Lita took you on many walks! You were so excited to spend so much time outdoors. This was one of the first beautiful weekends we'd had since we moved here and we definitely made the most of it.

Picking our Pumpkin

This year we went to the Desert Botanical Garden to pick out one of our pumpkins. We love going to a big pumpkin farm each Halloween and finding the perfect pumpkin for our famiily. We thought October 24th in Phoenix would be a nice, 80 degree day for our family adventure, but oh was it sweltering. It must have reached 100 degrees but we had fun! We took a hayride in a tractor out to the pumpkin patch.

You loved the petting zoo but your favorite part was getting to sit on the tractor. You could have stayed there all day but Mom and Dad were melting so we headed home.

The chosen pumpkin...

We love Phoenix in October!

Throughout the month of October we made the most of our below 100 degree days and played outside as much as possible!

Some favorite activities:
Riding bikes as a family. We rode our bikes to a local park and one night we had rode our bikes to a local school and had a Dinner Picnic! You love riding bikes and often run in the garage and point at your helmet as if to say, "come on guys, let's go!"

The helmet wasn't your favorite part at first but once you realized what putting the helmet on meant, you made friends with the helmet.



Dad was off early a couple days this month and we hit the trails. We are trying to get the full Phoenician experience and so far we have really enjoyed hiking.