Winter Break

With Willem going to preschool 5 mornings this year, we were ready to have a few weeks with the entire family at home. We enjoyed our slow mornings, the extra time to get together with friends and going to the Train Park and the Train Park again and again and again:)

We were due to host music class over break and although Teacher Kevin wasn't able to make it, we enjoyed an impromptu play date with friends. We're finding between Ellie taking two naps and Willem in school every morning, we aren't seeing friends as often as in the past. Music class is definitely a staple for us as a fun family night and a great time to catch up with friends.

Reese gave Willem a lesson on undressing and dressing baby dolls. Reese made it look deceiving simple.

Ellie is very into shoes. She loves trying on Jason and I's shoes and is now trying to put her own shoes on. When she wants to go outside, she grabs her shoes and then ours and brings them to us.

Train Park take 1. We love the train park. Willem loves playing in the museum, model area, general store and then riding the train. Ellie enjoys climbing on the trains as well and running away from Mom. She has no fear or need to see me so going to the train park with both of them was quite an adventure over break. Willem is to the age where he's helpful though so we had fun, though were quite exhausted by those outings.

Since we were going during the week, the diesel train was running, which Willem feels is very loud, therefore not a good train to ride. This particular day he declared he would not ride the train, as it was a diesel and is his policy. But after some pondering, he declared he would ride the train but only if he rode in the cattle car because it was the last passenger train from the caboose and therefore the furthest from the engine so it would be fairly quiet. I was nervous to have him in there alone but he did great. Jason later told me Willem had ridden in that car before. After the ride was over, Willem stated he would ride in the car from now on when a diesel was running. Problem solved.

Bath time is often special time with Grandma at the end of the day and the kids love it. Ellie is a fish in the water and loves being in there with her brother, most of the time. They both float on their backs in the tub and Willem uses that time to practice his spitting like a giraffe. They both warmed up to showering as well, which is more how Mom rolls, which is nice. Ellie didn't like the water in her face at first but forgets about it after a couple of minutes and is busy drawing on the glass and playing with her toys.

About every two weeks Willem and Jason or Erik build a new train track. It's fun to watch them work together as they all three have distinct ideas for the layout and come up with fun curves, bridges and multi-lane layouts so all of Willem's busy trains can run. Then when Mom is going crazy for the carpet to be vacuumed, before taking apart their creation, Willem insists we take a picture so he can remember how to build it again and then, the take down begins.

Overall we had a great Winter Break but were all needing to return to having a semblance of a routine by the time school started up again. 4 trips to the train park in 2 weeks did us in:)