Enjoying Winter 2013

It's always difficult to capture all of the highlights of the winter activities and what is new and exciting in our lives.  But we've tried to do our best in this post.  We start with one of the best toast/bagel/birthday cakes you have ever seen.  It was part of a great birthday morning for John's 40th.  Sarah and the girls surprised him with a fully decorated dining room and made him feel very loved.

Fortunately, John has had gray hair since college, so 40 just means his age matches his hair for the first time in his life.  

In other exciting news, Reese continues to have the energy level of the Energizer bunny.  And she is rapidly developing new skills every day.  In the video below she shows off her alphabet knowledge while providing a glimpse of what we deal with every night at bedtime.

She is very cute, it's true.  But that cuteness only ensures she is not put to sleep in the closet every night.

It was actually a pretty mild winter in Kentucky in terms of snow and freezing rain.  No heavy snows and no ice storms this year.  But we did everything we could to take advantage of any little snowfall that occurred.  The girls were pretty excited to get to put on their full winter gear, play outside, and then come indoors for hot chocolate.  They would certainly be happy if it snowed more often.

One great activity during the winter is always the Saturday afternoon book and craft hour at Joseph Beth.  On this particular Saturday, while John was out of town, the girls and Sarah went to the Teddy Bear hospital that Joseph Beth had set up.  It featured real nurses from area hospitals and the girls got to take their Teddy Bears around to nursing stations to do everything from putting on a band aid to removing an appendix.  Reese and Callie thought it was pretty nifty.

Sometimes there are pictures we put in the blog because we believe they are too cute to leave out.  This happens to be one of those pictures.  Reese is certainly a happy girl, and she loves the water, whether it is in the bathtub or the pool.  It is often very difficult to actually get her out of the bathtub.  She can be pretty determined about getting her way when she has her mind set on it.  You wouldn't necessarily know it from looking at this picture, but trust us, she is not always as sweet as she looks.

The next series of pictures shows our adventure at Jacobsen Park that took place one weekend when we just couldn't stand to be inside any longer.  It was about 25 degrees or so, and even snowed a little bit while we were there.   But we realized if we just kept running, we could keep warm.  On the plus side, from John's perspective especially, the playground was virtually empty and we had the run of it all.

The playground there has all sorts of cool twists and turns.  Part of it is built like a castle with multiple levels.  We all had fun playing tag and hide and go seek.  And Sarah took advantage of the opportunity to break out a little artistic photography action.  This is a pretty cool shot of Reese from about ten feet up.

Once our limbs were frozen we decided to have a picnic in the car with the heat on.  It was great because the girls wanted to be in the back by themselves, and we got to sit up front closer to the heaters.  

It was a great day, and a good way to make sure the girls strengthen their New England genes.  It was also a great reminder that you don't really need much more than each other to have a good time.

Another fun winter activity that we indulged in was movie night, where once again Reese benefited from having an older sister.  We certainly did not have movie night when Callie was 2.  But the girls prepared by getting their babies ready for the big show, and we happened to have a bunch of popcorn boxes we could use to make them feel like they were really at the movies.  This also allowed us to introduce them to our favorite movie treat - the mixture of popcorn and M&Ms.  So tasty.

Needless to say, wintertime involved a fair amount of dressing up.  Both Reese and Callie spent a lot of time in their respective princess dresses.  Reese could not get enough of Tinkerbell, while Callie remains devoted to the princess dress we got from one of Aunt Suzy's friends back when Callie was Reese's age.  It's pretty stunning that it still fits...well not really fits, but doesn't rip.

So that is a very brief overview of the winter moments when we were not traveling or entertaining visitors.  It's nice to know that sometimes we are able to simply entertain ourselves.