Gahan Christmas

We celebrated with Brian's side of the family on Christmas Eve this year. A lot of extended family came in and we had a wonderful time. Here he is waiting to leave for church. At our church Luke always goes to the nursery, so we were a little nervous about bringing him to the service, but he did great! I think he consumed about 3 lbs of animal crackers, but hey you gotta do what ya gotta do. =) After church family picture. Luke is very good at throwing overhand now. He gets so serious when he is about to throw, like he is concentrating and trying very hard. It is too cute. Here he is playing catch with his Grandpa, while his 2 great-grandpas watch.

4 Generations.

After church, we tried to get him into his PJs, but he had other plans. He got away from Brian, wearing nothing but his diaper and then asked Great-Aunt Kath to put his shoes back on. I told you that boy likes him some shoes. =)

Being almost naked gave him some sort of huge energy burst, because he then proceeded to run around like a crazy man for about 30 minutes. I must say it was super entertaining!

Not sure what he was doing here, but he was pulling very hard like he wanted to pull the post off the bed.

Playing with Great-Uncle Joe.

He was obsessed with the snow globe.

Taking a break with Uncle Jeff.

We finally managed to wrangle Luke into his PJs. Great-Grandpa Don gave Luke these cute PJs which were perfect for Christmas.

Luke enjoyed pointing to all the ornaments with his Great-Aunt Connie.

We had a wonderful time and Luke landed some great loot. Here he is playing with his Legos and the Lego table that Nami and Grandpa got him.

Checking out one of his new books. He is definitely a little reader.

Score! Look at this sweet ride!

Tis the Season...

To Be Jolly...Hahaha!That's more like it!

We had a fabulous Christmas with both sides of the family, and I have tons of pics to share, but still need to go through all of them. I have been slacking on the blogging front so I have a little catching up to do.

For our Christmas card this year, we dressed Luke up in his Christmas Church outfit and let him play in the "forest" by my parents house. Only 2 pictures made the cut, but there sure were other cute ones! Here are some of my favorite shots from the day.

We can now get Luke to do the cutest little laugh. All we do is make loud exaggerated fake laughing noises and this is what he does. Love it!

Luke is OBSESSED with photos. He loves looking at people he knows and I have made an album with family and friends that he loves! He will look at it for 15 minutes at a time (which is a lot in toddler time) and just point to everyone he knows, saying the names he can pronounce. Well we have recently found a new activity, looking at Christmas cards. Luke would pull out the basket several times a day and look at all the cards. We may be leaving them out a little longer this year!

As you can see in the above picture, Luke is sitting at our kitchen table. Well, over the past week, he has figured out that he can get into these chairs by himself and now that is all he wants to do. Needless to say, the highchair has lost its appeal and we have officially joined the table with a booster seat. Here is more evidence of his chair sitting. What a big boy! =)

Finally I wanted to post a picture of the stockings Ali and I have been working on for several months. My mom made our stockings when we were growing up and Ali and I wanted to do the same thing. We weren't sure what we wanted to do, but got a great idea from the Knochel family. Ali and I busted out my mom's old sewing machine and bought fabric and made the stockings from scratch. Having never sewed before, we were pretty impressed with ourselves. ;)

So the idea is that everyone gets a stocking with a different character in the middle. Then every year they get a new little icon sewed on that represents something from the past year. I decided to start from the year Brian and I got married, so we each have 6 things, while Luke only got 2. Brian and I have things like college emblems, NYC big apple, Italian flag, baby bottle representing Luke, Hawaii and Costa Rica icons, new house, dog, etc. Luke got a monkey emblem, since he had a lot of monkey stuff his first year, and then a plane and palm tree representing his first plane ride and trip to Hawaii. Thanks Knochels for the great idea! What a fun way to look back a remember.

Fancy Camera

Soooo...we broke down and bought a fancy camera. I am super excited! We have several friends with D-SLR cameras and I have been having picture envy. =) I was never a big picture taker growing up, but ever since Luke has been here, Brian and I have both loved taking pictures. When you have a face this cute, you just can't resist! We have had the camera for a week and already really like it. There is a lot to learn, but here are some shots from the week. Enjoy!

Ok not the best picture, but evidence that the "stink eye" is still around. =)

This is what he does when we ask him how old he is. So cute!

Showing me his new Elmo ornament. He loves it!

Poor Ernie never gets any love!

Sittin' with Santa

What a difference a year makes! Last years picture was taken at the height of Luke's fatness. Right before he started crawling, but still eating a ton. Look at those cheeks! =)

Yes this is the look of sheer terror! So funny and I am happy to actually own one of these screaming Santa pictures. Luke thought Santa was great, up until we pried him out of his daddy's arms to sit with him. Love it! =)

Thanksgiving

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving full of food, football, family and fun! The day was spent at my parents house and my mom made a wonderful meal, while I contributed the stuffing and a couple of pies. Everything was yummy! The Lord has really blessed our family this year, and giving Him thanks and praise is what it is all about! There have been several different families in our lives going through hard struggles right now. We have seen people with mold infesting their entire house (a house they just bought), families dealing with health issue after health issue, financial problems, etc. Seeing these things makes you realize everything you have and appreciate things like your marriage, home, job, health, child, family, etc, even more. Nothing is guaranteed in life and we certainly don't deserve everything we are given, that is why I want to thank and praise our heavenly father for all the blessings we have been given this year. Here is one of those little blessings enjoying the cold Thanksgiving weather.

Football watching in progress. (Nice hair Grant!)

Pop bought Luke a set of authentic Linkin Logs to take to the lake. Awesome!

Luke taking a break from football to catch up on some reading. He recently rediscovered the bumbo and LOVES sitting in it, even though it is tight fit. =)

Luke was very into all the shoes laying around the house. He tried on every pair he could find, hence Ali's cheetah peep-toe wedges in the 3rd picture. =)

Not only does he love trying on everyone's shoes, he is also becoming very particular about what shoes and jackets he wears. He wants to pick them out himself and gets very angry if I put the wrong shoes on. Now I can't tell if he is just being stubborn and doesn't want to wear it because I picked it, or if he really wants a specific shoe. Hmmmm...this could get interesting. After Thanksgiving we broke out the Christmas decorations. Luke was only 5 months old last Christmas so didn't pay much attention to the tree. Well this year he really helped with the ornaments. I picked out all the ones that he couldn't break and he would take them to his daddy and they would put it up together. He was so proud of himself, and has been very good about not messing with the tree now. What a good boy!