HAPPY BIRTHDAY LOGAN!!!!

Today is Logan's 1st birthday! We celebrated by having all his family in the area come over for lunch and cupcakes. We had a great time. Logan was completely spoiled and got lots of really fun toys. He even got some clothes that he is in desperate need of. Luckily, he was a little more interested in opening presents than he was at Christmas, but he still didn't figure it out. He opened one present and was in complete aww. After that first present, he didn't want to open any others. He was just fine with the school bus that his Grandpa & Grandma H. gave him. We finally got him sidetracked enough to get more presents opened. He loved every one of them. I have to say though that the most adored present of the day was the 4-wheeler that his Uncle David and Aunt Heather gave him. He loves it. He spent the afternoon just riding around on it. I think we'll hide it tomorrow and let him play with his other toys.



After presents we got out the cupcakes and let Logan enjoy. He wasn't too fond of the idea at first, but soon got the idea that he was to eat it. After he figured it out, there was no stopping him. He went to town on that thing. It was fun to watch.





The party stopped soon after the cupcakes since Mr. Logan decided he needed a nap. Over all, I would say that his birthday was a success. We all had fun, and he really enjoyed being the center of attention. He is a complete people person.

Christmas Misadventures

Our Christmas proved to be one that we will not forget anytime soon.

As soon as Logan woke up we went downstairs to open presents. For some reason, Logan wasn't into it. In fact, the wrapping paper scared him. Once the wrapping paper was gone though, he seemed to enjoy his new toys.




After the presents were unwrapped, we ate a quick breakfast (delicious cereal...one day I'll actually make a Christmas breakfast) and got ready as fast as possible to get down to my parents house in Auburn (which is about an hours drive).

We got into the car and headed out around 9:45am. It was snowing, and it was snowing hard! I couldn't believe all the snow, didn't we all ready have enough? I had talked to my brother who assured me that the freeway was fine. Our side streets weren't so good so we were looking forward to getting onto the freeway. We probably shouldn't have been so excited. I-405 was covered in snow and I believe the fastest we drove was a whopping 40mph. Only when we reached south Bellevue did it clear up. What should have taken us an hour to get to, took us about an hour and a half. It was insane! But we made it and we made it safely.

Finally at my parents house it was time to get the camera out and take pictures. I was excited to get lots of pictures of Logan since it was his first Christmas and the whole family was together. I turned on the camera to take a picture and the camera was broken! Seriously, it was working fine earlier that morning, but something happened to it between our house and my parents that convinced it not to work anymore. And, not only was our camera broken, but it seemed that everyone else's camera didn't have a working battery and there were no chargers. So, no camera this year. We did find an old one that we used, but it just wasn't the same. It made us laugh that all the cameras that everyone had didn't want to work today.

Here is a picture of David and Logan with the only camera we could find that worked. David and Heather got him this huge truck that they thought would be fun for Logan. I guess David had a different idea of fun for Logan by actually placing him in the truck instead of letting him play with it. :)

Dinner was great though, roast beef with lots of side dishes. It was delicious! We played some Rock Band after dinner and visited...it was an all around great Christmas despite the earlier problems. All too soon it was time to get home.

We left my parents house, or at least tried to. Our car got a little stuck in the street as we tried to leave, it took a little while, but we were able to get out. The roads were very slushy, icy, and snowy. You name it, the roads had it. The freeway was much better getting home though, just bare and wet. We were very excited about that. Finally we made it to our neighborhood. We turned into our development, then onto our street. Our house was just next door to where we were and our car got stuck yet again! Only this time, it was really stuck. Tires spinning, burning rubber, and going nowhere. It was 10:00 at night, no one had lights on in their homes so we didn't want to bother them. We tried for awhile, and then I looked up and saw one house with a light on. I ran to it and knocked on the door. I apologized for bothering them so late and told them the situation. Luckily he came out and helped us and after a long time, we got the car into our driveway and then into the garage. In total it took us about 30 minutes to get from our next door neighbors house to our garage. Crazy! I think tomorrow we are just going to stay home, in fact we may not go anywhere until the road is cleared up a little more.

All in all it was a great Christmas, just not so great for travelling. I love snow, but I think it should stay off the roads. In fact, it would be better if it just stayed in the mountains. :) Oh well. At least we had a white Christmas!

A big Congratulations!!!

Congratulations to my brother David and his now fiancee, Heather! They got engaged on December 23rd. I personally think it's the best day to get engaged. ;)
They are so very perfect for each other and I couldn't be happier for them. We are so excited to have Heather join our family! Congrats again!!!

Christmas Eve

Tonight we celebrated Christmas Eve with Sam's family. It started with dinner at Buca Di Beppo in Lynnwood followed by a live nativity scene at our house with the cousins. I may be a little biased, but I think that Logan made one of the cutest wisemen ever!


After the nativity, it was on to opening christmas presents. It was just an exhchange between those that were here since we won't see them tomorrow. It was so much fun to watch the kids open presents. Logan was excited to get a construction truck from his grandma and grandpa B. He carried that thing everywhere, and I'm sure if we let him, he probably would have slept with it.

Tomorrow morning we will do a small family christmas and then head down to my parents house in Auburn to celebrate Christmas yet again!!! I love the holidays, it provides so much time to spend with family that I just can't get enough of!

It's a miracle!

Logan has had problems sleeping through the night. It really hasn't been so bad, but he would wake up at least 3 times just screaming, but would eventually put himself back to sleep. We would feed him once at night to calm him down. We didn't like doing that since we figured he should be getting enough during the day. But we weren't sure what to do and it did calm him down. And of course, every time Logan woke up, so did I. Only I have a hard time falling asleep after he does, so I'm up most of the night.

One thing we have noticed is that Logan's room is incredibly cold, and has become worse with the weather. We've notified the heating company and they have made a few appointments to come out and check it out, but they have cancelled all appointments they made because of the road conditions (being ice).

A few nights ago Sam had the brilliant idea to close ALL heater vents in the house except Logan's. It worked. His room was warm and cozy, however the rest of the house was not so much. I don't care though, because those nights that the vents were closed were nights that Logan slept from 8pm til 8am!!!! It has been absolutely amazing. I really hope that the cold room is the problem. If it is, hopefully one day the heating people can come out and fix the problem. In the meantime, we have lots of blankets, and it's really not that bad in our room, but we'll do anything to make sure Logan gets a good nights sleep. And as a result, so do we! :)

Is it over yet?

Well, for the time being the snow has stopped. We have over a foot of snow in our yard, but I know that other areas have much more. The weather has warmed up a bit so the snow is melting off of the roof. We've had some pretty amazing icicles though as a result. It looks like we will get a break from the winter madness...at least until Tuesday night.

Let it snow!

We have had lots of snow, at least for the area. This morning I measured 6 inches of snow in our driveway, plus about an inch of ice underneath and it's still snowing! I love snow and all the whiteness, but we don't have a snow shovel to shovel our driveway or snow clothes for Logan or boots for anybody. So we can't really go out and play in it. So sad. We will probably go out anyway for a very little bit and then come back in and warm up. I did attempt to clear off our driveway with a broom. It was a sad attempt as I got exhausted really quickly and only managed to sweep away about a square foot of snow from the driveway. Now it just looks silly.

As much as I love the snow, I wish it would stop. Perhaps this week we will get lucky since the temps are supposed to get into the mid 30's during the day. But with rain and freezing temps at night, I'm thinking we are going to be stuck at home for quite some time. I guess it's time to get the board games out!

This is the view from our front door...

Our street...(you can't tell where the driveways end and the street begins, it's just crazy!)

Snow Day

We've had some extremely cold weather lately, and with it came snow. Starting around 3pm yesterday and still going it has been snowing in our area. You'd think we'd have more snow than we do, but I'm guessing we have about 4-5 inches at our house. The roads are ice and traffic is terrible, so Sam decided to work from home today. I'm glad he did because the reports are that the roads are so bad that lots of the freeways have been closed in some parts. One of the major roads that Sam would have to take to get to work was one of those closed.



Logan has been hypnotized by the snow, always looking out the window to watch it fall. We decided to bundle him up as much as we could (we are lacking in snow gear for him) and take him outside for his first time in the snow. He loved it! He wasn't too fond of falling in it, but he seemed to do alright. He was so excited to be outside, it was just too cute. When it was time to go inside, he threw a tantrum. He was just having too much fun outside that he didn't want to come in. Oh well, there will be more days to play.

i luv roomba!

So about a week or so ago, we bought ourselves an IRobot Roomba. The only reason we even got one was because Linens N Things is going out of business and it was on clearance...it was the only way we could afford one. I've been wanting one for awhile because I was getting tired of vacuuming every night after Logan. He has gotten very good at leaving messes wherever he goes. (crumbs everywhere!) Since I had become lazy at cleaning the house, the crumbs were piling up and of course Logan was finding them and trying to eat them. Gross!!! We needed help! Enter Roomba.

This thing is awesome. It makes me clean up the toys every night (otherwise it won't do it's job very well) and then all I do is push a button and off Roomba goes, happily vacuuming the mess made that day. It runs for about an hour or so going in all sorts of directions. There is no particular pattern for this thing. It just goes where it wants. When the battery starts to run low, it takes itself back to the charging base. What a smart robot! Of course, it does run into the end tables and such, which is actually quite funny to watch it bump into things, but other than that it's pretty amazing. And the best part is, now I don't have to vacuum as often. I still need to every now and then to get the deep cleaning, but it's so much better than doing it every day. What can I say, I luv Roomba!

Picture Day

Yesterday I took Logan in to get his Christmas and birthday pictures done. It didn't go as I had planned. Oh well, it happens. Here's the story...

Logan had woken up from his morning nap quite happy. I tried to feed him some food, but he seems to be on a food strike right now and didn't eat very much. He was giggling and smiling really big while I was getting him ready for his pictures. We arrived at the studio and we had to wait a little while since there was a backup. I wasn't worried though, afterall, Logan was in a great mood. So we hung out for a bit and I let him wander around. Finally it was our turn. I got Logan where he needed to be and the photographer came to help pose him. At that moment, Logan seemed to change his mind about his mood. He went from all smiles to all screams. We did manage to get a couple decent pictures of him, but once we got to the Christmas pictures, he was done. He didn't smile in any of those and, actually decided to throw a tantrum in the middle of the session. We got him calmed down a bit, but only enough to take one more shot of him. He looked so upset in that picture, but what can you do?

Despite the fact that it didn't go quite like I had planned, we got his 1 year and Christmas pictures done. At least we can look back on them in later years and tell Logan the story of what happened. Ah the memories...

We started with this...


And ended with this...

Nutcracker

Saturday night Sam and I went to see the Nutcracker in Seattle. It was amazing. The sets were incredible and the dancers were very talented, even the little kids were entertaining to watch.
Sam and I don't get out much anymore, and that night we remembered why. The show didn't start until 8pm and about halfway through the first act, both of us were falling asleep. Pathetic, I know! At one point in the show, Sam leaned over and whispered that he forgot there was no talking in ballet. I almost started to laugh, but remembered that others may not appreciate that. Despite being exhausted, we had a great time. It's definitely a show we will take Logan to when he's older, most likely to a matinee showing though. :)

And he's off...

Logan is walking! Yes, that's right, our little baby is no longer, he's a little boy! He's been taking steps here and there for awhile now, but as of Sunday he decided that walking is his preferred method of getting around the house. He'll still crawl if there is something that he wants to get to really fast but usually, he's walking. He never seemed to want help with it either, he refused to hold hands with anyone or hold on to anything (except when cruising the furniture). He's very independent, but that's what I love about him.

(Sorry the video is so dark, it was taken very early in the morning, and we don't have much lighting in the house.)

An Early Christmas Video

What better way to get into the holiday spirit than to make our son a dancing elf! ;)

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Our Thanksgiving Weekend

Where to start...this weekend was a busy one, but fun.

Thanksgiving day we went to Sam's parents house to celebrate Thanksgiving. As always, there was lots of delicious food. I was excited for Logan to try Thanksgiving dinner, but he had other plans. He decided to eat only a small amount of potatoes and then take a nap halfway through the meal. Oh well. There's always next year. He seemed to enjoy playing with his cousins. Well, he more or less watched them play, but he was very entertained by it.

On Friday, I actually braved the morning crowds to get some good deals on presents for Logan. His Christmas shopping was all done, but it dawned on me that his birthday is right after Christmas and I needed to get him something, so I went to Toys R Us and got lots of great things for him at really great prices. I'm not sure I'll do that again though, parents can get rather vicious when it comes to getting toys for their kids. I did however, enjoy the deals I got. Later that afternoon, we headed south to visit my parents in Auburn. We had yet another delicious turkey dinner (gotta love leftovers), and Logan actually got to eat some of it this time. He seemed to really love the sweet potatoes, but not the turkey. He's a crazy kid, but we still love him.

Saturday was fun. Sam went to lunch with his family while I stayed home and babysat my awesome neices! (I didn't want to go to lunch...it was Dim sum, not something I enjoy, but Sam does.) While everyone was eating, I had Hannah help me decorate our Christmas tree. I really wish I had taken a picture, she did a wonderful job of putting the ornaments in the same place on the tree. It was awesome! Unfortunately, we couldn't keep it like that because Logan thought it was a fun toy to bat at. So we had to place the ornaments in various places on the tree. Sorry Hannah, maybe next year we'll try your idea. :) Once lunch was over, the guys came home to babysit while some of us went to see Twilight. All I'll say about the movie is that I thought it was all right. Not my favorite, but still good.

I really regret not taking any pictures. There was so much going on, but picture taking wasn't really on my mind. I guess I need to get better at remembering to have the camera ready. Despite the lack of photos, this past weekend was so much fun. Now we just have to get through Christmas, a first birthday, and the New Year, all within a month! It's going to be crazy around here, but one thing is for sure...we're definitely going to have some fun!