Merry Christmas!

What do I mean when I say "Merry Christmas"?

In those two words, I am really saying:

Let's rejoice together in the birth of our Savior. Let us rejoice that we are brothers and sisters, children of an involved, loving Heavenly Father. Let us remember that we celebrate the birth of Christ because what His death and resurrection means for us. Let us rejoice with gratitude for the peace that comes with accepting God's love in sending His Son and genuinely striving to do His will.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

The Secret Powers of Time

One of my favorite secret past times is watching RSA Animate clips on YouTube.

Christmas Food Court Flash Mob, Hallelujah Chorus

Scroll down and pause the music at the right before you play this.



I love Christmas!!!

Happy Birthday Grandma!!!

We love our amazing, wonderful, thoughtful, talented, supportive, loving mothers/grandmas who had birthdays in the past little while.

Keys, Candles, Snow, Snow and more Snow

Keys don't open closed doors from the inside. That's what Rody (Little Pedro) learned today.

He loves using keys to try to open doors. The kid will spend 10 minutes trying to open a door from the inside. Tonight he got so frustrated when the door didn't magically open when he put a key by the handle. While he uses the key, he wanted me to stand by the door, open it, wait for him to say "brrrrrrr" as the 4* cold seeped in, then shut it and repeat.  He could do this for an hour.

I'm hoping this kid decides to learn how to talk really soon. He gets so frustrated when he can't communicate what he wants. This morning he brought me a small birthday candle and grunt/squealed and nodded. I guessed at several meanings to the grunt/squeal and nod without success and with increased intensity in the squeal. Finally, I said, "Should we light it?" Suddenly he was pacified or just distracted (who knows) as I stuck it in a banana and lit the wick.  I let him try to blow it out a few times then he decided he was much more interested in the banana. Problem solved or at least adverted.

Does he really remember from his first birthday what a candle is and that it can have a flame?

And for a completely opposite topic, we got 20+ inches of snow yesterday. The city practically shut down since visibility was too low for plows. The roof of the Metrodome where the Vikings were supposed to play the Giants collapsed.

Church was cancelled. We got dressed in Sunday best anyway and held our own little family worship service with songs, prayers, scripture reading and a special guest speaker, Pres. Uchtdorf: "Of Things That Matter Most". We love the new http://www.lds.org/ website, especially how the conference talks page lets us access conference talks so much better.

We decided to follow his counsel to spend some time appreciating and pondering God's creations. We changed and added lots of clothes and braved the 6* coldness with a windchill at some number ridiculously below 0*. The snow was a little higher than a picnic bench. I know because we took advantage of a picnic bench on our walk so we wouldn't sink down as much. The snow was over Rody's head in some places from snow drifts. But, it didn't matter; he couldn't walk with all his snow gear on anyway. Pedro forged our path with him in his arms. Rody laughed heartily as he watched me make a snow angel.

Back home our pile of snow clothes made a pile much higher than the snow, and we enjoyed a traditional Sunday lunch of grilled cheese and tomato soup. Yum!

I am so grateful for a warm home, warm soup and warm hearts.

Tor-tu-ga

Rody (my newest favorite nickname for Lil' Pedro) is BILINGUAL! He can say Mama (Spanish: Mama), Dada (Spanish: Papa) and Turtle (Spanish: Tortuga). He says Mama or Papa upon request only, but the past two days he has wandered around repeating tor-tu-ga in that adorable little voice of his just for fun. I taught Rody "turtle" first, and he enjoyed saying it for a few hours until his dad came home and taught him "tortuga". Most kids' first words are cup or ball or something useful, so what does it mean that our kid only says "tortuga" and seems content to stick with his grunt/squeal/point to communicate? He is either brilliant or, uh, well, let's just stay with brilliant.

Living Room Forts and Snow Camping

  

Cool Hair!

Tickle Tickle Tickle

Lil' Pedro likes to play "tickle toes." Whenever he sees our toes (or his), he pretends to tickle by wiggling his fingers at them while saying his version of "tickle tickle tickle."

The other day we were playing at a toddler's gym, a parks and rec program where parents can bring kids to play with balls, hoola hoops and small indoor slides and teeter totters. Pedro was playing basketball when the purple penguin socks of a girl caught his eye. He toddled over, pointed at the penguins and started to play the tickle game. The girl, who was about three, wasn't so comfortable with a strange kid wiggling his fingers near her feet, but she smiled when I explained that he thought her socks were really neat. I quickly distracted him with a basketball.

This kid makes me laugh all the time. (For Grandmas and aunts who care: See his new molar on his bottom right side.)

Lil' P loves to draw/write with pens. Crayons won't do for this little man. Maybe because he loves taking pen lids off and putting them on again as much as he likes drawing. Today, we compromised with some newly-purchased washable markers. He let me know when he finished with his masterpiece by throwing all the markers on the floor. I've started asking him to clean up whatever he throws on the floor, which he is pretty good about doing. So, he got to pick up the markers and put them back in a cup. The second I turned my back for two seconds, he started to work on a new type of canvas: the floor. Gotta love those washable markers.