Train Museam and Snow

My twin cousins turned 40 and so we had a party here in town for them and while they were here, we took all the kids to a train museam. If you are on facebook, you can see most of the pictures there, but here is one of Alex with his cousin Katy Lyn working in the kitchen and one of Billy taking him to see the big train.

We had our annual dusting of snow here in Atlanta, so when Alex woke up, he immediatly began begging to go outside to play. Once we got all bundled up, we headed out get some play time in.

Alex is all about helping right now, so he insisted on putting the logs in to the fireplace all by himself, oh and yes he did get ashes all over himself!

Merry Christmas

We had a wonderful Christmas this year. Santa and his helpers were quite good to all of us. Alex really got into it this year which made it so much fun.
On Christmas Eve we went to the Childrens Service at Grandma and Grandpa's church, then went to dinner and came home and got ready for Santa to come. Santa did come and left a train table and all sorts of other various fun items. We then went to Uncle Billy's house for Christmas lunch with all the cousins, then came back home and had Christmas Dinner at home.
Alex is quite into his train table and his Home Depot workbench with all his drills and tools as well as his medical set, Lincoln Logs and playdough and painting sets.
Here is a family photo as well as a few photos of Alex and his various items.

Random

Here are a few random photos from our various activities throughout December.

As we were putting up our outside decorations, Alex enjoyed playing in the leaves.

He also was able to get more involved with decorating the tree this year.

His class at school had a little christmas party that we were able to attend, he was very happy to see us there and show off all his artwork and his room.

Thanksgiving

We had all of Carl's family in town for thanksgiving this year. It was a wonderful time to spend with everyone. Here are a couple of photos of our time. Alex with Nanna and Uncle Gabe throwing Alex "up high"!

Forts and Pigs

One of my favorite memories as a child was building forts with the couch cushions, Alex has also found this equally as fun.

My friend Angela and I took Alex and Thomas to their first ride on the Pink Pig. This is a train that is set up at christmas time at a local mall. We went the first week it was set up and had the train to ourselves and got to ride 4x for the price of 2. They boys enjoyed their ride and then we hit the mall for some shopping and lunch.

Philly

Back in October, Grandma, Alex and I headed up to Philly for Aunt Deb's baby shower.

Alex was super excited about his plane trip and had a great time playing with Aunt Deb, Uncle Rick and all the other friends and family in town for the shower. It is a great thing that there is a park in back of their house, Alex took them all outside to try it out before Mark's arrival to make sure that everything was going to be fun for him to play with when he gets bigger.

We are very excited that Mark has now arrived and can't wait to get back to Philly to meet him.

Alive

Yes, yes we are alive.
I have not been that great at updating recently, so I will try to sum up in 1 post and catch back up. Pictures to come later.
Alex had an amazing 2nd birthday party. Uncle Michael and Aunt Christal came in town along with Nono. Alex and all his friends had a blast on the bounce house and slide. We were lucky and had a great weather day for it, not too unbearably hot for the middle of June. Alex received tons of wonderful presents that he still enjoys today, including a front end loader, bucket wheel, a dump truck he can ride in, tonka garage, t-ball, soccer, and a sand and water box with a very large green excavator attachment!
He is completely obsessed with any kind of loud vehicle, excavator is his most favorite, followed closely by garbage man. I am sure our garbage men love the weekly audience he gives them every Friday morning, screaming HI BIG GARBAGE MAN at the top of his lungs! and yes, he did so loudly the other day from his room, the men looked up and waved, oh and yes the windows were closed!
Aunt Katie came in for a visit and we were able to go to the aquarium again to see the BIG fishes.
I had the realization the other day that I did not have a cell phone until I graduated from college, yet my 2 year old knows how to video conference his Nono and will request to "call Nono on puter" quite often.
It has been very busy with various birthday parties, wedding showers and weddings. Congrats to Johanna and Kacey and Melissa and William.
On my front, I left AutoTrader.com in June and took about a month off before starting my part time job with The Simpson Organization in July. I am working 3 days a week now and really enjoying getting to spend the extra time with Alex.
We have found many new parks and enjoyed numerous play dates with friends.
We took Alex to the Zoo for the first time last weekend. He yelled at the Rhino for sleeping, enjoyed the very tall Giraffes, loved petting the sheep, goats and pigs, was overjoyed with riding the choo choo... but I think his most favorite part was HAIRY DOG! Yes, out of sheer coincidence we happened to go on UGA Alumni day. We were walking along and Alex screamed Mommy Daddy HAIRY DOG, we did not even see him, but Alex has a very keen eye. He gave him a big hug and high 5!
Alex vocabulary is taking off and along with that comes some very funny things, like last week when he attempted to send Daddy to time out during dinner for not giving him mustard in a timely enough manner!
He is a very good eater, not too many things that he does not like.
This is a big few weeks for Alex, he will go meet his preschool teacher tomorrow and then start school next Tuesday. We hope it goes better this year. We have been putting him in the nursery at church and so far so good, many tears but he has not gotten sick on them. In addition, Nono is coming back for 2 weeks to hang out with Alex and give grandma a break.
More to come now that I am getting caught back up.