First Words

Cosette is learning to talk! She can say a bunch of things, including a few 2 word phrases like "ut-oh" and "whoa-baby."  She also loves the basics like "dada" and "mama" and "baba" for bottle. She also calls my dad "papa" and roars like a lion and copies other silly sounds we make. My favorite is the latest: waving and saying "bye bye" and saying "hi." Her little voice is so precious to me! I'm anxious to hear what she'll call her big brother once she has a word for him.

Jackson didn't want to be left out of the filming so he wanted to show off his emotional faces. You can also hear him in the background of Cosette's video doing the "dada" and other baby words. He's demonstrating how he can do them better than baby.

Hand Holding at Hidden Villa

Jackson with his friends Grace and Adelaide at a little farm. Hand holding is very "in" at this age.

Christmas Weekend

We visited Santa Rosa for Christmas weekend and spent 4 days with both families. Here are some highlights.

We let the kids start opening gifts a few days in advance so they could enjoy some of them throughout the weekend and they wouldn't be so overwhelmed on Christmas morning. This first one I'm pretty proud of. I found this unfinished wooden castle at Micheal's Crafts and knew Jackson would love it for putting little toys and animals inside, like a doll house. So I bought it in September and took it on as a project to make it special for him.

Before

 And After! Here's the front. The drawbridge has a lion (Jackson's favorite animal). And I used ideas from the Gieseke family coat of arms to design the sheilds with "JT" for Jackson Timothy.

 All filled with dragons and knights ready to play

 "Gieseke" on the back. This was a lot more time consuming than I thought it would be, but I'm happy with the results. I have to resign myself to the reality that it will probably get broken and he's not really old enough to care about the custom paint job, but it's cool nonetheless.

Discovering the castle for the first time

 He's pleased!

Cosette got a barnyard full of animals

On our way to church Christmas Eve

Kids with their cousin Evan

Christmas morning! Cosette gets a cart to push and a dolly!

Posing with her dolly in matching pink

 

 Running to Papa to show off her toys and get snuggles. She is so affectionate.

 Eating our mom's famous cinnamon rolls

 Jack's willing to try them

 Natalie and Justin and me and Dan

Opening the first of the Dinosaur Train toys. He was so thrilled!

Coco just loved the ribbon!

A little tea set

Hard at work on those trains!

Stomping around with another dolly

Loves to run to Papa!

So happy

Even more dinos and trains! Best Christmas ever for Jack.

Sweet Christmas Baby

Lot of cute headwear

New fishing vest

New pirate ship from Papa

Crazy reindeer

What a great morning!

This is from Christmas Caroling with our small group, but it was cute so I'm throwing it in. Jack and Emeline prepare to carol by running amok.

Cosette snuggles up

Love my blue-eyed lady!

Holiday Wrap Up

Like most people, we are kind of revealed that the holidays are now well behind us. We had a wonderful time, but it's hard to be in celebratory mode for too long, especially with a toddler who is not the most adaptable to change. This is the first year Jackson has been able to really understand a lot about Christmas and participate in some of the traditions. His favorite was the advent calendar with chocolate coins. He now mistakenly thinks all coin money is made of chocolate.

The angel goes up! My sister and I would fight every year about whose turn it was to put up the angel. Jack's lucky in that he doesn't have active competition yet.

A few special ordinments

 Sweet boy

 They loved adding, but mostly removing the ornaments. We put the non-breakables on the lower half of the tree and that worked pretty well to let them touch and help. We did discover over the month that the tree was up that every ornament is indeed breakable. It's amazing what a 16lb, 11 month old baby can break. Lots of crazy glue fixed most issues.

  All done!

 Silly kids playing with the ornaments. These were their main toys for a few weeks

 Cosette is a really steady walker at this point. Playing chase together.

 Posing cuties. Coco's head matches the couch.

 Wrestling

 Jackson watching the old claymation Rudolf movie while we finished decorating. Little did we know the abominable snowman would scare him so badly. He still talks about the "monster" every day.

 Our playgroup did a Christmas party and book exchange together. Cosette showing off her walking skills.

 Jackson and Charlotte with snacks

 Adelaide and Jack with snacks

 Cosette with her buddies Joanna and Hudson

 Most of the kids together under the tree.

 Every year we go see the same Christmas lights in San Carlos near Redwood City. It was fun to see Jack get a lot more excited about it this year. This street really goes over the top on the decor.

 With our friends Terah and Michelle and their son Noah seeing the lights.

 Jack and Noah are buds

 Cosette prefers to stay warm

 Posing with the snowmen

 He points out the train every year

 Noah and Jack by the lights

 Jackson and I in front of a tropical themed house.

 We came back another day to see the street again on a quieter weeknight. Cosette did not appreciate wearing her new snow jacket.

 She really hated it. Poor thing want to be in bed, not walking around outside at night. Sorry Cosette!