Christmas #4-Aunts, Uncle, Grandpa Bidney & Lola

Last but not least, Christmas #4!!! On Saturday afternoon, we headed over to Grandpa Bidney & Lola's house for a wonderful ham dinner & gift opening. Aunt Holly & Uncle Chris live literally 2 minutes from the house I spent my middle & high school years living so the ice & snow didn't stop us!!

When we arrived, Eli had to check everything out, including Grandpa's dog, Gus. Gus is the kindest Golden Retriever you will ever meet & Eli instantly fell in love with him. He would follow him around & hug him. Here's an adorable picture of Gus getting some Eli love:

Dinner was somewhat potluck with Aunt Holly bringing green bean casserole & Aunt Sarah bringing potato casserole, but the best part of the dinner was made by Grandpa & Lola-wonderful ham! Here is Grandpa carving the "roast beast":

Eli waiting for the feast to begin:

Eli having some Grandpa time:

Then some Aunt Sarah time:

Gift opening time was great fun! Eli received some money from Grandpa & Lola for his college fund & some fun stars to put up on his ceiling. Thanks Grandpa & Lola!!

And, in usual Bidney fashion, anything entertainment: movies, music, etc., is what our gatherings consist of. Uncle Chris brought over his "Rock Band" for everyone to enjoy. Eli was having an awesome time dancing during all the excitement. Go to Aunt Holly's blog for more pics:

It was wonderful to spend time with everyone this holiday. As families grow larger getting to spend each Christmas with everyone will get harder & harder but hopefully we can do all we can to make it possible! Eli is very blessed to have such wonderful family!

P.S. Check out Eli's new words!

Christmas #3-Aunts, Uncle & Grandma Bidney

Christmas #3 occurred in Iowa where my sisters & dad live. Grandma Bidney drove up earlier in the week & we left for the 3 hour drive on Friday morning. Eli did VERY well the way up & back & napped for at least an hour each way. Another sign that he is growing up!

Aunt Holly & Uncle Chris hosted & we decided ordering pizza was the perfect way to celebrate :) As it should be, (because we drew names this year) most of the gifts were for Eli. Being that he is the first grandchild on my side of the family, you can see why this is the case! But before gift opening, Eli decided to try his hand at Uncle Chris' "Rock Band":

Eli, once again, was quite spoiled. From Aunt Holly & Uncle Chris he got a cool pop up Transformers tent/tunnel & puzzles. From Aunt Sarah & Aunt Stephanie he got a ball popper toy, sit & spin (SO retro!!), Mr. Potato Head (again, retro!), & toy cell phone. From Grandma Bidney, Eli received some wonderful books. Let's just say that after this weekend, I decided we needed to empty the living room out to make a decent play room for Eli :)

Aunt Holly & Uncle Chris have 2 cats. Eli had a great time trying to chase around the "CATS!!" & an even better time watching Vivian playing with him in his high chair during lunch:

I forgot to say in the last post, but we made Eli calendars for all the grandparents & Eli & grandma ornaments for the grandmas. We also printed off a grandma poem in appreciation for all they do for Eli. When we received the calendars in the mail, we somehow got 6 instead of 3! So, we had enough to also give the aunts & uncles.

Thank you all for a wonderful weekend & the gifts! Hope to see you again soon!

Christmas #2-The Clarksons

Christmas with the Clarksons started with a yummy tradition of eating Jackstack BBQ. This tradition started a number of years ago when it was decided that Eric's mom didn't need to cook for days on end for Thanksgiving AND Christmas. It's a great tradition that I'm sure will continue on for years to come.

After lunch, it was time for present opening. Uncle Blake, Cousin Sammie, Grandma & Grandpa Clarkson & us enjoyed opening gifts from each other & watching Sammie & Eli opening theirs. Eli was spoiled with a variety of toys & clothes including a guitar, bongo drum, tool sorting set, ATV, Barney doll, bath toys, & cell phone (toy one, of course). Here are some pictures of the gift opening extravaganza:

Then a few family pictures were taken in front of the tree & it seemed that Eli had to be a part of all of them. Eli was VERY lovey on Christmas Day & gave all of his family lots of hugs & kisses. It was too cute.

Eli enjoyed his time with Cousin Sammie on Christmas Day. He just seemed enthralled with her & loved playing with her:

After gift opening, Grandma Clarkson had worked hard at preparing a fun game called Pokerchino (spelled wrong, I'm sure). Essentially it is bingo with a deck of cards. Grandma made it extra special & put together a variety of prizes for the winners (& of course everyone won the same amount of prizes to make it fair). She had a clue of some sort that would give an idea of what type of gift card was inside an envelope. For example, a flashlight was a clue for a Lowe's gift card. It was a fun & unique twist to gift receiving on Christmas day! Thanks Grandma for all your hard work!!

In addition, Eli turned 16 months on Christmas Day.....1 year ago he was a tiny 4 months old!

After Christmas with the Clarksons, we packed & prepared for our trip to Iowa for Christmas #3 & #4!

Christmas #1-Just the 3 of Us!

Our 1st of 4 Christmas' started Christmas Eve where Eric continued our tradition of reading Eli "The Night Before Christmas". This year was a little different than last year, as he couldn't still too long & was able to point out things he saw in the pictures such as lights & Santa:

Another tradition is to open one gift on Christmas Eve. Here is Eli "opening" his gift (he hasn't mastered the art of tearing the paper off quite yet):

Eli wasn't too sure what to think of his first "choo-choo" but I'm happy to report he is no longer scared:



Eli learned that he had reindeer (actually I think they are moose, but he'll never know!!) on his p.j.'s:



Christmas morning, we got up & finished opening gifts. Eli received a Handy Manny tool set, a tool bench, Leap Frog Animal Sounds magnets, a Royals cap, & a toy box/book shelf from mommy & daddy. Mommy then made breakfast & we all got ready for Christmas #2 with the Clarkson gang!

Merry Christmas 2008

Just a little post to say Merry Christmas! We've had 1 out of our 4 Christmas' so I'll probably do few separate posts this weekend. Have a wonderful remainder of your holiday!

Coloring, new toy, running, glasses, laundry, Starbucks, tower, bear crawl, laughing, words, kisses, & longest post title EVER!!!!

Hello all! Hope you are as excited about the upcoming holiday as I am! Not only am I excited for Eli to enjoy Christmas even more than last year, but also because I pretty much have the next 2 weeks off from work (only working a total of 8 hours in 2 weeks!!). That means more time home with my little Eli! Our plan is to celebrate Christmas Eve & morning with just the 3 of us & then celebrate with the Clarkson gang Christmas afternoon. Friday we will drive up to Des Moines to be with the Bidney brood. Hopefully the weather will cooperate with our plans!

As I said in the last post, before the what is now known as the "snowsuit drama", Eli experienced coloring for the first time. We used those cool Tadoodles that are made for toddler hands & he really figured it out pretty quickly on his own. He isn't exactly coloring yet, more like "poking" the paper, but he liked it! I think Eli will be a well rounded young man as he really enjoys music already & I can see him also enjoying art & sports:

Eli's first piece of art (mommy did the little scribble, but the rest is his own creation):

Eli then decided he was done coloring & wanted to run (walk fast, really) across the mat:

At my work Christmas party, we ate lunch at Manny's (Y-U-M-M-Y!!!) and did a "white elephant" gift exchange. I drew a pretty high number so I pretty much could have chosen from a variety of items: Target gift card, Starbucks gift card, candles, lotion, wine, etc. But, because I am an EXCELLANT mommy (hehe), I chose the below Christmas toy that I knew Eli would enjoy. Oh the selflessness of mommyhood :):

Eli continues to master walking more & more & I think he soon will be running. This picture LOOKS like he is running, but really I just caught a frame that looked like he was:

Eli thought it was funny to try on daddy's glasses. It was cute because he would laugh like it tickled when the glasses went over his ears:

Eli helped daddy with laundry today. Here he is playing "Where's Eli??":

"There he is, peek-a-boo!!":

As I've said before, Eli sees his daddy & mommy drinking coffee on a daily basis. On special occasions (by special I mean anytime one is in the vacinity :) we get Starbucks. Eli's favorite by far has to be the Peppermint Mocha Twist....JUST KIDDING!! But he is already loving the feeling of holding a Starbucks in his hand:

Mmmm.....caffeine:

Eli really enjoys throwing around his blocks but is yet to really stack them together. He also likes to play "Eli the Destroyer" when we build towers and knocks them all down. This week, I built a tall tower & it was funny because he was actually in awe of it & didn't want to touch it. Whenever he is excited about something or trying to figure it out, he says "Ehhh?? Di dou!!! Ehh??" or some other babble very enthusiastically while pointing. He walked around it, pointed at it, eventually touched it, & after about 5 minutes, knocked it down:


Eli decided that although he has moved on to walking, he would do a rendition of the "bear crawl" for old times sake:



Eli has a variety of laughs. He has a really deep down belly laugh, a silly laugh, & a laugh that sounds like he is a grown up. It's too cute how he has come up with all of these variations. Here's daddy making Eli do the deep down belly laugh:

Eli continues to say more words. Some words he is saying more often with more "meaning" & connection, and some are new words that he just surprises us with. The other day we were at Target and Eli started to say "cat! cat!". I wasn't really paying too close attention & then turned and saw a picture with a cat on it that Eli was pointing to. Then in the next isle, he started to say "up! up!" & he was pointing to cups (still no "c" yet). Then later he said "ball" while pointing to a ball. This week he started to say the following words pretty regularly: hi, apple, and "ca ku"=cracker. In addition, he is starting to TRY to say his name. A few times he has said "Lee-i" when we call his name. AND, he now actually says "uh-oh" instead of "uh-uh" when he drops things or falls.

Lastly, Eli is starting to actually give kisses! He has always turned away or given us open mouth kisses (sloppy, but still cute) when we attempted to kiss him. Now, after you ask him for a kiss (granted you have to ask several times), he closes his mouth & leans forward to your lips. Too cute!! He also has been so into hugging & cuddling lately (including grandmas :) & will just hug & hug while saying "mmmmm". Melts your heart!!

Everyone have a safe & happy holiday full of family & friends!!

Snowsuit drama

Tuesday, I had a snow day. Since I'm not usually home with Eli all day, I tried to come up with things that would be fun & new for us to do. I got out his Tadoodles so we could color together (which he enjoyed & did pretty good!), we listened to fun songs & danced, & we played with virtually every toy he owns. The week prior, I had bought Eli a snow suit but he had not yet tried it on. Since it was snowing outside (but VERY cold), I thought it would be a good time to try it on with his boots to see how cute he looked & to see if I needed to exchange it for a larger size. I put on the snow pants....they fit very well. I then put on his boots & got the below cute pictures:

Then I decided I MUST see the entire suit & put him in his coat. He was walking around a little slow, but doing well. The coat made it all TOO adorable and I turned around to grab the camera when BOOM.....Eli face planted into the floor. I immediately starting saying mommy stuff like "Ohhh.....Eli, are you okay??" & then I picked him up. To my horror, his mouth was full of blood & he immediately burst into tears & put his hands in his mouth. I was not at all expecting this as he has fallen many times....but not in ankle constricting boots & fluffy, yet movement constricting, pants & coat (not quite this bad:)!

I immediately thought "What was I thinking??? He's only been walking for less than a month!! He can't handle all this yet!!" I apologized over & over to Eli as I tried to figure out what to do next. I knew I couldn't do much to get the blood out of his mouth & I was also trying desperately to not get blood everywhere (especially on the coat & pants as I was hoping to exchange for a larger size!!) but this was impossible. So I wet a washcloth to try to at least wipe the blood off of his face & hands. I then thought the only way to get the blood out of his mouth was to give him water. This seemed to help & he seemed to feel comforted by this. As I was rushing around to the kitchen, bathroom, living room, I am taking off a boot here, a boot there, coat, etc. It was quite the scene.

Eli settled down & I decided I should see what his mouth looked like. I of course thought the worst and thought maybe he knocked a tooth loose or bit his tongue. I couldn't see anything until I lifted up his top lip & saw a nasty cut in the skin connecting his gums to his lip (I later found out called a Frenulum Laceration). It looked terrible & I immediately called the doctor in fear of him needing stitches or possible infection. We got lucky and they had an appointment open. By this time, Eli was fine & acted like nothing happened. I still wanted to get it checked out, though.

The doc simply said that cuts in the mouth heal pretty quickly & they never do stitches except for cases of a split tongue (yuck!!) or if the mouth has been punctured in some way. I felt SO relieved as he said for stitches they would have had to put him under! Doc said all we needed to do was make sure he ate soft foods for a week & if he acted in pain we could use any numbing medication.

Needless to say, I was pretty shaken up to see all that blood & with the idea of him needing stitches at 15 1/2 months. I also felt guilty for dressing him up unnecessarily to see how cute he looked & then have this happen! All is good now & it is already healing very quickly. I just now know he can't handle walking around in boots & all bundled up quite yet :) All I can say is that I am in BIG trouble for having a boy as there will be MANY more incidents of blood, broken bones, & other yucky things. HELP!!!

The Clarkson gang

Here's the link to the Clarkson family pictures!

Bass Pro Santa

Last year, we didn't venture out to take Eli to see Santa (he was only 3 1/2 months old). Call us lazy, but we didn't feel like standing in line with a fussy baby. This year, we decided Eli would enjoy a visit to Santa, even though he really doesn't get the whole concept quite yet. We were going to go to the mall, but found out that the Bass Pro Shop had a Santa that was free! So, we decided this was the best Santa of all!! Plus, Eli had never been to Bass Pro, so we knew he would enjoy the experience. I looked up online that Santa "arrived" today at noon so we decided to go around 11:30am to get a good spot in line. This turned out to be a good idea because the line grew pretty long! We also ran into Sue, Kevin & Kalani who were out for the same adventure. Here are pictures of our time at Bass Pro today:

Waiting in line:

Santa is a REAL Santa with a REAL beard & a REAL Santa smile. Here is Eli's first reaction to sitting on Santa's lap:

"This guy really wants me to smile for camera....okay, I guess I will":

"Look dad, he gave me a candy cane!!":

See, he IS a smiley Santa!!:

Sidenote: since Eli has become a master walker, going out is becoming harder & harder. He will stay in the cart or stroller for awhile, but then begins to realize that there is SO much to explore! Letting him walk around is okay, as long as we follow him closely, but it's the redirecting that is the issue. As soon as you try to take his hand to walk a different direction: melt down! Because of this, you have to chose the right time to let him walk around & be prepared to leave or do some major distraction. At Bass Pro, this wasn't as much an issue as everywhere you turn is something fun to look at!

Checking out the boats:

Looking out at the lake:

Can you see the look on his face...."let me down!!":

Paranoid mama has to hold him to make sure the steel bars don't somehow break & Eli falls through....silly I know:

What could have caught his attention????:

"Yippee! A Christmas tree!!":

"Nice touch":

"Ooooo....balll!"

Some OTHER child broke this ornament off the tree....really, I swear:

Now for some pics/videos from the week. But first, a quick overview:

1) Our Parent Educator, Katie, visited on Thursday. Eli did well on his assessment & I will post about results when I receive them in the mail.
2) We had our Clarkson family pictures taken on Saturday. They will be posted on Tuesday so I will post a link then!
3) Eli has used several new words this week that I am adding to the list: "tee"=tree, eat, "uh-uh"=uh oh, baby, "choo-choo"=train, & poo poo :).
4) I got a snow day!

Eli makes this ADORABLE face where he scrunches his nose, closes his eyes & says "mmmmm":

Eli gets so excited when Ming Ming dances:

Just wearing mommy's coat:

"Do I look like a doggie??":

"I like to play with mommy's ID badges":

"Blanket is SO soft!":

We are slowly introducing the spoon to Eli. Here he is eating yogurt from a spoon:

Such a little walker now! No more crawling and he will circle around the house over & over again:



Unfortunately, he's too smart for us:

This week we will attend a play date, see the chiropractor, attend La Leche League Christmas potluck, mommy will attend work Christmas party, & mommy & daddy will attend daddy's work Christmas party! Christmas is just around the corner....Happy shopping!!!