Istablogged, Winter Edition

Jet Lagged in CA during our Disneyland trip.

Elsa and Anna

Bert and Mary Poppins

The 70+ degree weather in LA was nice, but I also love a snowy January afternoon.

Bedheaded pancake maker.

We did a ladies-only trip to the Smithsonian American Art Museum. I was the personal tour guide, and it was so much fun. Here's the gorgeous visible storage.

I figured out how to do a 5-strand braid on my own hair. I feel so fancy.

Another photo-worthy train track.

Our sofa finally arrives!

Boys trying out the new sofa.

Reading on a snowy Saturday. (This was also the day of Nate's birthday, and it got completely snowed out.)

I did an art history class for Beckett's preschool. We talked about special art vocabulary: portraits, landscapes, still lifes, and abstract art. Then the kids made their own landscapes, still lifes, and abstractions. (They make lots of portraits already.) We made the classroom into a museum for the parents to visit. This is Beckett's still life. You can see the different kinds of fruit in a bowl.

These may look like abstractions, but they are actually landscapes. (They are green, after all.) Beckett's is a tall mountain.

Blurry swinging at an indoor playground.

Visits from old friends are the best. So glad that Kristen could come by. It was so short but also so sweet.

 When I ask: Are you tired of all my snow pictures? Too bad. That's all I've got this winter.

Another visit from an old friend. And a facebook win. Suzanne posted some pictures of Baltimore on facebook, so I commented, "I live in Baltimore. Come see me." So, she did! It was so much fun to catch up. We hadn't seen each other for almost18 years.

Welcome to Daylight Savings where not even video games can keep you awake until bedtime. (If you're Felix anyway. Beckett was up until 10pm, just not tired.)

The first day of spring. One lesson I learned from my years in Colorado is that you can never rely on spring.

All the Snow Days

We had a lot of snow this winter. And a lot of snow days. School was cancelled eight times. Church was cancelled three weeks in a row. Honestly, I thought about half of those snow days were completely unnecessary. I keep saying this, but I really like that everyone in Maryland would be happier if they just admitted that they have winter. Instead, I feel like Maryland thinks it's a southern state, when, in reality, we only live two hours south of Pennsylvania, and no one there thinks they don't have winter.

Luckily, I actually really like winter. And I've realized that I'm just going to have to come to terms with the fact that winter equals cancellations in Maryland. If I can do that, winter will be a happier season for me.

Anyway, because there was so much snow, I have lots of lovely snow pictures.

My backyard.

Beckett, especially, is a big fan of winter. He always claims that it's his favorite season. Nate and I have always thought that was a little strange, seeing how he hates to be cold, but cold doesn't seem to bother him when he's in the snow.


Nate is typically the more fun parent, but, when it comes to playing in the snow, I've got him beat. It comes from having much more experience. One thing I did this winter was drag our small playset over to the edge of the deck. Then I piled up the snow underneath it so the kids could slide right into a snowdrift. The slide was extra fast because it was wet.

Here are pictures of Felix before and after he got his haircut.

We had one good snowman day.

This photo got a lot of attention. It's pretty lucky how I caught that snowflake.

After all that snow, we are enjoying our spring.

Felix Has a Birthday

Felix had a birthday. How crazy is it that he is three? We celebrated with a monkey birthday. Felix was really pumped up for it. Every time we asked him what he wanted for his birthday he would say, "Monkey birthday." When I asked him what he wanted to give Daddy for his birthday, he said, "Monkey birthday." Then he said, "Mommy have monkey birthday. Daddy have monkey birthday. Bobby have monkey birthday. Me have monkey birthday." Everyone needed a monkey birthday.

The monkey theme was a good one. We've called Felix our Little Monkey since he was born. He lives up to the nickname with ease. Monkey decorations were readily available and very cute.

For the big Monkey Birthday I got Felix a monkey shirt, and Daddy brought him a monkey balloon.

We put monkeys on the cake. Oh, and he got a little monkey friend, too.

We had the Grovers over for dinner and cake. Felix loved how everyone was singing "Happy Birthday" to him. Cutest face during the whole song.

We put some extra candles on the cake to appease all the kids. Felix did a great job blowing them out, but I am mostly including this picture because Beckett in the background is so funny. He was cheering Felix on with great gusto.

Present time. We wrapped everything in this wintery monkey wrapping paper.

Happy birthday, Little Monkey. We love you.

Felix Gets a Haircut

Felix has the loveliest hair with golden ringlets. I got a comment on his hair every single day. And that is not an exaggeration. But we knew his long hair couldn't last forever. We decided we would cut his hair when he turned three. It was time.

Felix's hair looked pretty amazing when I did it, but it could also look super crazy. Plus, it was crazy long--halfway down his back when wet.

The day before his haircut I did his hair so that it would look extra nice, and we went outside to take a few pictures. (On the last snow-free Sunday in February.)

His hair looked so good this day that it was hard to know that the next day it would all be gone.

When we got to the hair stylist, Felix volunteered to go first. (Beckett and I also got haircuts.) His current obsession is Angry Birds, so he was thrilled to wear the smock. Funniest moment from the haircut: Christy asked me if we had any fun plans for the weekend (Valentine's Day), and Felix replied, "Me go Toby's house."  That definitely was not in the plans, but I think Felix would live at Toby's house if he could.

Here's the final product. A couple shots from the day of the big chop:

It was so short. I wasn't really loving it at first. I wished I had done everything differently and had the stylist give him a chin-length haircut and then trim up from there. I felt like the bangs, especially, were too short.

It's now a couple weeks later, and I'm liking the short hair much better. It's still very curly. Where there is any length at all the hair wants to curl into a ringlet. One nice thing about the shorter hair is that it looks good whether or not we actually do it. Looser curls and tighter curls both look equally nice. I think the shorter hair makes Felix look less like a baby and more like a rascal, but since he is kind of a rascal, I guess the 'do suits him.