Time To Get Dressed

Have you ever wondered what a 14 month old would choose to wear to church if he got the opportunity to decide for himself? Well now you know!

That's right! Brown sweatpants and a gray GAP shirt. This morning, I was getting ready for church and Beniah was being...helpful. So, I went to his dresser and opened the shirt drawer and the pants drawer and told him to pick out a shirt and a pair of pants, expecting him to pull out all of his clothes leaving me with the time to finish getting ready. Instead, he pulled out 1 pair of pants and 1 shirt. He then shut both drawers and went off to play elsewhere. While I wouldn't normally dress my son up like this for church (or anywhere else for that matter), I thought "What the heck! It's the 1st time he chose an outfit for himself. So he'll wear it!"

We also had the pleasure of watching the kids in nursery this morning where Beniah successfully figured out how to crawl in and out of the toy box. When it was time to put toys away, he wanted to stay in there and have us put the toys in the box with him.

Christmas Past

With the Holiday season and the flu that followed now behind us, I feel that now is a good time to reflect over the events of Christmas 2009. Another contributing factor was that one of my best friends told me to "update your blog already!" Without further ado, here are my musings of this past Christmas.
Last year (2008) was, technically, Beniah's 1st Christmas, but this year actually felt like his 1st Christmas. He was very interested in the Christmas lights and would literally demand that they be turned on the minute he was taken upstairs to eat his breakfast. Beniah would go to every Christmas decoration that lit up and would say, "ight!" and blow on it (yes, we taught him to blow on lights to turn them on) until we turned on the decoration.
Beniah had a ton of fun playing with his cousins during Christmas.


Tim had a ton of fun teaching Beniah and Jeshu to juggle.


I had a ton of fun dressing my son up in his suit. Beniah didn't seem to appreciate it though.


Watching Beniah unwrap presents was another delight of ours. When we celebrated with my family, Beniah was very diligent in unwrapping his gifts, until he got to the large lego set from Grandpa and Grandma, then he wanted nothing else to do with gift opening.

At the Whittaker celebration, he just opened the apple (only part of a gift from Auntie Jo) and wandered around eating the apple for the rest of the gift opening.


Beniah and his Whittaker cousins all received Chinese kung-fu outfits from their Auntie Jo.



Sad, but true gifts that Tim received.


I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and have a happy New Year (it still counts if you say it in January).

A Very Crafty Christmas

For Christmas this year, Tim and I decided to make homemade gifts to help with the cost of giving to 16 people. We had a lot of fun planning and creating our gifts and just might make this a tradition in our gift giving.

Our nephews each received wooden blocks that spelled out their names.

Our nieces each received a pillow with their names on it (I don't have a picture of Katie's pillow though).


My mom received a silhouette paper cut out of her wedding picture.


My mother in law received a candle in a teacup (I made the candle not the cup).


My sister received a wall hanging of India.


Tim's sisters each received a tea light candle holder.


My dad received a garden stepping stone that had leaf imprints on it. I chose the leaves for their pretty color. My dad, the tree lover that he is, started naming off all of the trees that the leaves came from.

Tim is 25 and a College Graduate

December has been an exciting month. Tim finished up and passed the last of his college classes and turned 25! We are now looking forward to Tim finding a job and lower insurance premiums.