First Christmas Concert

Kobe just had his first christmas concert on thursday.  It was so exciting and adorable (yes, mommy's tears of joy were flowing)!  Kobe was a perfect angel, we were expecting him to get up in front of everyone and be shy (like at the pumpkin parade), but he did great, singing, and even doing a lot of the hand movements.  Thanks to Grandma and Grandpa Krass we got front row seats!  Those teachers are amazing to get 18 three/four year olds to sing for even a 7 1/2 minute program.  We are looking forward to next year's 9 1/2 minute program!  :)

Our Sweetest Kobe

Kobe has been such a sweetheart lately, I just had to share a few of his "sayings".  He's been telling me "mommy, thank you for making such a nice supper", or "mommy I really like the christmas decorations, they look really nice", or he'll tell us "you did a great job with that".  While we were hanging the ornaments on the tree, he was into "this one is so sweet" , "Mommy, isn't this one sweet", or "Oh, sweet", over and over, about a million times, no exaggerating, about every ornament, troy and I had to hide our giggles.  He had preschool earlier that day, obviously someone at school says the phrase "sweet" all the time!  

One more to share quickly - mommy started a new tradition, St Nick, for those who don't know, you put your shoes out at night before you go to bed, St Nick comes and fills them (growing up, we always got ornaments, but I'm going to do christmas PJ's).  So we put the shoes out, and the next morning, Troy went to get Kobe out of bed, and he said "daddy, I don't need many presents, I already have a lot of toys, santa should bring you and mommy presents instead".  Isn't he the sweetest?  He will still say these things when he's a teenager, right?

16 ft Christmas tree

Unfortunately this year, for the first time in 10+ years, we didn't get to carry on our tradition of cutting a christmas tree down together as a family.  Since the boys had been sick with flu/colds daddy took on the load all by himself.  Being the daddy he is, he found the biggest tree he could (attendents at the tree farm vouched it was the biggest they'd sold all year), and loaded it all himself.  Yes, it is actually 16 feet, and yes, we really had to use a 2 story ladder to decorate it.  Brennan didn't know what to think when we brought this huge thing into the house, but so far he's just ignored it (he did enjoy walking through the ladder though).  Kobe really got into decorating the tree this year, not only the ones on the bottom, but insisted on climbing the ladder to hang some as well (all 5 on one branch of course)!  There's nothing better to put you into the christmas spirit than the smell of a fresh cut tree!

Brennan's new things

Okay, I promise this is the last one, and I will try to keep updated in the future!

Brennan's latest thing is to climb into something like a basket or in this case a toy container.  He's pretty proud of himself.  For the first year Brennan's tongue was constantly hanging out of his mouth (not sure how it never dried out), but now his new thing, when he thinks he has an audience, is to stick his tongue out and swish it side to side.  It's the cutest, course he's at the stage where he'll do anything you'll laugh at, again, and again, and again - it never get's old to him, so look out!  :)  Seriously, look at the time, I've got to get to bed!

Krass Christmas

Last weekend (yes, after hosting thanksgiving) we traveled out to Green Bay area to celebrate christmas with the Krass's.  Brennan decided to nap only a half hour in that 5 hour car ride.  Nice!  Kobe actually traveled very well.  We traveled to my aunt lynn's house and joined their family in a thanksgiving celebration, and then headed closer to Green Bay to have christmas with my other family (thanksgiving and christmas in the same day, can it get any better?).  Here is a picture of Kobe and Brennan's Great Grandma and Grandpa Krass.  It was nice to finally visit their new home in Wisconsin.  One christmas down, 6 to go (yes, six more, really!).

Thanksgiving 2008

We had a wonderful thanksgiving 2008 - we are all so blessed in our families with many more blessings than we could even list.  We thank our God every day for giving us everything we need and so much more.  The youngs actually hosted thanksgiving this year for Heidi's side.  Daddy Troy cooked up a 22 lb turkey (yes, that's a pound more than brennan's weight!), and mommy made a lot of other food.  Of course we had enough left over we could feed a whole village in Africa.  If only we could overnight some to them.  Please, Lord, give them even just an ounce of our richness.  :)

Winter Swimming

Wow, we've gone swimming 3 times in 2 weeks, that's more than in the summer (unless you count a pool with 4 inches of water).  This pic was taken at auntie Dea's hotel in downtown Mpls when we went to visit her while she was in work training (thanks Wells Fargo).  The following week we stayed with daddy in a hotel in Red Wing, the Best Western Suites - part of their pool was outside, it was really neat, you can swim right out, that's crazy in the winter!  That same week we took a trip to Green Bay for our first christmas, and swam in another pool.  The boys both loved it, although brennan got upset because he couldn't understand why mommy wouldn't let go of him in the water.  Brennan pretends he's swimming now in the bathtub, he lays on his belly and kicks his legs.