December 2015 (Pre-Christmas)

Axel started gymnastics! 3 of his church friends are in class with him. He LOVES it and had no trouble adjusting to having a teacher and not having mom there (although I am watching every move behind the glass, because I'm paranoid like that).

This was his first time on the balance beam. He looks so timid!

Helping Daddy put the star on the tree. We got to decorate the tree all together! Nothing got broken, thank goodness.

I was a little slow getting out of bed one morning, and I came out to him getting his own Cheerios! 

He is getting really good at following Lego instructions. We had done this one several times together, and then he put this mostly together himself!

My new nativity! I bought it in Salzburg, Austria. Jeff and I love the simplicity!

Look at that fantastic "T"!

I made this wreath at a Relief Society Activity. I think it turned out rather well!

He turned a letter A into a monster. Love it!

Doing a pretty awesome wall handstand. 

Jeff left some doodles out overnight, and Axel woke up early and "improved" them. My favorite is the creepy red eyes on all the cows!

Gotta love living in New York sometimes...

Axel can write his own name! Smarty pants.

I tried to get Axel and Tytan to take a nice picture at the Ward Christmas party, but of course that is impossible.

Axel likes to help dry the dishes.

Some fun eye-ball monsters.

Ugh. We had to get new tile due to some water damage... It was no fun and I'm STILL finding little patches that didn't get cleaned up from all the dust.

We had a Wendy's date after gymnastics one day. He was so happy!

We donated some toys at the fire station, and he got a cool hat.

Axel and Tytan after preschool

Sugar cookie fail... They used to be stars, trees, gingerbread men, and mittens...

Still good though!

Elbow licking good!

Our tree, ready to open presents! We did it on the Saturday before Christmas because we didn't want to lug it all to California!

(The screwdrivers were Axel's idea. And he hasn't even seen Dr. Who)

"Oooo Legos!"

Cutest ninja ever!

Then we headed to California to spend Christmas with my family!

Thanksgiving 2015

Thanksgiving was the quietest I have ever experienced. It was just the 3 of us!

For breakfast we had Mickey Mouse pancakes.

It was my first time making a whole holiday dinner, but it turned out really well! The stuffing was TO DIE for.

Jeff with his beloved cranberry salad.

Totally stuffed.

Jeff promptly fell asleep.

The day after, we went to the zoo. It was a gorgeous day! Unseasonably warm.

Tired boy who refused to pee for, like, 6 hours.

Saturday we went to a screening of The Good Dinosaur. Axel liked it, but I thought it was WAY too scary. There was a scary part every 5 minutes, no joke.

We walked from the screening through Central Park (shown below) to Gray's Papaya (a famous hot dog restaurant).

 From there we walked to the Museum of Natural History. Axel was completely out of it, as you can see.

He was so excited to see the dinosaur bones!

 The we went to the 34th street Macy's (you know, THE Macy's) to Santaland.

Axel kept saying that he didn't want to meet Santa, so we were ready to just say hi and run through, but then Axel loved it! The Santa was so nice and friendly, and spent a couple minutes talking to Axel before they even took pictures. They have a really sweet set-up there. You walk through a Winter Wonderland while you wait in line for Santa, and then there are probably 8 partitions each with a different Santa, so that each kid can spend a good chunk of time with Santa. We were very impressed!

It was a long day (11 hours out and about in the city!) so we were tired on the train ride back.

We had such an awesome Thanksgiving weekend and I am so grateful for all the time Jeff was able to spend with us. He has been so busy at work, so it was amazing to have 3 straight days with him (Sunday doesn't count because I was in various meetings all day).