We're trying, people...

 We are trying to get into the Christmas spirit, we really are. The kids come home from school, Sunday school, the gym--always with a new ornament they made (glue and glitter everywhere). We've put up the (super small) tree and i've been doing my (middling) best to decorate the house. I'm trying. I love Christmas; I just prefer someone else decorates. Last weekend, we got together with our city cousins to hit the Walnut Room. THE Walnut Room. Turns out it was a 4-hour wait. Insane. So we decided to meander around Macy's while we waited and go see Santa. Santa was a 2 hour wait. 

 So instead of waiting in a long line in a hot store, surrounded by whiny kids and screaming babies, and expensive toys, we went outside (in the rain) to see the windows. They were whimsical and just the thing to save the boys' moods. 

 Instead of waiting it out for the Walnut Room, we wandered up the street and went to Elephant and Castle. Mmmm, Bass Ale and Yorkshire dinner. Yummy. The kids waited really well, especially given the fact they spent nearly the entire day waiting for one thing or another. 

 Brice and Uncle David. I've said this before, but I inherited a GREAT family when I married Seth. Aunts and uncles and cousins everywhere. Uncle David was the first I met, when Seth and I were dating. He tried to corner me on some theological issue the first time I met him and I loved him right away.

 The next day, both boys came down with the flu. Brice woke up with a raging fever and Harry succumbed later in the day. That evening, we were all cozied into my bed, everyone with their favorite blanket and pillow. Then, Harry threw up and managed to hit everyone's blanket and pillow. Then Brice was overcome with empathetic nausea and threw up all over my carpet. Awesome.

 Yesterday, with both boys still tenaciously holding onto their fevers, we hit the most obvious place to see Santa--Bass Pro Shop. That's right, yo!! We went at 3:15 and were told to come back at 7:30. WTW??? So we went over to IKEA and headed back at the allotted time. Here's Harry sitting in the cart--he refused to have his picture taken. Seth took off with Brice to wander around the store. And of course, just as he left, the line started moving. And by the time we were within spitting distance of Santa himself, still no Seth. The dad behind us had mercy on me and took off to try and find him. And he did. Crazy! Both boys decided they actually did not want to see Santa, so we had to drag them both up to Santa and pose with them. Harry was screaming in the picture. Brice refused to look at the camera and was looking gloomily in the distance. But both managed to spit out what they wanted for Christmas (web shooter and remote control train) when Santa asked. Whew!! 

This is the guy who was working the carousel. Doesn't he look thrilled? 

Raising Boys

Today during lunch, Harry was a having a nervous breakdown because Brice got the last of the sparkling juice with his sandwich. I mean, full-on-four-year-old breakdown. So Brice said, "hey Harry, I know something that will cheer you up!" He then proceeded to stand on his chair, turn around, and shake his backside a few times in Harry's direction. Whereupon, Harry stopped crying, started laughing and said (with utter sincerity), "nanks Brice! Your booty always makes me feel better!!" Brice just smiled.

Then, shortly thereafter, I sent them into the garage to wait for me while I got myself out the door. When I stepped into the garage, Brice looked at me and held out his hand as if to say, "stop! I know what you're going to say! We can explain!!" Brice was pumping furiously on the bike pump and Harry had the air-side-end in his mouth (smiling, of course). "mom, Harry wanted me to pump air into his mouth." Then Harry calmly pulled it out and said, "yeah, I yike it!!"

Boys.

Where we've been

 This is Brice around the first of the school year. He hated this outfit. I loved it. Isn't he cute? I love this age of semi-independence, but their cheeks and bottoms are still chubby enough to grab and squeeze. 

This is Harry posing with his brand-new Spiderman lunch bag. He won't actually be taking a lunch to school for a few years, but he LOVES this bag. If you look at the top of this picture, you can see Brice's head hanging off the balustrades. Boys.

Harry playing at the Children's Museum.

Brice and Harry enjoying some root beer outside our favorite restaurant in Geneva. 

Harry learned to ride his two-wheeler this Fall. His bike is a bit big for him, so he needs someone to actually set him on the bike and push him. Then, when he needs to stop, he pedals toward the grass and throws himself off. Usually someone is around to set him back up on it.

Dinner with friends. Dawnie and Meglie and Stephen Vosloo. Ok, here I am bragging: Stephen is the art director at Tyndale and one of his photos of Lauren Scruggs was in People Magazine. Way to go Stephen!! You rock!!! 

I think a certain Storm Shadow needs a potty break :)  This is major improvement over last year when not only would he not wear his costume, he made one of his teachers carry it for him during the parade. Good job, Harry!! We love you Storm Shadow!!!

I told them to stick out their chests. Brice has a glowing heart and Harry has a very muscular chest. Love this age.

This is Harry posing at the polling place. The last time I voted, I wore Harry in my Baby Bjorn. Sniff...

Nana came to visit and helped Brice with his Turkey Art Project (I am not known for my crafting...).

Train Museum

This past long weekend, Brice went to stay with my parents in Byron Center. We decided to take Harry to the Illinois Train Museum (i'm pretty sure that's not the actual name of the place, but you get the idea). Harry LOVES trains. He dreams about trains. He plays with his trains to the exclusion of everything else. So Sunday after church we packed a picnic and drove to Union IL. This placed is staffed by mostly older, grouchy men who stare at you and begrudingly answer your ridiculous questions, like, "so, when does the next train leave?" We loved it. 

 Now that is a train set!

 Picnic with mom. I don't know why Harry's face looks so large and slanted. Weird.

 old train

Harry's first real train ride. So exciting!!

We let Harry pick out his own ice cream treat--can you tell??

 Borrowing dad's shades

 family portrait

 Harry had his fake ticket stamped. 

 This is why I love the midwest. If I live to be a 100, i'll never tire of scenes like this.

 Sitting on dad's lap. We were there for nearly 3 and half hours. Harry was amazingly patient and well-behaved all day. At the end, he was getting restless and hyper. Seth was trying to contain him. He looks thrilled, doesn't he?

I love this picture. I love this boy.

The end of Epic Roadtrip 2012

For some reason, these photos did not load in the correct order. So, bear with me...

 This is what we returned to. Apparently a huge storm ripped through Wheaton and shredded hundreds of trees. We lost our huge gingko tree in our backyard. It split in two and fell away from our house (whew!), crushing our fence and narrowly missing the playset. Our boys had fun climbing all over the fallen tree. 

 This is the other damage. A silver maple fell onto another part of our fence. And an ash fell as well, landing on another tree right next to our house. We were amazed that no tree actually touched our house. God's protection, without a doubt.

 OK, so Niagra Falls. This is where we went from Northampton. I hear that seeing the Falls from the Canadian side is better (or, so says my parents) but we were in Buffalo and not about to travel 1 mile more in any direction. Look at our kids. I wonder if they will ever actually look up and smile when I yell, "guys! look up and smile!!" I hope we don't go straight from distracted toddler to sullen teenager. Fingers crossed!

I love this shot of Brice. Brice is the most engaged, enthusiastic, persistent child on the planet. And i'm not exaggerating when I say this. Brice throws himself wholeheartedly into every adventure. And I love him for that. 

Here we are waiting to ride the Maid of the Mist. We never have any doubt as to what Brice thinks or feels. But Harry--when Harry is afraid of something, he gets quiet. He doesn't make a fuss or yell or scream, he just goes into himself. Here he is waiting patiently to get onto the boat, even though I know he's terrified. Poor baby.

The end of our road trip was Shipshewana IN. I LOVE this town. This is where Seth's Grandma June lived and now Uncle Joel lives in her old house. The town is heavily Amish. We even took a ride in a buggy with a former-Amish gentleman. Apparently he left before he was baptised, so he wasn't "shunned" and still works with his former church family. So interesting. I am fascinated with the Amish. 

This is Uncle Joel and sweet Ariella. She is Joel's grandaughter by way of his daughter Julie (and her husband Tom). We had a big get together one of the nights we were there. I love having this big family. My family is small, and I have only a smattering of cousins, most of whom are all older than I am and spread out around the country. Seth's family is big and warm and fun. They are somewhat spread out, but everyone keeps in touch and is somewhat close in age. 

This was such a great vacation. Seth got his fill of roadtripping and the kids were fabulous--considering. We got to see the cousins and the aunts and uncles. We saw old friends, new cities, went fishing, milked goats, walked the High Line, saw the Falls, toured Harvard, partied at the wedding, and managed to be away while the temps hit the 100s in Wheaton and our AC went down. 

Boston and Northampton

From NYC, we packed up the family truckster and headed to Boston. Seth went to school in Boston and has wanted to take me there and show me around his old stomping grounds. So, we pinned that city too when we planned the trip. And it was a short and merciful drive from NYC. At this point, the boys were overstimulated, underslept and surly. As was their mother.

All my boys in front of Kirkland House at Harvard. Don't the kids looked thrilled? This is how they looked the entire time we were in Boston. It was only the very public nature of touring that kept me from knocking their heads together and giving them each a "Free to a Good Home" sign. Geez.

In the courtyard of Kirkland House. Seth and I decided this was more of a fact-finding vacation--deciding where to go should we ever get the chance to vacation without small children hanging off our limbs and sucking all the good cheer from our bones.

This is the tower at Lowell House (supposedly). It's also possibly the tower at Quincy House. My husband is unsure now and bristling at me to look it up. I will not. This is some tower in Cambridge. So there.

This is Harry. We are waiting outside J.P. Licks for Brice & Seth to get us ice cream. We broke every parenting rule on this vacation--deny them sleep, let them OD on dvds, and give them sugar at any inappropriate time. Here we are having ice cream before we take them to a small Thai restaurant and feed them food we know they will hate. They will then whine and make a scene and we will sneer at them and start discussing boarding school options (people--we are not bad parents. Not all the time. We love our kids. Really. )

This is Seth, finally having a lobster roll in Quincy Market. The kids are next to him eating bagels. I am taking this picture while holding a glass of white wine (my lunch) in my other hand. Poor Seth loves seafood and I hate it. Really hate it. It drives him crazy. He is very inflexible about flexibility and it kills him that I don't like shrimp or lobster or anything tasting of the sea.

Harry and Brice (but mostly Brice) decorating Harry's cupcakes. Harry turned 4 while we were in Northampton with Uncle Tim, Aunt Debbie and the cousins. 

Harry got a Thomas the Train! He really really loves trains. It's so sweet. Brice doesn't really play with anything unless he's actively learning (seriously, even as a baby, he had no interest in toys and needed constant engagement from me. I'm still tired from those days). I also got Harry the coolest doodling book, hoping to awaken some artistic interest--sadly no.

This is the whole gang after having chinese food in Northampton. The family took us here so they could all hear Seth speak Mandarin. He happily obliged and entertained us all. 

This is Brice posing with a bear in Easthampton. I think it was like the cow thing that Chicago did years ago. Remember? 

Happy Birthday Harry! You're four!! You delight us and astound us and we can't imagine life with you!!

Epic Roadtrip 2012, Part Two

So, stop #2 is NYC. Seth's good friend has a condo in Union Square. We crashed with him for two nights. 

This is the boys on the subway. They LOVED the subway. I always wanted to raise my kids in the city, so they could ride the subway and eat street food and generally be much cooler than suburban kids. But then reality hit and I couldn't deal with all the stresses of raising two little boys in Chicago and  sending them to public schools and never having enough room for guests. Anyway, I digress. My kids loved the subway. They loved trying to stand up and hold the pole and not fall down. Sort of urban surfing, I guess. 

This is us standing in line for the Staten Island Ferry. Did you know it's free? Neither did I. But it is. I love ferries. 

The midgets hugging and spotting the Statue of Liberty.

We had lunch at A Salt & Battery. There are not enough words to express how much I love this place. The fish and chips are outstanding. They sell Shandy. The guys who work here are from working-class England (or at least sound like it; adds to the authenticity, I think). We finished things with a deep-fried Mars bar. Yeah, you heard that right. Deep-fried Mars bar.

This is a view from The High Line. It's an above ground walking park in Manhattan. A park they built on an abandoned elevated train line. It's really cool and lovely. And the views are amazing, as you can imagine. 

They had both had their fill of walking, and we had had our fill of them. So we stuffed them both into our borrowed stroller and went to Dylan's Candy Bar--the biggest candy store in the world (so says Dylan [Ralph Lauren's daughter, fyi]). This could have been a total disaster, but we managed to get in and out with a small bag of candy for each of them. And then they had their meltdown.

That night we got street food and then went out for ice cream. YYY (Seth's friend) is serious about his ice cream, so we headed over to a restaurant in Union Square and had a toasted marshmallow shake. It has, of course, a toasted marshmallow on top, but the whole shake tastes that way. It's amazing. Frankly, I was bitter about sharing it. From there we got herbal shakes from a street vendor.

By this time it was around 9pm and both boys were getting tired and grumpy. So, we went to another place!! Harry was going on and on about how all he wanted in the world was cherry gelato and he could never be truly happy if he didn't get cherry gelato (or something along those lines). So we ordered him a cherry gelato cone. But since it was fancy gelato and not the cheap ice cream we usually buy, it wasn't cherry-colored. It was white. And then Harry proceeded to lose his *%^&a* on the sidewalk in the middle of Manhattan. So while we and a million others were milling about, enjoying our evening and the food, Harry was sitting on a bench crying and yelling, "I don't want cherry ice cream!! I wanna go to bed!!!" And a nice gentleman stopped and looked at him and said, "well, this looks fun." And it was, actually, all tantrums aside.  NYC was so much fun.