Little Monsters!

We so much fun with these little monsters on our Thanksgiving break!!!! Christmas break needs to hurry!!!

ICE

Our friends, Rachel and Joe, told us about the Gaylord's ICE last year. We were super excited when we heard that they would be doing it again this year.
This year the theme was the Grinch. So, Friday night, we had the kiddos watch the original cartoon. They watched it about five times and were super excited to see the ICE show.
We all bundled up GOOD! Thank goodness we did. It was 9 degrees in there. They also gave us coats. Nate ended up carrying Link around because his was so big. He looked like a blue penguin.
The pictures do not do it justice. It was so amazing!
This was my favorite scene. It looked so real.
Ethan got in trouble by the guards here. He was sitting on the Grinch. I guess that is frowned upon here!
In this big room, they had four slides made out of ice. Two were for children under 40 inches and two were for everyone above 40 inches. Link was so offended that he could not ride on the bigger slide. He went down and it was much faster than he thought. It scared him and he wouldn't go down again. E loved it. There is a video at the end of this blog with a snipet of him going down.
The Grinch's heart grew!!!
At the very end, they had a room with the nativity! They had speakers that explained that this is what Christmas is really about. It was so much fun!

Thanksgiving 2010

The day did not start off as well as we expected. I burnt the garlic for the garlic mashed potatoes. Nate thought we had a roasting pan, when in fact it was a lasagna pan. We had to scramble to get to the grocery store to get the turkey in the oven on time.Lincoln must have been worried that we were going to make another mistake, so he came to help Nate out.....with his knife!
Here he is saying....Just give it here and I'll do it!
Notice Mr. Independent's smile when he gets to do it by himself.
Ethan helped out by making Thanksgiving cards for our guests.
Ethan and Link BOTH had to sit by Aja!!!
Jenn and Justin brought a green bean casserole that was amazing! We learned that three of our dishes had heavy whipping cream in them. We decided that butter AND heavy whipping cream make everything better! Justin made his awesome chocolate pecan pie. Aaron loved the Reddi whip!!
Andrea, Aja's mom, was happy because the boys had football on! The little boys couldn't wait for Aja to sit and play with them!!! What started off a little rough, ended perfectly!! Happy Thanksgiving!!

Big Church

Lincoln sat through "big church" for the first time last night! We ran a few errands yesterday, so we decided to head to church while we were out. I printed out some coloring pages to occupy them. When the preaching started, I asked Link if he wanted to color and he said, "Nah, I'll just wait til I get to my classroom." So, I had to explain he wasn't going to his classroom. About five minutes later he asked me, "When am I going to see my children?" It took a few minutes, but he finally got it!! He was great!
In case you are wondering.....he didn't wear his boots like this!!!

Privacy

Setting: Me in the bathroom with the door LOCKED.
Lincoln screaming at the door: MOMMY, are you in there??????
Ethan: Yes, she needs some privacy. Right Mommy....you need privacy?
Me: Silent
Ethan: MOMMMYYYY, are you in there?????
Followed by banging on the door!!!

Hidin'

"Hey Mommy, I am gonna go hide behind that tree. Come find me!"

National Arboretum

We are marking off one by one DC attractions. Today, the Hills and Leaps made it to the National Arboretum.
We basically made it to the Bonsai exhibit and then had a picnic lunch on a grassy area.
The boys scarfed their lunch down and ran to play some ball.There was much debate from Ethan as to who was on each team. He really wanted to stack his team to win!
Lincoln was really confused about "tackling!" He thought "tackling" was really "tickling!"
Daddy decided to show them some fun tackling.
I think this kind of tackling is much more fun! We ran out of time after lots of playing! We will definitely have to come back!

Sharp Dresser

Yesterday, Ethan picked out a shirt that was a church shirt. I was a little surprised he picked it out, but I didn't ask why. I just told him how nice he looked. Today, he asked for church pants and a church shirt. Then, he chose boots! I broke down and asked why. He told me that a boy at schools got lots of compliments the other day because he was dressed so nice. When we picked E up from school today, I asked if anyone commented on his clothes. He said that they liked his boots, but he needed a nicer shirt next time! :)

Solution.....so far

This show....which is on streaming Netflix seems to be a good solution, so far. Link and E seem to be happy with this show for the time being.

Little boy

Nate and I are really having a hard time remembering that this little guy is only three. He wants to be big so bad. He wants to do everything his big brother does. He wants to watch big boys shows and play big boy games. These past two weeks, he has been having nightmares and waking up two to three times a night. I think we are all going to have to work hard on doing three year old things instead of six year old things!

Luray Caverns

The HIGHLIGHT of our trip was to Luray Caverns.
The caverns were seriously breathtaking!!!!! These are stalactites on top and a pool of water underneath making a mirror image on bottom. It was the best optical illusion I have ever seen. The picture does not do it justice.
This place was so kid friendly. We were able to take the stroller everywhere. They also provided headphones with codes for each stop. They had a code for adults and a code for kids. The boys LOVED listening for the clues to find different things.
This was the Christmas tree!
I don't know what was more fun....looking at the cavern or the boy's faces!!
Ethan took a photo of us! Nice!!!
I took this one! ha!
Nate and I had to share a headphone b/c Lincoln was admitted for free and so he didn't get a headphone. Nate was just as cute! This place was truly awesome!
Ethan walked around pretty much independently. I only had to tell him a few times to slow down and look at everything.
The four of us were so bummed when the hour tour was over!

Appalachian Trail

Once it warmed up a bit on our drive, we stopped to take a little hike on the Appalachian Trail.
These guys were not excited to stop their movie on the DVD player at first.
BUT, almost immediately as we got onto the trail, Daddy found this tree and decided to climb it. The little guys were right behind him.
Of course, one climb was not good enough. They had to keep climbing, and climbing, and climbing!They had so much fun.
We started back up the trail, but every tree we saw on the ground Lincoln wanted to climb it.
Luckily, Nate had another great idea. He told the boys to look for really good walking sticks.

We ended up walking about an hour. It was gorgeous!!! It was also all up hill, so we warmed up quickly and really enjoyed the walk.
You've gotta love the self-timer on the camera!!!